In the competitive world of nonprofit funding, the journey from a vision to impactful
community programs is filled with financial challenges. Securing grants can provide
essential resources to sustain and expand your mission. However, a crucial yet often
overlooked step is the preparatory work required before applying for grants. This is
known as grant readiness.
Why Focus on Grant Readiness Instead of Jumping Right into Grant Writing?
Let’s be honest, the primary reason you’re seeking grants is because you need funding
for your programs and services. Most nonprofits urgently need financial resources.
However, without being prepared in advance, you’re wasting precious time and money.
An internal study of our firm’s service requests from U.S. nonprofits found that 95%
sought to hire a grant writer prematurely, thinking it was the solution to their financial
distress. To secure grant money, you must be a qualified applicant. With over 1.5
million nonprofits in the U.S. according to the National Center for Charitable Statistics
(NCCS) and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) – having your 501(c)(3) status isn’t
enough. This preparation is vital, much like being pre-approved for a mortgage before
buying a house. Just as a homebuyer must demonstrate financial stability to qualify for
a mortgage, nonprofits must prove their organizational preparedness to secure grant
funding. Yet, many nonprofits seek a grant writer’s help before they are ready to apply,
leading to unrealistic expectations and often unsuccessful efforts.
A Tale of The Frustrated Nonprofit and Overwhelmed Grant Writer
Here’s a common scenario in the nonprofits journey towards acquiring grant funding:
The nonprofit hires a grant writer with high hopes that their new team member’s efforts
will lead to quick funding. Once the writer begins, they discover the nonprofit lacks the
necessary documentation to apply the organization for funding. The grant writer then
spends countless hours preparing the organization to become a qualified grant
candidate, and months pass by with no new funding in sight. Honest and experienced
grant writers inform nonprofits about this process upfront, while dishonest or
inexperienced ones may drag out the grant readiness process for months, costing the
nonprofit significant funds that could have been used for their cause.
This situation often leaves nonprofits feeling frustrated and disheartened. They hired a
grant writer expecting a swift resolution, only to find themselves mired in preparatory
work for six months to a year or more with no promise of new funding on the horizon.
The scenario also leads the grant writer to feel frustrated and unsuccessful in their
efforts, leading towards high levels of turnover and dissatisfaction with their work.
The resolution? It starts with the nonprofit. A smart nonprofit completes the preparatory
work in advance, providing their grant writer with 80% of what they need. This
efficiency translates to substantial cost savings, ensuring funds are spent on actual
grant writing rather than preparatory work that the nonprofit can handle better
internally.
Grant Readiness Review (GRR)
After a decade of working with nonprofits through their ups and downs, we’ve used
their insights to create services that directly address their funding needs. From these
experiences, we developed the Grant Readiness Review (GRR). It’s aimed at
streamlining the grant application process by ensuring organizations have all
preparations in place before diving into applications, saving both time and money.
The GRR is a structured process guided by funder-level grading criteria, helping
nonprofits organize and prepare their essential documents and information to meet the
key requirements of grant applications. The GRR is composed of two main parts:
1. Digital Document Repository
This includes a comprehensive collection of
audio and video guides, PDF manuals, and downloadable templates that detail
the documentation required for grant applications. This repository serves as a
one-stop resource of guided and instructional materials to help nonprofits
understand what is required of them to be grant ready.
2. Document Review and Feedback
Organizations can upload their documents
into a secure portal, where funding experts review each document and provide
detailed feedback on their readiness for grant applications. This feedback is not
just a general “ready” or “not ready” assessment but includes tangible guidance
on how to improve documentation and correct errors that nonprofits might not be
aware of. The review process is guided by funder grading criteria, ensuring that
the feedback aligns with the exact standards used by grant funders.
Tangible Benefits for Nonprofits
Here are the top five tangible benefits nonprofits who have gone through the GRR find
the most valuable.
1. Cost Savings and Increased ROI
Providing hired grant writers with 80% of the
documentation they need to do the job will save them time and you money – since their
time will only be spent on drafting applications rather than completing back and forth
busy work that you can do in advance. This leads to more completed applications and
more funding coming in within shorter time frames. Talk about more bang for your
buck!
2. Streamlined Grant Writing Process
One of the primary benefits of the GRR is that
it significantly reduces the time and effort required to write grant applications. By
having all necessary documents and information organized and readily available,
nonprofits can focus on tailoring their proposals to specific funders instead of
scrambling to gather basic requirements.
3. Improved Organizational Cohesion
The GRR process encourages collaboration
within the nonprofit. By involving various team members and board members in
gathering and organizing documents, the process fosters a sense of shared
responsibility and collective effort towards achieving the organization’s mission.
4. Better Reporting and Accountability
A key component of the GRR is ensuring
that all documents are in order and easily accessible. This not only facilitates grant
applications but also improves the nonprofit’s ability to report on its activities and
outcomes to stakeholders, including funders, beneficiaries, and regulatory bodies.
5. Responsibility and Expertise
It’s essential to recognize that the grant writer
doesn’t know the intricate details of your organization—only you do. Therefore, it’s the
nonprofit’s responsibility to compile and provide all relevant information to the writer in
advance (aka GRR elements). This ensures that the grant writer can focus on crafting
a compelling proposal rather than piecing together basic organizational details,
ultimately leading to better, more persuasive grant applications.
With proper support, teamwork, and an optimistic attitude, nonprofit organizations have
become grant-ready in just a few weeks using the GRR process, a significantly faster (
and cheaper) timeline compared to completing the process independently!
Cheers to getting grant ready!