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Public Funding 101
- 1. Public Funding 101 What is it? Where is it? How to Access it. How to Manage it. How to extract the most value from
- 2. Includes federal, provincial (state) and municipal or city governments and ? public organizations such as Foundations - In Canada there are thousands of sources of public funding totalling in excess of $28 billion
- 3. Deliver Acquire Find Relative Difficulty The greatest risk to you and your organization is when public funding shows up at your door!
- 4. Government and public funding will always be there, investments in business and nonprofits are a constant
- 5. Why should you pursue Public Funding? Businesses frequently consider government funding as a nightmare Many non-profit organizations are busy delivering programs or simply trying to survive Internal capacity or assets to access funding is often a challenge It doesn’t need to be this way!
- 6. Public funding represents an enormous opportunity for businesses and non-profits to enable their organizations to move forward
- 7. enabler Public funding can remove barriers that enable your organization to achieve the next level in its evolution!
- 8. Public funding is not a crutch to make sure your organization limps along!
- 9. Not every organization is ready to go after public funding Organizations should have some kind of demonstrated track record and clear plans to sustain the initiative to be funded
- 10. In general the level of effort for a grant of say $100,000 is about the same as a proposal for $1,000,000 The level of reporting is also about the same Level of Funding Level of Effort
- 11. The amount of risk your organization faces increases with the level of funding acquired Level of Funding Level of Risk
- 12. Stacking is a mechanism where you acquire contributions from multiple sources and lever them against each other. Stacking is strongly encouraged!
- 13. Indirect funding is simply accessing funding through another organization where yours is not eligible Partnerships are typically with colleges, universities, other businesses, consortia or non-profits
- 14. In Canada a good starting point = thefunding portal.com For non-profits searching out international sources for funding is the Foundation Centre Talk to a local expert!
- 15. Acquire Capability • Do you have all the pieces required to acquire and deliver on public funding • What is your proposal process? • Do you have management controls in place? • Do you have the necessary contributions in place (not hopefully but REALLY!) • What about partners?
- 16. The approach to the acquisition and management of public funding is essentially the same regardless of the funding organization
- 17. Plan Process Strategy Partners People Skin 6 elements to help you define where and how to move forward
- 18. Strategy is critical...how are you differentiated? Many organizations apply for funds just like you It is essential that you stick out from the crowd - how is your project different than the others? - who have you partnered with that can make a significant difference? - does your product/process significantly address government priorities? - are your social programs more of the same or are they unique?
- 19. You need a plan Develop a framework including: - timelines for drafts - info from external sources - checklist of mandatory items to be delivered - checklist of mandatory technical elements and more!
- 20. Pursuing public funding requires you to think about and establish process within your organization that fit with the process of the funding organization you are targeting
- 21. Public funding always comes with risk either from acquiring funds or not acquiring funds. - know the risks up front and have a plan to manage them - are you stacking funds and expect matching from another source? - if you receive less than anticipated, can you deliver the same project or re-scope this and still deliver value? - are there alternative sources of funding?
- 22. Build a team either real or virtual as a minimum someone to bounce ideas off of whether you are going after $50,000 or $5 million Include the funding agency as part of the team respecting any conditions that may apply
- 23. Most funding organizations require you to have a real investment of time, effort and of course money. For businesses this usually requires an investment of cash and possibly in-kind Non-profits in general require less cash and smaller percentages of matching commitments Either way, cash is king!
- 24. The magic ... mayhem ... and of in-kind In-kind contributions: • can include salary of people, costs of space, contributions from other organizations in time, resources, assets • need to verified, tracked and monitored • must be directly linked to the proposed project Verify your in-kind is acceptable, talk to the funding agency
- 25. Partnerships = Shared Value Transactional partnerships, the formation of a partnership for a specific short-term goal, is not a partnership! There must be mutual and significant benefit to all parties. 2+2=7
- 26. Treat the funder like your Launch Client Ask for advice up front, they are the experts and in today’s economy many of them now come from business and have been on both sides of the fence This interaction can make-or-break your success!
- 27. The Proposal If you are not prepared, yes it can be this bad!
- 28. In many cases you are addressing multiple levels of audiences from administrators to technical experts to non-technical executives to business analysts so avoid the jargon! Just because a proposal has a limit of 15 pages doesn’t mean you need to use it all! Keep it Simple...
