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It has come to my attention that the organization has decided to move forward with its plan to solicit funds from foundations and corporations as well as state and government agencies. Although I understand what it takes to develop a successful grant proposal, our grant development team is fairly new and the proposed project has not received funding in the form of a grant yet, so it is my responsibility to highlight some important aspects of the grant research and proposal writing processes. This will ensure that our entire team, including the board of directors, employees, and volunteers understand the relationship between our organization’s project, the prospective Grantmakers’ missions, and the successful components of a grant funded program as included herein.
In order to ensure that the grant writing team is striving toward the same mission, it is important to start by developing a set of working papers for interagency communication. These papers will highlight all of the key information that will be needed to apply for any type of funding, essentially a simplified list of facts without the fat. After the proposed program budget, organizational budget, and goals/objectives are defined, it is time to start delegating work to different writers in the grant development office, but not before cautioning our team on these most common and costly mistakes that will ensure the failure of the proposals and the subsequent denial of funding.
Sloppy Research. Before the writing process begins, thorough research must be conducted to compile a list of funders that best suit the needs of the program and to establish the amount of funding that those funders typically provide. First and foremost, this can be established by reading each Request for Proposal in its entirety, and analyzing the funder’s criteria to ensure that their mission is in line with the proposed program. One of the most common mistakes that novice grant writers make is to not research their prospective funders in depth.
Over-asking. The second most common mistake that proposal writers make is asking for too much money. This goes back to research and if the prospective funder is investigated thoroughly, and the grant writer makes sure to “read the Request for Proposals carefully” , then the development team can establish the correct application guidelines prior to submitting the application.
Lack of Clarity. Another mistake that proposal writers make is to draft an application as if it were a work of fiction. Sure, substance is important because you want to make sure that you clearly state the need and how the support of the funder will address that need, but according to reviewed commentary on research grants, reviewers aren’t looking for lyrical prose. Instead they are looking for clear and concise language, free of grammatical errors.
Avoiding Guidelines. There are differing review processes amongst Grantmakers, but they all have basic components in common. One of those components is incorporated into every Grantmakers scoring rubric and it is the simple task of following instructions. The funder specifies the specific font type and size, maximum number of pages, and even the margin size. Any one of these slightly technical errors can be the reason our proposal is tossed to the side.
If the grant development team, in conjunction with the rest of the organization’s staff, can keep in mind these commonly forgotten pitfalls, the proposed project has a chance at being funded. As long as we match the needs of our program with the mission of the funder, and show an effective and sustainable program with measurable outcomes, we should be able to get a few funders on board with this new project.
References
Abdoul, H., Perrey, C., Amiel, P., Tubach, F., Gottot, S., Durand.-Zaleski, I., . . . Gagnier, J. J. (2012). Peer Review of Grant Applications: Criteria Used and Qualitative Study of Reviewer Practices. PLoS ONE, 7(9), 1-15.
Cambronero, J., Allen, L.-A. H., Cathcart, M. K., Justement, L. B., Kovacs, E. J., McLeish, K. R., & Nauseef, W. M. (2012). Writing a first grant proposal. Nature Immunology, 13(2), 105-108.
Ludlow, B. L. (2014). Secrets of Successful Grant Writing to Support Rural Special Education Programs. Rural Special Education Quarterly, 33(2), 29-37.
