Most literature on grant seeking starts smack in the middle of the
ABCs of Grant Development – at the point where you’re hunting down those generous foundations and are about to assemble a brilliant proposal.
Be careful: A lot of nonprofits, even the big sophisticated ones, have suffered the curse of getting what they ask for – a big juicy grant that, because of a few extra promises in the proposal, has now whipped the nonprofit into new and unexpected directions.
The tail has wagged the dog. This dilemma can disrupt the whole organization and drain resources in an attempt to meet unrealistic objectives.
Imagine, in the business world, Ford Motor Company re-dedicating a whole factory to film-making.
It doesn’t matter that the film will be on car assembly; the crew simply doesn’t have the proper skills (even if they have the proper knowledge), and actual manufacturing comes to a devastating halt.
Once the project is over, the factory will probably close. So…
Affirm your organizational objectives, capabilities, and relevance
If you have to, re-visit your mission and review your objectives.
Make sure that you have a clear understanding of what you need resources for and what your opportunities and threats are.
Do a SWOT analysis of your organization.
Make a three-year plan. (Some foundations actually give grants to help with strategic planning.
The Chicago Community Trust, for instance, has MOD grants for such purposes.)
When you are solid on who you are as an organization and where you’d like to be in the future, you should start to:
Build proposal boilerplates
It’s not enough
only to have a clear idea of what you do. You have to be able to articulate it.
You have to make sure that you can compel your potential funders with a good, strong story about your work.
Because grants are not a sure thing, you should become adept at pulling together proposal pieces for several foundations at a time.
Making boilerplates, or a library, of the basic components of proposals that can be tweaked is a good way to save time and be prepared for deadlines that sneak up on you.
Make sure you can show that:
| | » | Your mission is indispensable – without your organization or project the world would be a poorer planet.
In order to back this assertion you will need to connect it to the real world: your community or
"audience."
Therefore, you excel at describing: | -- | Why your audience needs you | | -- | How many there are, actually and potentially, and where they come from | | -- | How you reach them (many funders will ask about your
outreach activities) | | -- | How you are going to learn from them so your mission stays relevant (many funders will ask that you have an evaluation section in your proposal) |
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| » | Your objectives are: | -- | clearly defined – on paper! | | -- | realistic for your organization’s or project’s capacity | | -- | relevant to enough people to make a significant positive impact |
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| » | Your project plan is: | -- | well thought out | | -- | realistic for your organization’s or project’s capacity | | -- | going to have a significant impact (yes, impact again) | | -- | clearly defined in time, space, and energy |
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| » | You have a development strategy (revenue generating strategy) that is realistic for supporting your organization or project, which means you have thought out: | -- | how and when resources will be spent (resources can be money as well as labor, equipment, or anything else that’s not free) | | -- | who will have the time to raise those resources | | -- | what strategy will be used to raise those resources | | -- | who is likely to give you the resources | | -- | who else is likely to give you the resources |
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Almost all funders worth their salt will ask you to touch on most or all of these aspects of your organization.
And remember: If you start fudging this information on proposals to fit grant guidelines, it is likely to come back to haunt you.
You will either be rejected or, worse, accepted and fail miserably to meet your proposed milestones.
Make supporting materials accessible
There are a number of written documents that many funders require beyond the proposal itself.
These include financial and non-financial documents. It is helpful to establish a file with duplicate copies of each of these so that they can be easily accessed during the preparation process.
Non-Financial Documents
| | » | IRS 501(c)(3) status |
| » | Mission/Values/Vision Statement and overall goals |
| » | Names, titles and affiliations of Board members |
| » | List of key staff members with short biography (one paragraph) |
| » |
Representative printed material, such as recent newsletters, programs, organizational brochures, etc.)Press coverage, such as reviews, feature articles, etc. |
Financial Documents
| | » | Organization Budget for current fiscal year |
| » | Project Budget (if applicable) |
| » | Most recent audit or IRS 990 (if audit is unavailable) |
| » | Statement of Revenue/Expenses from most recent completed fiscal year |
| » |
Balance Sheet from most recent completed fiscal year. List of confirmed support from government, foundations, corporations for previous fiscal year and current fiscal year with amounts and purpose |
Check the
"competition"
Just from experience, you probably already know who else is doing what you want to do.
These organizations may not really be competitors – in the nonprofit world everyone is supposed to play nice.
Many foundations will ask you how you differentiate yourself from your peers and also how you collaborate with them.
Try to articulate why they can’t do what you can and how you all get along.
For instance, are you unique because:
| | » | you have better or different or broader skills or resources |
| » | you are in the right place at the right time – a different city, a different neighborhood, a different building… |
| » |
you are more appealing to the people you want to serve (maybe you have a
"cultural competency" – you perform in Spanish, for example) |
On the other hand, you are grateful for your “coopetition” because they are:
| | » | great partners –funders love to hear about partnerships |
| » | great resources for learning how to do your project better – learn from their mistakes and successes |
| » |
see who is funding them |
After hammering out these broadly requested descriptions, you will be ready to be a master rainmaker!
Now it’s time to find the funder!