- 29. Is it clear? Clarity of thought from the first to the last page and any appendices is essential This includes CV's, financial statements, budgets, letters of support etc.
- 30. Tell a riveting story Don’t spin a yarn
- 31. One error is enough to raise flags so reviewers will be LOOKING for more!What is your opinion of an applicant who has errors on their CV? Proposal documents frequently become a formal part of the contractual agreement. You don’t want any extra zeros in the wrong place! Reduce your risk and plan your proposal process.
- 32. Deliver Deliver Results! Results It isn’t hard if you approach it the right way...
- 33. It all comes back to the plan! - your original blueprints, the plan outlined in your proposal and the processes you have put in place become key elements in the delivery - the worksheet budget you prepared offline becomes a tracking tool, - the worksheet used to calculate in-kind time of employees becomes a tracking sheet - the program plan becomes the basis to deliver your project - for consortia the governance structure comes alive
- 34. Shift happens! Stuff will happen that impacts your project Have all the facts and backup plans in place then talk to the funders!
- 35. Public funding is meant to enable your organization to achieve something you were not able to on your own Approach public funding the right way you will achieve!
Notes de l'éditeur
- - This presentation will provide you with tips and procedures to enable you and your organization to decide whether you want to acquire public funding, how to go about accessing these funds, manage the funds and then of course how to extract the maximum value from those funds.\n- This presentation is equally applicable to businesses as it is non-profit organizations.\n- Even though there are thousands of sources of public sector funding, there are many attributes that are very similar between them, thus these notes are applicable to most sources of funding. \n- I will also address both direct and indirect sources of funding vehicles\n
- So what is Public Funding?\n- Includes funding from federal, provincial (state) and municipal or city governments.\n- Also includes funding from other public organizations such as Foundations\n- In Canada there are thousands of sources of public funding totalling in excess of $4 billion at any given time\n- Internationally there are many more billions available.\n
- - Public funding is relatively easy to find\n- It is relatively easy to get\n- he greatest risk you face is during delivery of the project that got you the money!\n- a great advantage of public funding is the capability to stack funds from different public sources\n- although this may increase available cash flow and enable your organization to go further it can represent significant risk if you are not prepared and set up to manage it from the planning stage of the proposals \n
- - The good news is that government and public funding will always be there, investments in business and nonprofits are a constant\n- financial vehicles to deliver the funding, mechanisms, guidelines, eligibility may change\n- wrt Government funding sources, change is inevitable - Governments are very large and thus adopt and adjust their programming slower than the actual need.   This if your organization has a good handle on the current and future needs in your sector, you should be able to anticipate the direction of change, be prepared and reap the benefits.  Really smart organizations will influence this change by working together with government agencies in a partnership modality.\n- in todays economic climate business innovation and labour productivity are key drivers behind government investments and current and investments over the next 5 years or more will focus on business innovation in some shape way or form \n- Foundations also undergo change to meet priorities\n
- - This next section will Why should we go after public funding?\n- one business owner I spoke to considered government funding as a nightmare, another industry sector is not using a specific current program due to its perceived complexity\n- many non-profit organizations are busy delivering their programs and simply trying to survive or they don't believe they have the capacity of internal assest to access public funding\n- well in both cases I say this does not have to be the case so..\n- Lets Discover your Opportunity\n\n
- - public sector funding represents an enormous opportunity for businesses and non-profits to enable their organizations to move forward\n- although many organizations consider public funding to be a nightmare or too difficult to deal with, if you use the proper approach from the start it doesn’t have to be like this\n- in many ways these sources are like your partners and part of entering into a partnership is understanding each other, once you pass this hurdle you have a better appreciation of what to expect and he process becomes much simpler\n- also many public funding sources require funds from you which automatically turns many away, “Oh we have no cash or resources” which simply may not be entirely correct.\n
- - Public funding can remove barriers that enable your organization to achieve the next level in its evolution\n- it may allow you to take the next step and if managed properly, reduce your risk to enter or expand your market\n- this may be developing a product, implementing a new social program, expanding business, expanding business lines and capabilities, repairing infrastructure\n- as enablers funding orgs typically require some kind of track record and future plans for sustainability \n- they are not set up to act as a <next slide>\n
