Grant Writing

Perhaps the greatest challenge facing the nonprofit organization today is how to maintain its financial viability. No matter how important the organization's function, staff cannot carry out its objectives without adequate operating income.

Your first priority will be to weed through thousands of foundations to discover which ones might be interested in funding your program. Your research will uncover many differences ranging from the size of the assets, the number of grants disbursed, geographical preferences, the average grant, and the focus of the foundation.

To locate the appropriate foundation, one has to do research. A prime source of foundations is the Foundation Center, which is a national organization established and funded by foundations across the country. The Center maintains libraries and cooperating library collections throughout the country. Reference collections include:

Other sources of information are the books "Environmental Grant-Making Foundations" published by Resources for Global Sustainability, Inc. and "Grassroots Grants: An Activist's Guide to Proposal Writing" published by Chardon Press.

Now that you have identified foundations to approach, you must determine what kind of information a foundation wants from you as a grant-maker. Your research comes in handy here. The surest approach is to ask the foundation directly. Call them or write them to request a copy of an annual report, a list of funding policies, or guidelines for submitting a request for funding.

If you are approaching national foundations or large state foundations, you may find they will publish information to help you outline your request. Whatever the foundation tells you to do, follow their guidelines explicitly. Faced with a little or no staff and a deluge of grant proposals, foundation decision-makers want to see proposals in a standardized format.

There are two schools of thought in fundraising about when to call a foundation to discuss your project. The first suggests a phone call before a proposal is submitted to determine if there is interest. While the second thought is that foundations prefer to receive a full proposal before the phone call.

Many of the publications on foundations will tell the potential grant-maker if a call is necessary or a formal proposal is needed or if a letter of inquiry is the first step. It is possible that all three or combinations of them are necessary. Research on grant-making policies by each foundation is a must.

Before you begin writing the request, put yourself in the proper frame of mind. Perhaps it might be useful to get away from the office to avoid phone calls or distractions. Develop a positive attitude about what you are doing.

Make an outline, based upon the guidelines of the foundation and of what you intend to ask for. Organize your thoughts. Spend time focusing on the goals and objectives of your project.

Do not make the initial approach too long. Three to five pages are ideal. Foundation officers want a concise explanation of the problem and how your organization intends to deal with it.

Your proposal should be neat and easy to read. It should be typed with reasonable margins. Proofread the request carefully so there are no typos or glaring errors.

Many foundations will give you deadlines for submission of requests. If at all possible, try to get your request in ahead of time. Attempt to have the grant proposal completed and to the foundation office at least one week prior to the deadline.

Write in readable English. Avoid technical complicated jargon. Remember that the foundation officer may not be familiar with your type of organization so avoid abbreviations or acronyms. Do not make assumptions about what a foundation officer knows.

If the funding source suggests an outline, follow their suggestions as closely as possible. If the foundation does not tell you specifically what they want, the following outline is a good standard to follow.

A. The Cover Letter

The purpose of the cover letter is to briefly describe your request, the amount money you are seeking, and possibly request a meeting with a foundation official to discuss the request in greater detail once they have an opportunity to review the request. It should be signed by the Chairman of the Board or the Executive Director and should be no longer than one page. If the foundation requests a letter proposal, it is not necessary to include the cover letter.

B. The Introduction

The introduction is a concise explanation of the project describing the sponsoring organization, the goals and objectives of that organization, a plan to achieve these goals, how much money is being requested from the foundation and how the money will be spent. It is sometimes good to give a title to the project.

This paragraph should so completely summarize the entire proposal that ideally it could stand on its own. Many foundation officers may only read this first paragraph, so make it good. There are a number of reasons why this section is important. This is your first, and sometimes only, opportunity to catch the interest of the person reviewing your request. If you do not excite them in the beginning, you may lose them for the remainder of the proposal.

This is also your opportunity to establish your organization's credibility. What qualifies the organization to carry out this program? Explain previous accomplishments, which might serve as an example of what you can do in the future.

C. Defining the Need

In order to convince a foundation to give you money, you must first convince them that there is a genuine need. Explain the problem the organization plans to address. If you can, include brief case studies, verifiable statistics, feasibility studies, or statewide or national findings in defining the need. You must be able to document all of your claims. Make sure the foundation appreciates your expertise and assessment of the problem.

Furthermore, make sure your goals are realistic in addressing the problem. Don't make broad claims or promises that cannot be kept. The foundation will be able to recognize whether or not the need can be met. If they do not believe you can accomplish such grandiose objectives, they may reject your request.

