There is so much to winning grants than just writing and submitting proposals. You already know the race to grant funding is fiercely competitive. But do you know how to be fiercely competitive in a way that will land you the big jackpot?
Grant readiness is the measurement of your organization’s capacity to research, apply, win, and manage grant applications successfully. It includes the overall structure of your organization; the strength, mode of operations, sustainability, finances, and impact.
Although grants offer significant funding for your organization, they shouldn't be mistaken for huge stacks of free money. Asides making an attempt, winning a grant is nothing like winning the lottery. Unlike the lottery, blind luck won’t take you far in grant writing. You must be strategic when applying for grants.
To ensure that you are not wasting your resources and time when applying for grants, here are 5 signs you are grant ready:
Ensuring that your organization is registered is the first step in getting your organization ready for grants. It proves to the funder that you are not only operational but legally recognized in the country you operate. Funders rarely give grants to individuals.
All funders will be interested in where their money will be spent and how it will be handled. As such, most grant applications will require proof of your organization's fiscal capacity to handle new funds. Your organization must show a history of responsibly managing money and a transparent accounting system that tracks expenses. If you are still recording your income and expenses using paper and pencil, stop right now and sign up on cloud-based accounting software. Your bank account should be in the name of the organization. Transactions should have appropriate descriptions. Some funders may ask for an audited financial statement. You can get an accountant to help you prepare it. If you haven’t successfully managed $10,000 no funder will trust you with $100,000.
Traction is the progress of your organization and the speed of its growth. Clear indicators of the startup's growth tendencies and the speed and acceleration of this growth help indicate business traction. Traction is essentially your scorecard. It show’s where you are and points to how far you could go. Continuously capture information about how your product or service is already showing its value. This can include current sales, growth, valuable partnerships, endorsements, pre-orders, or data from a pilot study outlining current consumer interest.
The more traction you have, the more funders are attracted to the organization and the more funds are available to help your organization/project succeed.
Most times when organizations find a grant opportunity, they rush to design a project that meets the specific requirements and scope of the funder’s focus areas. This does not only lead to a stressful and chaotic scramble to prepare a proposal but also rejection from funders. To be fully ready to submit a winning grant proposal, ensure your projects are not alien to you. If you are looking for funds to develop new ideas, you should have concrete plans in place for the implementation and delivery. New projects/ideas should be made in compliance with your organization’s mission and values, not just to meet funding requirements. Compelling projects usually have a powerful theory of change. This means the input, activities, output, outcome, and impact are clearly spelt out. Speaking of impact….
The impact of your project is twice as important as your actual project. What triggers the funding of your project is the usefulness (or projected usefulness) of the project in making the lives of others better. A project aimed at providing hygienic/sanitary products for young women in local communities would most likely get faster attention than an application seeking business expansion (for the sake of business expansion).
Are you grant ready?
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