Win-win grantwriting process

Yesterday I mentioned the frustration that I as a grantwriter sometimes feel when putting together a proposal, as well as the frustration that program officers must sometimes feel reading through certain proposals. This is why I always write and edit my proposals while putting myself in the shoes of the person who will have to read them.

Just imagine what it must be like to be a program officer. Often I’ve thought it would be a pretty great job, and sometimes I’m sure it is. But the day after a big proposal deadline probably isn’t one of those times. When I’m writing a proposal, I think about the pile of proposals that appear on the program officer’s desk, about the hours he or she will have to spend reading them and then making recommendations for which ones should be funded. I think about eye strain and boredom and the long process of finding each piece of information required by the RFP in every single proposal in that pile. And I try to write my proposal in a way that minimizes all of those annoyances.

Program officers are people too, and don’t want to be bored any more than the rest of us. So I write my proposals to be interesting, with introductions that grab interest and tell a story, and conclusions that clearly state the overall point I’m trying to make. I include statistics if they’re relevant or required, but I also try to put a face on those statistics. I also avoid jargon, which serves only to distance the reader from the issues being discussed. You want the reader of your proposal to feel something, and to feel that if they give to your cause, they’re giving to real people, not numbers or terminology. Not only does this way of writing make it easier for a potential donor to feel compelled to give, it also makes the narrative itself more fun for him or her to read.

Program officers are busy workers just like all of us, especially after a proposal deadline has dropped a ton of extra reading material into their schedules. So I make my proposals concise and to the point as well as easy to read. The print is always in a reasonably sized font, the margins are generous, the sections are brief and well-labeled, and paragraph breaks are frequent and sensible. My philosophy is that if you have to futz around with the margins and fonts in order to make your proposal fit within the funder’s parameters, then you’re trying to include too much and should revisit the content, not the type size. And when you edit your proposal draft, assuming you know that you’ve already included everything that the RFP asked for, you should always be making it shorter, never longer.

Finally, program officers have to answer to other people in their organizations, usually the board of directors who will make the ultimate funding decisions, and they need to be able to easily gather the information they need to make the case for any given proposal that they would like to recommend for funding. So, I follow the order and outline provided in the original RFP religiously so that whoever reads my proposal can quickly fill in a checklist showing that everything the RFP requested is in fact included. That means that if the RFP asks for an evaluation plan before a timeline, I put it in that very order, no matter what order my existing boilerplate or earlier proposals put it in. I answer every single RFP question in the order in which it was asked, even if I would’ve put it in a different sequence if I were the one asking the questions. In fact, if I have the RFP in electronic form, I cut and copy the suggested outline directly into a new document first thing, and then fill in each section based on that template. I use the same terminology as the RFP for each section heading, and when possible, restate the question being asked within the answer that I give.

I find that writing proposals this way, with the point of view of the program officer in mind, benefits me as well. I’d rather write things that are interesting than things that are boring after all, and if I follow the RFP outline exactly I have a built-in checklist and don’t have to worry that I’ve left out requirements. Ultimately, this grantwriting philosophy not only makes the program officer’s life easier, but also makes my job easier. Win-win situation.