Make a Library of Stats for Your Proposals

Statistics are wonderful resources!  They show a possible investor, sponsor, donor, etc. that you know who you are and you know who your organization affects / supports.

Financials are a type of statistic.  For those who live in states were the CDP (cultural Data Project) is now required, a word of advice, READ YOUR CDP!  As an occasional grant panelist it is always obvious which organizations had one person fill out the CDP while another wrote the narrative.  And it is glaring when the narrative does not match the story in the financials.  Be smart, know who your own organization is.

Credit for this article goes to Jim Abernathy and it was originally published March 2013 in Volume 6, Issue 3 of {Centered}, a publication of The Grantmanship Center.

Make a Library of Stats for Your Proposals

By using good statistics in your proposals, you bolster your arguments for funding. So why not start collecting relevant stats now? This way you'll have more choices about which ones to use when it's time to write a new proposal, says Diane H. Leonard in "Putting the Horse Before the Cart: Gathering Statistics Prior to Writing Grant Applications," CharityChannel, February 6, 2013). Leonard advises against using the same stats in every proposal you submit; instead, you should think about which, of the relevant statistics available, are most likely to clinch your argument with a particular grantmaker. She offers these tips on how to make sure you'll have a wide range to choose from: Collect and save statistics related to your program areas as you come across them. Remind coworkers and program staff to let you know when they come across useful research or statistical data. Find out which sources of data are the most widely accepted in your program areas. Don't limit yourself to outside sources. Collect stats from within your organization too: - Ask program staff to give you monthly or quarterly updates on progress in achieving program and organizational goals. - Collect data that was developed for grant reports, whether or not that data was used in the reports. - If your organization has an in-house evaluation staff or uses evaluation consultants, ask them to identify the statistics they believe are most significant.