Hello friends,
Question of the day: How do you know what kind of grant you need?
The Answer: It’s complicated
The short answer is that it depends on the kind of project that you are trying to complete. I know…that’s the opposite of helpful; just stay with me here. In my opinion, it is easier to approach projects with a funding strategy mindset. You are likely going to need grants, cash, leveraged funds, and services, partnerships that may have in-kind costs included, etc. to round out your total funding strategy. Along those lines, your grantor is going to want to get a picture of what kind of other funds and services you are leveraging to carry out the project. It is sometimes more palatable if the grantor sees buy-in from others and isn’t the sole funding source.
Before we go further, I feel that I might need to define some terms so that I’m not just writing jargon that you might not have the background to understand.
Grantor- This is the organization/individual/agency that has posted a funding opportunity and is going to provide the funding.
In-Kind- This refers to services that you are offering that are either being paid from your other funding (you might be co-enrolling into a couple of grants) or from a partner who is offering the service in lieu of cash payment. (To be a good partner you should offer a letter for tax purposes that shows the cash value of the services the partner has rendered. If the partner is also a non-profit that may not matter, but they are necessary for business partners, and a lot of non-profit boards like to have those to show value for their services.)
Subaward– Some grants allow you to portion out a piece of the grant award (if you have indicated that you are doing this from the beginning) to a third party to carry out services that you cannot complete but are essential to the outcomes of your project.
Match Funds– Matching funds are a requirement of some funding opportunities. These are funds that your organization has to raise via solicitation that can be cash or committed in-kind contributions. The amount can vary generally starting at 10%-20% but often extends to 50% of the amount that you are requesting from the grantor. Example: you are requesting $100,000; the match could be from $10,000 to $50,000 or more. Matching funds in small areas or for small organizations can take a long time to raise and/or can just be a deal-breaker. My suggestion is to look for sources that do not require a match or solicit a donor for your match funds.
It is possible to write a larger grant and take care of all of the project needs with one funding stream. That is possible. However, rarely do small non-profit groups have everything and everyone in-house who can fill every need especially if that project has multiple things going on. For example: if you have a project that is serving an at-risk population you might be offering training, job search, placement, mental health referral, health assistance, transportation, paying stipends, or offering financial assistance of some type. In this scenario, you need front-line staff, training programs and instructors, a project director, and finance employees to pay bills and write checks for stipends that you may be offering; these could be folks you already have. However, do you also have medical professionals, transportation workers, workforce employees, or at least someone to reach out to businesses for placements? You can see that having all those folks in-house already would be incredibly rare, and if you did because you run other similar programs, does your current staff have the capacity to take on the additional workload of another large-scale project? Overwhelming staff (I call this project dumping) is one of the leading causes of non-profit and social service burnout. That’s a topic we will get into in another post.
So, if you don’t have all of the project pieces you are looking for a grant that allows you to obtain what you need, or subaward to partners who can meet those needs. In the above scenario, our front-line staff may be trained to identify a mental health need and then we would make a referral to a mental health partner to carry out those assessments. That might mean a sub-award for contracting those mental health individuals, or it could be that they are a partner who offers their service in kind.
As you are thinking about what funding you need you will have already determined (hopefully) what you are going to do with the funds, who you have that will be working on the project, and who else you will need to pull into your project to make it successful. That’s where you start developing your funding strategy.
- What is the total amount that it will take to fully fund your project?
- Do you have any private donors that are interested in investing in your project?
- Do you have cash that you will be investing?
- Who can you pull to help leverage funds and services? In-kind?
Federal and state grants are good for projects that are expensive or have a lot of elements because they tend to have larger caps and allow for subawards for additional staff etc. State grants LOVE to require match funding. The theory or purpose requiring match is so that the grantee (you) will increase awareness and support for your organization and project and hopefully gain additional buy-in from your larger community. The hope; more buy-in and exposure will lead to better outcomes and more success. Additionally, grantors are looking for sustainability and many contributors better assure the longevity of your project post-grant. Many federal grants do not require match funding, but it is probably one of the first things that you should look for when you are reading the funding opportunity application. You don’t want to get too far into things and then find out you have a 50% match requirement. Federal and state grants are also good for projects that target services to specific challenges, economic development or workforce needs, educational needs, or groups with social challenges.
You can find a lot of these grants through a simple Google search and maybe a site registration. However, as you get into grant writing you may want to consider subscribing to at least one of the paid sites or purchasing a search software because they do save you a lot of time.
Grants.gov- (you will need a Sam.gov registration and if you apply you will need that registration anyway to submit your application.)
Candid- good for non-profits
GrantStation
Instrumentl- great for non-profits
Grantscape
GrantForward
Private foundation grants are great for smaller-scale projects, organizations that have a specific need, or who need access to unrestricted funds to cover several day-to-day needs. Examples: you need help to replace a roof or renovate a space, buy or replace a piece of equipment, funding for an event, you need to hire a consultant, buy a new tracking system, or new outreach supplies, engage in a community needs assessment, etc. Those are just some of the recent requests that I have seen. Some of those foundations can help purchase real estate to host an organization, start-up businesses, revitalize downtown areas (with additional grant funders) provide match for a larger state or federal grant opportunity. Foundation grants are extremely versatile and are often more straightforward. The downside is the caps are generally smaller, they only fund in certain fields that align with their mission and values, are restricted to certain geographical areas that are meaningful to the foundation, and in many cases do not allow sub-awards.
Searching for foundation grants can be trickier. They can be found on sites like:
Find Grants for Nonprofits | Foundation Directory | Candid,
However, if you have the name of the foundation, Google and you will find information about who the foundation is and what they do. You can gain information about what types of programs they fund and their requirements. I like to visit the full Foundation site to ascertain whether I feel like there is alignment. You don’t want to just apply for the sake of applying; that is just a lot of wasted time for everyone. All grant writing should be purposeful otherwise you are just taking money that could have been left on the table for another non-profit or organization that needs it.
These are by far NOT the only ways that you can find funding opportunities. You can talk to organizations with similar causes and find out how they are getting funding, read blogs or join social media groups, talk to businesses because many of them have philanthropic foundations, and ask in your communities. However, in this instance, the internet is your friend. I’m sure there are even more ways to find out about grants and funding opportunities, these are just the ways that I have found them.
I hope that this was helpful. As always if you have questions or would like to talk regarding consulting services, you can feel free to reach out to me at tbishop80@outlook.com.
Stay Wordy!
~Tiffanie