- - Public funding is not a crutch to make sure your organization limps along\n- I had a discussion recently with a CEO of a local company who cannot believe how many organizations including businesses rely on public funding, notably from the government, as a core part of their cash flow\n- this is not the intent\n- an acquaintance of mine built and ran a business on tax credits, he lost everything both professionally and personally!\n
- - not everyone or every organization is ready to go after public funding\n- public funding organizations are typically risk averse, this is especially true of governments where risk tolerance is essentially 0\n- organizations should have some kind of demonstrated track record and clear plans to sustain whatever initiative the agency funded\n- of course the level of funding will require differing degrees of track record or levels of organizational &#x201C;readiness&#x201D;\n- there are funds specifically for start-up companies, which most of you are aware\n- for example one government sponsored foundation that supports community projects require 2-3 years of financial statements; if you just started a non-profit organization this fund shouldn&#x2019;t be on your radar\n- another way to look at this is <next slide>\n
- - in general the level of effort for a grant of say $100,000 is about the same as a proposal for $1,000,000 or even $10,000,000\n- in many instances the &#x201C;form&#x201D; for the proposal is identical with a few additions or space allowed for writing\n- the level of reporting is also about the same\n- of course there will be differences such as some additional information to be provided, level of rigor etc.\n
- - BUT, and this is a big but, the amount of risk you as an organization faces increases with the level of funding you have acquired\n- as mentioned in the beginning, easy to find, easy to get, HARD to manage\n- one organization I know of received $9M in support from an agency, the project was delayed, they banked the money and didn't talk to the agency; at the end of the day they were asked for the entire $9M back\n
- - stacking is a mechanism whereby you acquire contributions from multiple sources and lever them against each other\n- in government contexts stacking between federal and for example provincial governments is strongly encouraged\n- as a simple example consider a project where one agency will invest a maximum of 50%\n- rather than use organizational funding, a second funding agency will be approached for the remaining 50% \n- stacking can be a good way to reduce financial burdens on your organization \n- stacking will require more hands on management to ensure any rules for the stacking are not broken, reporting will be increased since you need to report to more than one organization and it will incur additional risk \n
- - indirect funding is simply accessing funding through another organization where you are not eligible\n- it does require some level of funding of your own and a partnership\n- partnerships are typically, though not always, with colleges and universities\n- for example, a company can invest $5,000 with a local college who has immediate access to a number of students for technical development and the College can apply $5,000 to $50,000 of funding acquired from a source you do not have access to the project\n- many companies and other organizations have used this approach, aside from reducing the cost of your project you build a relationship with another organization and have access to new talenet trained with your organization\n
- - there are thousands of sources of public funding and finding them is one of the major challenges for many businesses and non-profit organizations\n- in Canada a new portal was launched that aggregates all of this funding in a single place and is accessible through simple and rapid searches. This is a good first place to go \nthefunding portal.com\n\n- in the non-profit space one of the most useful tools fro searching out international sources for funding is the Foundation Centre. \n- in this case searches are not free and an annual subscription is required\n\nIf you have an idea and want an expert to guide you call local experts they are typically happy to oblige and quite knowledgeable\n
- - Do you have all the pieces required to acquire and deliver on funding from the public sector? \n- What is your proposal process? Are there stage gates, go-no go decisions?\n- Do you have management controls in place such as accounting, time reporting, project management, stakeholder management, communications to deal with reporting on and managing the acquired funding? \n- Do you have the necessary contributions in place (not hopefully but REALLY!)\n- What about partners?\n\n
- - the approach to the acquisition and management of public funding is essentially the same regardless of the funding organization\n- of course there will be nuances with every organization but they can all be approached in a similar manner.\n\n
- - to be successful when applying for public funding, approach it like any other project \n- these 6 elements will help you to define where and how to move forward\n\n
