success

Key Trends in Grant Funding

In recent months, several trends have emerged in the landscape of grant procurement, reflecting both ongoing challenges and new opportunities. These include: Increasing emphasis on grants that address pressing societal issues, such as climate change, public health, and social inequality. For example, there has been a surge in grants for renewable energy research, community health… read more

challenges

Challenges Facing Grant Writers in Today’s Environment

New and seasoned grant writers are encountering increased challenges in seeking funding for their research and organizations. Many of these challenges are beyond their control. In this blog, I will briefly outline five of the most common barriers. In subsequent blogs, I will comprehensively address each one: Increased Competition: As the demand for grant funding… read more

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Can AI Write your Grant Proposal?

The participants in my grant writing and designing workshops frequently ask me if AI is now able or will eventually be able to write their grant proposals. In one instance, a participant told me that AI wrote their grant, which was funded. It is difficult for me to believe that AI can possibly write a… read more

success

Three Essentials for Grant Success: Ingredients, Preparation, and Presentation

When the donor is expecting excellence, resourcefulness, and a keen awareness of how best to assure outcomes that make a difference, the best way to meet their needs is to incorporate the three essentials for grant success. The three essentials for grant success are ingredients, preparation, and presentation. All of these are crucial, equally important,… read more

success

What Makes a Successful Grant Writer?

Successful grant writers possess a variety of characteristics that contribute to their effectiveness. These are learned through experience, various proposal submissions, collaborative efforts with colleagues, and focus and determination. Thus, successful grant writers: Strong Research Skills: Can identify relevant funding opportunities, understand the funding organization’s priorities and requirements, and gather supporting data and evidence for… read more

support

University Support for Faculty Funding Success

The pool of funds available for grants in the US is steadily shrinking given that funding is similar from year to year, and those funds are not keeping up with inflation and labor costs. Also, grant funding has been dramatically reduced in certain federal funding agencies and in others it has fallen by 20-25 percent,… read more

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How to Write Persuasive Proposals

A 2015 meta-analysis of more than 1000 articles with advice to proposal writers showed that most of the top 10 recommendations focus on strategic positioning and project design.1 I’ve seen scores of presentations advising faculty how to write more competitive grant proposals and I rarely hear anything besides these. Only one of the top 10… read more

success

How to Build a Successful Nonprofit

The key to maintaining a successful nonprofit organization is to have a diverse fundraising strategy that builds upon your organization’s core strengths and resources. It is essential, therefore, to know your organization, understand your place in the giving community, and build on your strengths and resources. Once, when I worked for a small, under-resourced organization,… read more

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Critical Questions to Clarify Your Research

How you will construct the direction and destination of your proposal depends on the initial questions that you ask. As you move from generating the topic, to gathering the background information, to adding focus to your research, you should begin with the open-ended questions of “how” and “why”, while at all times considering the “so… read more

problems

Five Common Problems Facing Grant Writers – Part II

In my last blog, I outlined various problems that workshop participants mentioned as serious concerns in their grant writing process. In this blog, I will continue with additional factors they faced. Of equal concern and pertinence are the following: Planning Ahead: “What are the steps I need to take before I write?” Grant writing takes… read more