What does Empathy have to do with Grant Writing?

As I step back to reflect, I believe all grant writing should be grounded in empathy; the ability to listen with curiosity, reflect, and see things from multiple perspectives can make the difference between a ‘good enough’ proposal and a compelling one.

There are multiple ‘stakeholders’ in the grant development process;

--The main grant writer and editor

-- The content contributors

-- The person or people signing-off on the application

-- The grantors aka your funders

As a grant writer, your job is to bring together the narrative, data, finances and supporting documents in a cohesive story WHILE balancing the perspectives of each of the people engaged in your grant development process.

Let’s take a moment to think about that.

Imagine you are writing your first grant proposal to raise funds for a program that helps young people who have aged out of foster care transition to independent living.

 If you simply want to describe the program and activities offered, my guess is that you will find existing language on the organization’s website and other communications. Existing template materials are timesaving and provide valuable context and framing. They can also be outdated.

But what if you took the time to talk to the program coordinator who works directly with the young people, and asked “tell me how the young people are doing?” you might hear how Angela who didn’t want to interact with anyone at first, is now thriving in pottery class; how the youth in group therapy are now supporting each other outside of therapy sessions.

If you talk to the executive director, she might tell you about their partnership with the local community center which offers so many free enrichment activities which have been a lifeline to the youth, while relieving financial pressure on the organization’s budget; and how a conversation with a local furniture store owner transformed a bare office room into a welcoming group therapy space.

If you have the opportunity to speak with Angela herself (and this conversation needs to be handled with great care for privacy) you may have the privilege of gaining a deeper understanding of how much relationships and kindness matter in creating safety-nets which prevent young people from falling through the cracks.

And if you take time to delve into the funder’s giving history (priorities and dollar amounts) and ideally have a conversation about their current goals and priorities, that’s when you find figure out where the intersection of both your goals and priorities lie—this is the center point of your proposal narrative.  

At this point, ask yourself; what is my pitch? And how do I make it in a way that respects the dignity of everyone involved?

Compelling grant writing guided by empathy takes time and intent.

It allows others the space to speak, and share what is important to them.

It stops to ask questions and delve deeper.

And sometimes it requires you to step away from your own preconceived notions of how things work.   

You Can’t Write About Things You Don’t Know Enough About

[This blog is dedicated to all the Nonprofit Pros Who Didn’t Sign Up to Write Grants… But Got Stuck Doing it Anyway!]

Keep reading for lessons learned from my grant writing journey.

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The ED. The new intern. The finance guy who’s also good at words and got roped in.

Hand raised. That’s me and how my grant writing story began.  

In my early days as a consultant, I was hired via an agency to provide short-term report writing support for a nonprofit client. I arrived at the client’s location and was given a short tour around their facility which operated a food pantry for senior citizens. “They can buy food with Monopoly money,” is what my point-of-contact lady told me. Let’s call her POC lady for short.

I was then taken to the back office, and guided over to a pile of paper files by POC lady. “We are late, we are so late with our grant reports. We were supposed to submit this grant report last month. I just had a call with the funder who wanted to know when we would submit the report, and I said I would get it to them today. So I need you to get started right away.”

Now, consultant-me of today would have seen that red flag right away—and laughed. Consultant-me of 15+ years ago froze. When I unfroze enough to move, I buried my head in paper files, trying to make sense of a proposal that made no sense, while trying to write a report about a program I didn’t know anything about. Let’s just say that partnership did not last long.

If you are the new ED, the intern or the finance guy with writing skills—take the time, in fact insist, that you get enough time to get to know the programs before you start writing about them. Whether you are writing a proposal narrative or developing a monitoring and evaluation plan or reporting on a program you MUST know what is going on.

I call it digesting information.  In order for me to write convincingly about your organization’s mission, programs and impact I need to first wrap my head around what you do.

This also means, I need time to read your existing materials and ask plenty of questions and understand the ‘why’ behind what you do. I need to understand your strategy. I need to understand what sets you apart.

Six years ago I asked a new client whether I could come by and see their programs in action. It was a book club meeting for folks who had returned after being incarcerated. I also sat in on other program activities like a job-readiness workshop and a community-dialog night. You can learn a whole lot by being a fly on the wall.  

The fact is, you can write about things you don’t know about. But it will probably be full of fluff and gobblygook—and the reader will see through it.

 Like every other quality product, good grant writing means putting in time up front. You don’t need to stress about knowing everything, but you need to know enough.

 Got a good grant story to share? I’d love to hear it!

Go Beyond Raising Money—Centering Justice in Fundraising Stories

Fundraisers are among other things, storytellers. During the planning stage of a grant application or an appeal letter, one question we ask ourselves is “whose story should I tell?”

But another important question we should be asking ourselves is “why am I telling this story?”

Presumably, your primary goal is to raise money. Fair enough.

What else, do you want to do with this story?

We usually want to elicit an emotional response to our stories. We want the ‘need’ to be compelling—yet also present some warm and fuzzy hope with our framing—where the writing appeals to the power that ‘you’ the donor/grantor have to make things better.

I don’t see this as a bad thing in and of itself.  But here’s the deal;

The concept of donor-centric writing, as the name suggests, typically focuses on the donor as the key figure in the story. The hero.  Done well, this kind of writing works; it raises more money because most people like to feel like the good guy who saved the day. Right?

Here’s where I see it getting problematic;

Fundraising stories are an opportunity to do more than raise money and build support for your cause.

Our stories can and should always prioritize elevating the voices of, and creating a platform for, those who are most often unseen and unheard.

Storytelling should call attention to privilege and societal structures that keep generational poverty and injustice alive and well. Story telling should be bold enough to hold up a mirror so each of us is aware of our own role in upholding the status quo.

Writing from the perspective of community-centric fundraising shifts the balance of power to one where we respect and build strong relationships with donors, while centering the communities we serve and benefit from. The way I see it, the ethos of donor-centric fundraising (which remember is to center the role and power of the donor) while effective at raising financial and other support, is another element and an extension of Jason Lewis’ critique of “the soft authoritarianism of institutional philanthropy.” If you think that criticism is overly harsh, read Lewis’ article and consider where the balance of power in our sector lies.

Complex problems like incarceration justice and mental illness and discrimination of all stripes don’t have shiny solutions and cannot be easily solved with a $25 monthly donation or even a grant of $50,000. Creating any type of seismic shift in these arenas is a work and commitment of years, and sometimes decades and generations. To pretend otherwise is an injustice to those who live through these challenges every day.

Individual donors and institutional grantors are not heroes or rescuers—but they can be powerful allies, and we need them.  I am appreciative of their support. We need their money, their public platforms and their networks. But let’s be clear, their role is to be a part of a movement that is bigger than themselves in tipping the scales of justice in favor of those who are often on the margins of society. This is a privilege and an honor.

True impact stories elevate the leadership and resilience of the communities doing the work. They invite donors not to “save,” but to stand in solidarity. So when you set the stage in your next appeal or grant application, invite your donors to be partners and advocates. But don’t call for any heroes.

I know this topic and view point can be controversial - please do share your perspective below!