- - many organizations apply for funds just like you and it is essential that you stick out from the crowd\n- the essence of strategy is differentiation, \n- how is your project different than the others? \n- Who have you partnered with that can make a significant difference to the end result \n- is your produce going to significantly address the government priorities? \n- does your proposal solve any challenges the government currently has such as labour productivity, youth at risk, gang violence?\n- are your social programs more of the same or are they unique, one of a kind never been attempted before in your country?\n- do your plans for sustainability include new sources of future revenue? Does the public funding enable this?\n- is your business model different than any other "competitor"?\n- this was the positioning of a non-profit organization I helped to acquire funding recently\n- while at the same time acknowledging their competitors, how they fit together and would work together\n\n
- - need to have a plan in place to navigate through the requirements especially a timeline\n- develop a framework for the proposal listing all of the elements required including:\n- timelines for drafts, info from external sources even timing for courier etc., One proposal I was peripherally involved with required a private driver to get it 400 km away on time, made it with 10 minutes to spare\n- ideally you want a full proposal 2 weeks prior to the deadline\n- roles and responsibilities (even if you are solo!), who is writing what, who is interfacing with the agency, if you have a CFO who is checking the numbers, do you ned external quotes or letters of support, if so who is doing that etc.\n- checklists of mandatory items to be delivered with the proposal (CV's, financial statements, letters from partners, banks etc.) \n- a checklist of the mandatory technical elements of the proposal (eg "Describe any project or related activities that could have an environmental impact"\n- one funding agency recently stated that 90% of the proposals that are turned down by them are because the application is incomplete; a simple checklist coudl alleviate lots of frustration\nitems and technical material to make sure you didn&#x2019;t forget any piece of the proposal and any technical aspect that needs to be addressed\n- templates, many public funds are online, it is a great idea to download and create a Word/Pages/OpenOffice template to fill in to ease review and edits, also technology does fail so you have a backup and you have re-usable information in a simple format (example story of server failure)\n- external support, do you have someone outside than can review the proposal before it goes in?\n\nOf course this plan applies equally while you are trying to determine whether to apply - if you are not capable of applying now, ask yourself \n- what do I need to do now to get to the point where I can apply?\n- who do I need\n- do I need partners in place if so in what form?\n
- - going after public funding requires you to think about and establish process within your organization that fits with the process of the funding organization you are targeting\n- the amount of rigor in your process should represent the level of funding you are pursuing\n- haphazardly throwing together a proposal for $10M in a week or 2 won't work\n- consider the process similar to any project your organization has managed and apply similar principles\n- the processes need to consider the various phases of the project of targeting public funding\n- in simple terms these include \n- concept stage - this is where you look at what you have, where you are headed, and external factors/trends and of course funding targets either immediately or potentially in the future\n- development stage - building the proposal, talking to the potential funders, acquiring partners, recruiting outside help (if necessary)\n- execution stage - the money show up now you have to deliver, how?\n- termination/closure - this applies equally to while the funded project is running in the case of an early termination as it does to the wrapping up and the audit stage (if required)\n- in some instances the termination stage may outlive the actual expenditures of funds by months or years as is the case in reporting results and outcomes of the funding\n- elements of the process include review and sign off, timing, roles-responsibilities etc.\n- a simple WBS or Gantt chart can really help monitor the process using \n- make sure the process includes elements of the funding target process(es) and any interaction with them\n- critical in this as well are the people <next slide>\n
- - risk is something many people and organizations talk about but few actually do anything about\n- when looking at public funding there are 2 basic risks\n1)Risk associated with not receiving funding - I mentioned earlier that your organization should not be counting solely on public funding to keep going or to implement new initiatives. You must have plan A, B and C. The attitude of approaching public funders with a &#x201C;do or &#x201C;die&#x201D; mentality no longer works. This type of risk is also associated with stacking funds where you are relying on additional sources of public funding. Your back plans should include this as a scenario. Can you deliver the same project? If not, can we re-scope this and still deliver value to the primary source of funding? Are there alternative sources of funding?\n\n2)Risk associated with acquired funding - this becomes part of your project/program plan. Create a simple risk plan, what are the major risks? How will they be managed? What are the worst case scenarios? This type of risk is significantly amplified if your organization is stacking funds from several funding sources.\n\nThis is one of my favorite examples of the benefit of risk analysis that I have presented on numerous occasions to non-profits. We introduced risk assessment to the project scoping process for a sustainable development project I worked on many years ago, In this environment and non-profit government organization, risk analysis was simply not done formally. The top risk was &#x201C;loss of field manager&#x201D;. We produced 3 risk mitigation options one of which involved a training the trainer model (not previously considered) for the project in a developing country that had very few successfully implemented projects. We did lose the field manager but as a result of our risk plan actually delivered one of the few successful projects in that country. ON a similar project in another country, no similar risk analysis was performed, the result 2 people dead and the loss of a $4M project.\n\n- In today&#x2019;s environment where funders are very risk averse and you assume the risk failing to perform even a rudimentary risk analysis is a recipe for disaster.\n\n
