How to Succeed With Emergency Grant Opportunities

Good news! You non-profit organization just received an invitation to apply for a grant. Bad news! The application is due next week and you have at least a dozen other priorities.

Here’s a schedule to help you organize your preparations to meet the application deadline and provide a competitive application for funding:

Day 1

1. Review the donor’s website. Contact them for application requirements. Ask initial questions. Read any guidelines, marking all requirements with a tick box. You will fill the box in with a check mark during your final review after you fulfilled each requirement.

2. Do you need information for anyone else? Request their help. Establish Day 5 as their deadline.

3. Create an application dummy with scrap paper. A dummy is a mockup of the total grant proposal you will submit from cover letter to you’re the last page of the attachments. As you work, you will replace the dummy pages with completed ones so you can identify missing items. Take time to organize your submittal now instead of at the last minute.

4. Start drafting. Use paragraphs from existing materials, like case statements, bio statements from key staff.

5. Make a first attempt at creating the project budget.

Day 2 and 3

6. Continue drafting, aim for 1-2 hour sessions per day, during your most productive interludes. Apply butt glue, if necessary.

7. If you get stumped, you probably need more information. Find someone with answers or to make project decisions.

8. Time helps. The difficult questions you struggled with today will be easier when you review them tomorrow.

Day 4

9. By now your draft is emerging. Plan to work in shorter time blocks. Re-read sections while waiting for appointments, when you’re on hold or 15 minutes before lunch.

10. Email or call everyone who needs to provide you materials to remind them of the pending deadline.

Days 5, 6, and 7

11. Proof the draft, triple check all dates and numbers.

12. Ask one or two other people to read it.

13. Read the final application aloud. Check off the requirements you completed. Flag uncompleted items. Make a list of these and work through them one-by-one until all is done.

14. Compile the final document. Make copies. Remember to keep one for your organization. Deliver the application.

15 .Relax! You made it!

For more grant writing articles to help you non-profit organization earn funding, see this directory.

For six audios to purchase that will help you write grants if you are a newbie or an expert, follow this link. Each offers one hours of training from Karen– and contains the content of her famous grant writing workshops.

For other sources of non-profit income to augment your grant opportunities, read this article. Can Your Organization Obtain More Income?

Karen Eber Davis

Time To Breathe Deeply

Happy first day of summer! Breathe deeply and relax.

In summer, many nonprofits leaders have more flexibility in their schedule. One nonprofit takes the whole month of August to learn and plan. If you would like things to be less hectic this fall, consider investing time this summer the same way. We have a beach bag full of new resources to help you improve your time management and strategy planning. They include:

• Mission Brilliant Podcasts


• Added Value Newsletters


• Time Management Workshop (in conjunction with the Nonprofit Leadership Center of Tampa Bay)


• Raising the Bar on Strategic Planning in Your Organization Teleconference


• Time Management for Nonprofit Leaders Booklet
To start you off, here is one tip:

27. Block Islands. For large tasks, set aside a two-hour block of time. Repeat over several days or weeks, as needed, to make progress on key activities. Prioritize these time islands just like you would appointments with key donors.

As you learn and plan this summer, you will be able to breathe even more deeply knowing that you and your organization will be in a stronger and better place this fall.

How Does Time Management Relate To Nonprofit Strategy?

Good time management impacts not only how you do great strategy planning. It also helps you to achieve more of the strategy you select.

Good Meeting Time Management during planning sessions will help you to have the time to do the strategy thinking you need to do to be effective. Here is a tip about how to run strategy and other meetings:

72. Plan the Flow. Include a time estimate for each agenda item, i.e., “Special event opportunity -15 minutes.” During your meetings, as you approach the time limit, bring this to the group’s attention. State: “We have just spent 10 minutes on this topic. Would you like to come to a conclusion and move on in the next 5 minutes or schedule it for a future meeting?” Stated time estimates help groups move forward and balance the needs of the current topic against other agenda items.

Good Time Management and Strategy. Even the best strategies in the world are only effective if people have time to implement them. Here are two bonus tips to help you with strategy implementation.

128: Resist the Temptation to Just Do, Do, Do like digging in the sandbox to China. Instead take time to ask: 1) Must this task be done? Does this mesh with our strategy? 2) Might someone else do it? If so, who? 3) Is it best to do the task now or to schedule it for later?

129: Set Your Intentions. Before a meeting or other event, decide two things. 1) What is the minimum you want to get done? 2) What is the maximum you to hope to achieve? Armed with these clear parameters you are in the position to benefit from your activities.

We’ll be talking more about good time management at the workshop, Time Management for Nonprofit Leaders on July 30 in Tampa. Register today to get a free copy of Time Management for Nonprofit Leaders- 121 Time-Tastic Tips for Your Most Important Resource –-just a few seat available with this special offer.