Grant Us This!
Show Foundations the Impact You’re Already Making
There’s a unique excitement that comes with the opportunity to fill out a grant.
It’s that moment when the work ahead of you feels like an exciting challenge, a chance to show up at your best.
It’s not just about filling out forms or ticking off boxes. It’s about truly seizing the opportunity to make your case.
To say things like:
“This is why our organization is worthy of your trust. This is how we’re making an impact.”
When a nonprofit is invited to submit a grant, it’s one of the greatest opportunities they can get.
It’s when you can go all in, give it your best shot, and show that the work your nonprofit is doing matters.
That’s how I felt last week when one of Creative Grant Solutions’ clients hit me with the big news halfway through our check-in.
“Not only did they say yes, they increased the amount of the grant from $100,000 to $125,000!”
I couldn’t believe it when he told me!
SERIOUSLY?!
Hearing about the grant we worked on together made me so excited for our client.
It also made me think of the old saying: “Once is chance, twice is coincidence, three times is a pattern."
A foundation giving more than requested happened about a month ago, which I wrote about in Don’t Sleep On Your Loyal Funders.
But this was a new foundation!
So what do I think led to our client securing a $125,000 grant this month?
1.) Work Gets Noticed.
Our client was invited to submit a grant application, and that’s one of the greatest opportunities a nonprofit can have.
But here’s the important question: Why were they invited to apply?
I believe they were invited because the foundation saw the impact the nonprofit was already making in the community.
I think that’s something special, and my hope is that we’re going to see more of this:
Good nonprofits, already doing the work in their community, being asked to apply for grants.
If your nonprofit is doing meaningful work in the community, someone in your network is connected to a foundation looking to fund exactly what you're doing.
It’s up to the executive director, grant writing team, and others to get noticed and facilitate the necessary conversations to make this happen.
It’s up to the foundations to find impactful nonprofits.
Doing good work in the community is one way to bridge this gap.
2.) Earn Your Keep.
Just because a foundation asks you to submit a grant doesn’t mean you’ll get it.
Plenty of foundation websites say this.
You’ve got to show them you’re here to earn your keep.
It’s interesting to think about the shift happening in philanthropy right now.
Those who’ve mostly operated in a more relaxed, creative, “it’s not about metrics” kind of space are going to have to adopt a few habits from the business world.
Like learning how to measure what really matters, and report impact in a way that clearly shows the value of the work.
Yes, those practices have been tied to maximizing profits. But that’s not what this is about. This is about maximizing impact.
On the flip side, organizations that have primarily lived in the world of metrics—mostly quantitative—are going to have to open up to more creative, flexible ways of measuring impact.
They’re going to have to be willing to have conversations that don’t feel so rigid at the start.
And here’s something important to keep in mind: people who start foundations, or put their money into them, have zero obligation to do so.
I mean that literally.
When someone makes a lot of money, no one is forcing them to start a foundation and give it away. Sure, there are personal benefits, tax advantages, and legacy building perks, but they could easily find other ways to grow their wealth.
So when a nonprofit is invited to submit a grant it stands out when they approach that opportunity with genuine respect for that fact.
Applying for a grant is an opportunity.
It’s a time to be excited to earn your keep.
That’s why with this grant, we left no stone unturned. We answered every single question in the application with full vigor.
We built a budget that didn’t put the entire funding burden on this one foundation, even though on paper they had unlimited resources.
People are always competing for resources. Show a funder why your organization will be the best steward of them.
3.) Conversations.
We had at least half a dozen conversations about this specific grant application. I think that’s important to note.
Grant writers are often great at writing proposals on their own, but what’s going to matter more is having a small team of people who are having conversations about the grants being worked on.
This matters because you don’t want to come up with ideas for how to position your organization in a vacuum.
And honestly, it happens all the time in nonprofit spaces.
I’ve seen executive directors make up programs, budgets, or even the purpose for a grant right there on the spot, by themselves.
That’s how you end up with organizations overpromising on impact, or taking on so much that it’s unclear what they actually do.
When you have real conversations about a grant, you uncover important things.
Do our programs align with what this funder is looking for?
Are we creating something brand new just to chase the money?
Are we building programs around what we’re good at instead of what the community actually needs?
This is the kind of thinking that helps keep your organization grounded and in integrity, especially when funding opportunities start showing up.
For this particular client, our goal was to raise $300K in grants this year.
As of today, four months in, we’re at $214,500!
That means we’re probably eyeing our stretch goal of $500K, because we don’t want to get complacent.
I couldn’t be more excited for them. They have a small team focused on impacting a specific group of people.
It’s a coincidence that this is the second foundation to give them more than they asked for, but I’m starting to hope it’s not just chance.
Maybe we’re seeing a pattern take shape.
Doing impactful work can get noticed.
Building relationships with foundations is possible.
Earning your keep isn’t a negative thing, it’s an exciting opportunity.
This is one way to secure the resources your organization needs to keep making an impact in the community.