bidding

The Development of Competitive Bids is an Art and Science

The formal business acquisition process has always been a competitive endeavor. Today, winning bids is especially challenging given changing priorities, limited time and resources, and constrained budgets. The most successful organizations adopt industry standards and best practices – and when pursued diligently – find that win rates improve, and effectiveness and efficiencies are discovered. Best… 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

writing

Critical Tips for Captivating Grant Writing

The focus of this blog is effective grant writing. The reviewers of your proposal will be the ultimate judges of your funding success. To assure that they are enthused, you need to address: Whose story is this? What is this about? How does the material link backward and forward? What material warrants my attention? Let’s… read more

hands

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

doctor

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

international

Foundations & Corporations: The Art of Procuring International Funding

In my last blog, I discussed United States federal funding for international programs and research. In this article, I will focus on foundation giving for international programs. According to The State of Global Giving by U.S. Foundations, during a five-year study from 2011-2015, grant-making by American foundations to charitable organizations outside the United States reached… 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

problems

Five Common Problems Facing Grant Writers

During a recent grant training workshop I conducted in Pennsylvania, I asked participants what they considered to be the key obstacles they face in seeking, submitting and ultimately winning grants. The answers varied according to institution, discipline and experience, but the most universal problems and solutions for everyone were: Timelines: “We can never find the… read more

challenges

Proposal Rejection – Next Steps

You submit a grant proposal that you think has an excellent chance of success. Several weeks or months later you receive an email from the donor saying that it was not funded. Rejections can be difficult to swallow, especially since some reviewer comments might seem unjust. The best way to proceed is to give careful… read more