By Gloria Lawrence • 29 Jan, 2022
Have you been thinking about applying for grants, but not sure if you qualify? Or, have you applied for a few small foundation grants and ready to take your nonprofit's funding abilities to the next level? Whether you want to increase your impact, start a new program, become sustainable, or go full time in your nonprofit, grant funding can help you get there. Nonprofit For Newbies can connect you with qualified grant writing coaches to walk you through grant applications or apply for grants for you. However, there are a few elements that you should have in place to ensure that you have the best chance of winning funding. This article discusses the core 4 requirements for a nonprofit organization to be considered 'grant ready'. You'll learn about the questions your organization should be able to answer and items that you should have in place. If you have questions or need assistance with any of these requirements, join our ongoing live weekly workshops here . During our coaching workshops, we will help you further evaluate your eligibility for sustainable grant awards, answer any questions, and hold your hands through the process of building a master grant proposal. You'll walk away from each session with at least one action item checked off your to do list. Side Note: Nonprofit For Newbies has created tons of free & low cost resources to help you along your journey. As an added benefit, we've hyperlinked some of our tips (in purple) to the resources that you can use to learn more about each action item. If you are truly committed to building your organization's stability, I recommend you bookmark this article, read through once, and create a checklist of all the items your organization is missing. Then, go back and work your way through the additional resources provided. If you'd like hands-on support, we meet as a community every Monday at 7 pm EST to walk through each of these steps together in our Learning Academy. Our Core 4 Grant Readiness Framework Is your infrastructure strong? What's your unique selling proposition? Is your program structured? Are you measuring outcomes? Let's get started! 1. IS YOUR INFRASTRUCTURE STRONG? The majority of grant funders will want you to have your 501(c)3 tax-exemption. If your organization hasn't received tax exemption, you have the option of seeking fiscal sponsorship. Fiscal sponsorship is when an organization that is 5 or more years older than yours partners with your organization and agrees to be your fiscal manager, enabling you to apply for grant funding. When you partner with a fiscal sponsor, the organization that is granting to you looks at your fiscal sponsors' history and not yours. So, if you're a brand new organization, but your fiscal sponsors 10 years old, they're going to count you as a 10 year old organization when they look at your grant application. This opens you up to more opportunities for funding. For example, instead of applying to $1,000 dollars seed grants, you could apply for some substantial funding. Fiscal sponsors typically require a fee because they do a lot of fiscal management and accounting for you. Typically you're looking at between 7-13% of your overall budget going into your fiscal sponsors. If you're a newer organization, your budget might be $50,000. That's not a ton of payout. Even if you don't have fiscal sponsorship, there are still funding options available for you. Your organization will focus heavily on building relationships and providing outcomes, which we will discuss in detail further down in this article. Effective mission and vision statements are also important. I have rarely seen a grant application that does not want to know your mission, and so you might in your heart, know what you want to do and how you want to do it, but funders want to see something official. Questions to Consider: Have you invested in your idea? Is your paperwork filed correctly? Do you have a clear mission and vision? Are you showing up online? Is your board of directors strong? Do you have a niche target market? Are you registered to fundraise? Action Items: Articles of Incorporation Corporate Binder with Policies & Meeting Minutes (Bylaws, Conflict of Interest Policy, Budget Policy, Executive Compensation Policy, Whistleblower Protection Policy, Fundraising Policy, Donor Privacy Policy, Document & Records Retention Policy) EIN Number 501c3 Determination Letter or Strong Fiscal Sponsor 3+ Board Members (less than 50% family) List of Board Members with Photos & Affiliations 100% Board Giving Past 990s Current W9 Mission, Vision, & Value Statement Goals & Objectives (Year 1-5) High Quality Logo Visual Style Guide Professional Website Facebook, Instagram, & Linked In 2. WHAT'S YOUR UNIQUE SELLING PROPOSITION? Advanced grants will require your organization to have partnerships and a unique reason that your organization exists. Partnerships don't necessarily have to mean you're working with an organization. But if you offer the same services as an organization, it is really cool to formalize a partnership that says "I'll provide you with this, and you'll provide me with that", for example, or if you're both serving the homelessness , say your organization and the other organization agree if you can't serve somebody, you'll send them to them, and partnerships are solidified with memorandums of understanding, which are a lot like contracts, and partner letters, which are required for a lot of different grants. We just submitted a grant that required 5 of them. So 5 major partnerships, but partnerships are really good because if you really solidify partnerships in your community, you're being seen not only by the community at large, that you already served, but you're being seen by community served by these partner organizations, and once you get these partnerships together, it can really increase the trajectory for your organization. In order to form effective partnerships, you must ensure that you are meeting an unmet need and not duplicating services. Questions to Consider: Did you ask the community what they need? Have you connected with potential partners? What makes you different than competitors? What data supports the need for your program? Action Items: Elevator Pitch Business Plan Case Statement (think of this as your elevator pitch part 2) Letter of Support Partner Agreement Letters 3. IS YOUR PROGRAM STRUCTURED? Another item that needs to be included for advanced grant readiness is a strategic plan. So, a strategic plan is a plan that takes your organization and it looks at what you are, where you are currently, where you are going to be in the next year, two years, five years, and how you're going to accomplish your goals. Your organization's strategic plan may talk about how you are going to grow the organization by partnering with local community partners, applying for grants, securing funding, and eventually get to a point where you can achieve a large goal for your nonprofit organization. Questions to Consider: Do you have a clearly defined program/service? Do you have a well thought out budget? Do you have a plan for sustaining services if one revenue source dries up? Do you have a plan for staffing your program? Action Items: Program Narrative Customer Journey Map Operational & Program Budget Fundraising/Sustainability Plan Strategic Plan (Strategies & Tactics) Implementation Plan 4. ARE YOU MEASURING OUTCOMES? Your organization must have a framework for how you collect data for your organization and who it impacts. This is typically communicated through an impact and evaluation framework, as well as annual reports, which are the graphic designed end of year reports that you send to donors indicating what your accomplished this year ( many funders actually do require them). Questions to Consider: Are you starting with what you have and navigating challenges well? Are you keeping track of who you help and how? Are you setting goals for your program? Are you keeping track of accomplishments? Action Items: Impact & Evaluation Framework Logic Model Annual Reports Organizational History & Accomplishments This seems like a lot?! Right? Well it is, but it's easily manageable if you have a knowledgeable coach to hold your hand and walk you through the process. In our academy, we offer weekly group coaching and 1:1 coaching to help your organization reach its goals! 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