Once you have identified a promising federal grant opportunity, and before you invest the “usual” time and energy, you should first determine if this federal opportunity is for you…or not !!
The Five Basic Questions
Once you have carefully studied the grant guidelines, you should be able to address the following:
1. Are you eligible? In the section on “Eligible Applicants” are the parameters
for who can apply. Some federal grant programs are restricted to specific
states or certain kinds of organizations.
2. What is the deadline? The section labelled “Deadline for Transmittal of
Applications” will make it pretty clear if you have enough time to develop a
great application. You will need at least a month to develop a highly
competitive application.
3. What is the award size? Look in the section on “Estimated Average Award
Size.” You should know your total project cost and compare that number to
the size of the grant award. There is an economy of scale in developing
federal proposals. Requesting a small amount of grant funds may be almost
as time-consuming as requesting 10 times that amount.
4. What are your chances of receiving an award? This info is in the
“Estimated Number of Awards” section. If the federal program is
only going to award a few grants, you should consider not applying …
because the competition is going to be very fierce. Better to focus
on federal grant programs where the mathematical odds are more in
your favor.
5. Is my project directly related to the grant guidelines? Look at the
description of the grant program. Does your organization have the same
mission as the grant program? Will your grant application directly address
the goals and objectives of the grant program? If the answer to both
questions is yes, than this grant program may be for you.
Just Say No
If you do your homework, you will uncover many potential federal grant opportunities. You should not, however, even think about applying to all of them. After a while, when you’ve developed a good process for reviewing
those federal grant opportunities, you will find yourself deciding not to
bid on most of them.
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Dr. Jayme Sokolow, founder and president of The Development Source, Inc. helps nonprofit organizations develop proposals to government agencies, foundations, and corporations. He can be contacted at Jayme Sokolow.
Hank Lewis with Development Consultant Associates has over thirty years as a fundraising consultant and is a specialist in Board and Leadership Development, Capital Campaign, Bequest Program and Major Gifts.