D. Program Objectives

Once the problem or need has been identified, you now want to explain how your proposal will address the problem and what can be accomplished as a result of the program. Again, make sure your objectives are realistic and obtainable. Don't make broad statements about what you hope to achieve unless you believe that they can be accomplished given available staff and resources.

Well-defined objectives show the foundation what impact their grant money can have on a particular problem or need. They need to be convinced that their money can actually address and change a particular situation.

E. Methodology and Staff Qualifications

The funding source must understand how you intend to carry out your project. Define your strategy to achieve the stated objective. Present a timetable to be followed and a step-by-step explanation of how you intend to proceed.

F. Funding

Foundations pay particular attention to the financial viability of an organization. How does the organization intend to raise the annual budget? In requesting funding, you must be able to justify what other resources are currently committed or what other sources of potential funding have been approached. This section of the proposal reflects how this proposal fits into the organization's overall operations. Not only do you need to explain how you intend to raise the money for this year, but also for future years.

If you have approached a number of other foundations, disclose those contacts. Often foundations will contact one another to discuss a particular project.

G. Evaluation of the Project

Perhaps the most neglected element of grant writing is the evaluation element. How are you going to know whether the project worked? What is measurable about the success or failure of the project? Explain exactly how you intend to measure the effectiveness of the program to determine the impact the project has on the stated problem.

Once the grant has been expended, the grantee must report to the foundation how the money was actually spent. The Internal Revenue Service requires that foundations receive these reports from all grantees.

H. Budget

Every proposal should include a detailed budget of planned expenses for the year. This probably should be a line item budget identifying personnel costs such as staff salaries, fringe benefits, and consultants. If possible the actual salary expense of each position is preferable. The budget also needs to identify non-personnel costs such as office space, supplies equipment, telephone, travel, printing costs, etc. If you are asking for money for a specific project, include a project budget along with the overall organization's budget.

In addition submit an itemized list of expected income sources. List specific grants, which may have already been approved, and also list requests, which are pending. Describe any and all income you expect to receive during the coming year.

Your budget projection is only an estimate. However, there are items over which you have little control-i.e. salaries, and rent. Be as exact as possible. Don't underestimate your expenses or you may end up with a grant that does not pay for itself. The reverse is true. Don't try to pad the budget so that the organization's expenditures appear extravagant.

I. Other Attachments

Be sure to also enclose:

• A complete list of your Board of Directors and their occupations or affiliations.
• Certificate of tax-exempt status, your 501 (c) (3) tax letter from the IRS.

If you have additional information, which might help the foundation in consideration of your request, attach those as well. This may include newspaper clippings, letters of recommendation for funding, a brochure, or sample publications by the organization.

When the proposal has been mailed (use registered mailed), the major portion of your task has been complete. However, within the next few weeks make a phone call to follow up on the request, determine the status of the proposal, and check to see if the foundation has any questions. Foundations follow different procedures in their methods of reviewing proposals. Some review them as they arrive, while others have a set time of year.

As in any area of human dealings, whom you know is very important. Often people may know the director of the foundation or have strong contacts with the members on the Board of Directors. If your request does fall within the foundation's guidelines there is a good chance your request will receive more serious consideration if a member of the Foundation Board will speak on your behalf. Foundations fund people as well as projects, and if your name or a member of your Board lends credibility to the success of the project, use that contact.

You may receive a letter stating that your proposal has been received and assigned to a program officer. The program officer may have questions about the program, the budget, or require further background information. Many times the foundations are interested in a request but cannot act upon that request until they have additional information. Due to the tremendous workload of most foundation staff, it is often difficult to get back to these requests. If the time lapse is long, the foundation may just reject the request. A follow-up call from you might bring the proposal to the top of the pile, answer those questions the staff had, and release your proposal for serious consideration.

While your proposal is being considered, your program may receive another grant, get some good press coverage, or experience a significant accomplishment; call or write the foundation to bring them up-to-date with the organization's activities. Letters of support may also prove helpful at this stage.

Writing grant proposals is like hitting a baseball in that you will fail more often than you will succeed. If you are approaching several foundations, you are bound to receive letters of rejection. Even if you have done your homework and identified foundations that seem to have an interest in funding programs like yours, you must remember that about one in ten proposals get funded. If you receive a rejection don't get discouraged. Call them to determine why they turned you down. There is always the possibility that they might give you suggestions for your project and encourage you to resubmit your proposal. Go back, do more homework, identify other possible funding sources, revise your proposal to strengthen it, and continue to apply to other foundations.

Proposal writing is not an exact science. Continue to seek support from a variety of funding sources. You may be turned down by a foundation that seemed perfectly suited to funding your project and then turn around and receive a grant from a foundation that was a long shot. Eventually hard work will pay off.