Tips for Successful Grant Writing

What, you might ask is a “big sore thumb” in a grant budget? If there is a line item in your budget that is substantially larger than all the other expense items, it probably will stick out like a sore thumb to someone reviewing your proposal. See the big number I outlined in red in this example.

Big numbers can provoke questions, and you want your budget to answer questions, not create them.

So what should you do?
(1) Add a footnote to the budget explaining what went into determining the number, or
(2) Break it down into smaller numbers, but in doing this you might create additional questions (why is there a line item for sheetrock in an art budget?), so you might instead
(3) Create a subschedule, that is, a separate mini-budget that breaks down and explains the big number.

In this example, the exhibition costs are by far the largest single expense. By breaking it down into several lines in a subschedule, you’ll show the reviewer how much you have allowed for shipping, building out the exhibition space, fees to lenders, and marketing specifically for the exhibition.

In December I’ll be giving two grant writing seminars.

December 7, Arts Council of Rockland, Garnerville, NY. Grant Writing: Beyond the Basics, will explore specific ways to create strong proposals that are competitive in today’s economic climate.

December 14, New York Foundation for the Arts, Brooklyn, NY. Introduction to Grant Writing, includes all the aspects of the process of creating a grant proposal from initial research to follow up after submission.

Both seminars are open to individual artists and arts organizations. Contact the specific organizations about registration.

Reporting to a funder on a successful project is the first and most important step in receiving a second grant. When a foundation or other funder makes a grant, they want it to make a difference and for you (!) to make a difference. A job well done is a stronger endorsement of your nonprofit than any letter for reference or brilliantly constructed rationale for funding. So, what makes a good grant report?

Your grant report will have all the elements of good writing that you use in a proposal: clear, jargon-free language, positive language, and a well ordered narrative. Heading and sub-headings will make your report more readable. It may be helpful to the funder if the topics in your report follow those in your original proposal. So if you wrote about method first and then execution of the service you offer in the proposal, proceed in the report in the same format. And if you promised any specific measurements of success in your proposal, be sure you include them in the report.

Many funders require, and it’s always a good idea, to create a table showing your proposal budget and your actual income and expenses side by side. Any discrepancies of more than 10% should be explained in note to the budget. It’s inevitable that there will be differences, but there should be a concrete reason for them.

“What,” you might ask, “if the project did not turn out as planned? If the number of people served was greatly different than expected or the project wasn’t completed on time?”

Well – first of all, don’t let yourself get to the point of writing the report and to discover this. It is your job as a grant writer* to keep in touch with the people running programs so that you will know well before the grant period ends if it has progressed as planned.

If you find out that problems have arisen that will prevent the project from ending as expected and/or on time, you must first work out with the program people how you can make a success of this (for example, by working on the project longer) or how you can explain to the funders why the project ended differently and what you learned from that experience.

Secondly, you need to contact the funder to let them know what has happened. This is best done with a phone call rather than in writing. You want to be able to judge the funder’s reaction to the problem before going into unnecessary details.

Remember that funders want you to succeed, so if you need more time, ask for it, but do so before the end of the grant period. Also, when asking for an extension, ask for the maximum you think is needed. You don’t want to have to ask for a second extension, which may not be granted.

Sometime, projects just don’t work out. If you can explain clearly what went wrong (or just differently) and demonstrate that you learned lessons from that experience that will make your future programs stronger, you can still use the report to pave the way for another grant.

For more on grant reports, get my book, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Grant Writing.

—————–
*I refer here to grant writers who are employees of a nonprofit or work on an ongoing basis as a consultant. If your relationship ended with completing the proposal, you’re off the hook for the report.

With everyone pinching every penny at least twice these days, many nonprofits are relying more and more on volunteers and unpaid interns. When you are using a substantial amount of unpaid labor, your program budget will not reflect the true cost of operating your nonprofit. You can and should include an amount for volunteer time in your grant budget. The same amount will appear in your income section showing the donation for time as what you put in the expense line. (You can see an example in my article on grant budgets.)

Finding the right dollar amount is important – you don’t want to over- or undervalue the volunteer and intern time. Ruth Wahtera has written a lot on this topic in her grant writing blog. Rest assured that including volunteer time is standard practice. For example, the Federal EPA includes instructions for this in its tips on grant budgets (mid-way down the long page).

Many grant writers find creating a budget the most difficult part of the grant proposal process. It doesn’t have to be. I find that the old memory aid “who-what-when-where-how-why” for writing a newspaper article serves just as well when creating a budget (just leave off the “why”). I’ve explained how this works in an article on my web site.

It’s critical that you get the budget right. The program officer who reviews your proposal will have seen hundreds of budgets for similar projects, and she will know quickly if you have included everything that needs to be there to be successful.

For even more information on budgets, see the chapter in my book, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Grant Writing.