Panel Questions Continued #5 – 8 from the Meet the Grantmakers event hosted by The Support Center for Non Profit Management. I also I mentioned to several people a group called Games for Change – you can find them here: http://www.gamesforchange.org/f-program-2010. They holding a conference here in NYC at the end of May. For those who are interested and want to save a little money they are seeking volunteers for 2010 Festival – work one day, get in free the next! Email for more info: mark@gamesforchange.org
Panel Questions:
5. What are the key aspects of the relationship that you expect to have with organizations before and after the grant period?
If I’m interested in your project I will work very hard to be your advocate to my board and my constituency. I expect the same from you! The process begins as soon as you submit that proposal. I will help you shape and present it and work with you through out the year to make sure you are on the right track. I generally meet with funders at least 2x a year and do a program visit at least once. We only require two formal reports – an interim and a final report. Please give these some thought and at least answer the five questions I ask! In the best of all worlds I would love to hear from funders throughout the year so I can share before AND after the grant has ended. This is especially important if your project cannot be measured effectively. If you are not keeping in touch after the grant is over you are loosing a great opportunity for future funding. I would fall off my chair if a past funder would email me unsolicited information on how a project we previously funded is currently being used and/or continuing to help people etc. Don’t miss this opportunity to tell your story AGAIN and set the stage for the future. If it doesn’t work for me.. I might know someone else who is interested!
I also appreciate the not so good news so we can work together to redirect the project. No funder wants to hear from a Board member who says “did you hear this about xyz?” (good or ba and not know anything about it! Denise from the DYCD said it best “we just don’t want to be in the papers!”
I want to give a mention of something that Yancy of the Clark Foundation said about the relationship change that we, as Funders undertake. There are three roles here: the grant seeker, grant maker and our BOARD. In the beginning we are your judge and jury during the grant process but once you get the grant – we are then your biggest advocate to success. Both the grant seeker and the Board remain the same however we as grant makers then become accountable for our recommendations to our Board.
6. Many smaller nonprofits often feel that funders overlook them in favor of larger organizations. What can a smaller organization do to pique your interest?
I can only speak for myself to say that I would rather give to small-med nonprofits since we are a small FDN and our grant money will make a greater impact. I have found that the smaller groups have less bureaucracy, politics, and are much closer to their organizations and programs than larger ones. This usually translates to better communication and staff consistency. One of my biggest concerns is always will a key staff person be there next year to continue this project? Often a project will die a painful death when a key person leaves and a replacement is not found in time to continue the momentum. Another big question is – how many kids will my dollars help and where will we fall in the funding scheme?
7. How do you evaluate the performance of your grantees? What types of results do you look for? And how do you evaluate the success of your own programs?
Evaluation/ assessment – always the subject of much debate. I have always wondered.. given a choice, what would you pick as a grant-seeker? Evaluating yourself as an employee or having to go through a program evaluation?
There is no right answer to this. Everyone has a different answer and solution. I expect that as the grant seeker YOU will know your programs inside and out which means you should know how to best approach a measurement. Sometimes its impossible “measure that which has not happened” however there are certain things you can include that are specific to your program that will help us understand the impact. For us, we identify certain goals from the original proposal and ask the grantee to address if the goals where met, how they where met, milestones, unexpected results (good and bad), and FUTURE plans . As funders we love to hear about how a program we funded may have lasting impact. From a business point a view, our Board will expect to see some numbers to back up your claims. Its important you anticipate this and take post and pre-program data.
I mentioned in answer #5 that hearing from you through out the year helps to set the stage for success at the end of the year. The more information can help off set a final report that is light on stats and heavy on examples/stories if we have been hearing about your win’s through out the year.
8. If you could convey one “take-home message” to help nonprofits better understand the challenges faced by funders in today’s economic environment, what would it be?
READ/FOLLOW THE DIRECTIONS in the grant guidelines! I can’t say that enough. I’ve taken the time to put together grant guidelines which have gone through several drafts and stages of approval. We get many many proposals and eventually they all have to be duplicated and shared …. we have certain restrictions and guidelines for the ease of this.
- Don’t try and file off or stuff the corners of your square program to fit into our triangle funding model. I can see that! We support technology for youth education programs. Kids using the calculator function on their phone does not qualify for “math education”.
- To qualify you must be in at least two states – not two cities, towns, cornfields, teepees, igloo’s, communities etc.
- We only support programs in the United States – this means India, Europe, Africa etc is out. If you’re not sure.. really, I can’t help you.
- Follow the formatting requests – its not hard.. double space, no more than xx for that question, 12 pt arial font. Do I really have to specify portrait and not landscape? Letter not legal? If its too small or too fancy to read I’m not going to. Did mention I have to be able to duplicate your proposal? If you send this to me bound.. I will need to gnaw off the binding. I won’t forget that.
- Limit your attachment materials – don’t send me anything I have to “unpack”.. you’ve sent me too much stuff.
- Deadlines- Its there for a reason so unless I tell you otherwise you need to stick to it.
- “Email preferred” – this may mean that at 11:59 PM my email server is jammed but that’s OK. I prefer email – did I mention I have to share your materials? Electronic documents are easier to store and share. But if you insist on mailing.. yes postmarked deadline is fine or go ahead drop it off if you’re in the neighborhood. Don’t call me to ask if its OK. Just do it.
- “did you get it?” Please don’t call – we clearly state we will acknowledge receipt in a few business days. If you don’t get one then email. But 100′s of phone calls to ask if I”ve gotten don’t work.
You can probably tell following guidelines are a big thing for me. Almost 50% of my proposals don’t qualify because of one MAJOR criteria that cannot be worked around i.e. not in the US) , not a charity and thus will be cut right of the bat. Then there are the proposals that clearly are duplicated and sent to any company that has the word “Foundation” as part of their name. This is a waste of your and my time, paper, ink , electricity, gas etc. Proposals take time to write and read…please take the time to read my 1-2 pages of guidelines so we can save 50 pages of proposals.
Well that’s all folks, I really do encourage you to submit your questions.
Jenny “please follow the guidelines” Lai