- - have a team either real or virtual, doesn&#x2019;t need to be large bit it is a good idea to have someone to bounce ideas off of whether you are going after $50,000 or $5 million\n- having someone from outside to review your proposal once it is finished is always a good idea\n- if you can identify someone who has either prepared a winning proposal or been on the reviewing end that is even better\n- include the funding agency as part of the team respecting any conditions that may apply here,\n- some agencies will review a full draft proposal, while others are hands off and many are in between willing to listen to your plan and steer you in the right direction\n- you must absolutely be sure that roles and responsibilities are clear\n
- - almost every funding agency now requires the applicant organization to have more than just a vested interest but rather a real investment of time, effort and of course money\n- for businesses this usually (not always) requires an investment of about 50% cash and/or in-kind\n- non-profits in general requires less cash and smaller percentages of matching commitments\n- however the more skin in the game (I mean real skin) the greater the probability of success\n- ultimately Cash is King rules the day\n\n
- - a wonderful vehicle that many funding organizations use is in-kind\n- simply stated in-kind contributions are those that are existing expenses on the organizations books (usually)\n- in-kind can include salary of people, costs of space, contributions from other organizations in time, resources, assets\n- when an organization proposes a specific level of in-kind it does need to verified, tracked, monitored and I would suggest approved a priori by the funding program\n- these kinds of assets also must be directly linked to the proposed program you plan to undertake, just because you have an asset doesn&#x2019;t mean it can be applied to your project!\n- if in doubt ask!\n- if not properly documented and tracked you run the risk as a minimum of spending most of your time putting out fires at worst having to re-pay contributions. \n- a colleague is currently bailing out a few firms who made commitments at the proposal stage and had no mechanism in place to track these commitments, without this consultants help they would likely be asked to return some funding\n
- - in many cases partnerships make sense\n- I do not mean the transactional types of partnerships that are prevalent today \n- by transactional I refer to those &#x201C;partnerships&#x201D; that are established for the sole purpose of acquiring funding\n- any partnership must be adding value to both organizations, that is SHARED VALUE\n- many non-profits and even businesses approach partnerships in a transactional manner, that is a few weeks or days ahead of a proposal deadline hey call "partners" for support in the form of letters of contributions and sometimes this can be in the millions! Needless to say this doesn't go over well and tends to jeopardize the overall relationship and potential for future \n- in one case I am familiar with a very strong supporter of a NPO was approached fro support 48 hours before a deadline, they did support the proposal but the value of the support was 2-3 orders of magnitude lower than any other in the past; the damage was done!\n- ideally a partnership already exists and has borne fruit of some kind, that is not to say a new partnership will not help you acquire funds\n- the public funding agencies are in business not only to help you but also themselves whether that is a provincial or federal government or if they are a Foundation to address their key mission\n- treat them as a partner or if you are in business like your <next slide>\n\n
- - many businesses consider governments as second rate or second class and that attitude can come across during discussions whether it is intended or not\n- ask the funder for advice up front, they are the experts and in today&#x2019;s economy many of them now come from business and have been on both sides of the fence\n- ask for advice, get opinions and treat them with the respect they deserve\n- in many cases this interaction can make-or-break your success\n
- - No it isn&#x2019;t this bad if some simple advice provided earlier is followed, you create and follow a plan\n- Entire books are available on preparing proposals so here I will focus on a few key elements that will help you be more successful\n\n
- - the proposal, keep it simple\n- remember in many cases you are addressing multiple levels of audiences from administrators to technical experts to non-technical executives to business analysts\n- your language needs to address each of these levels and avoid the jargon\n- just because a proposal has a limit of 15 pages doesn&#x2019;t mean you need to use it all\n- put yourself in the reviewers shoes, especially if they have seen many proposals\n\n\n
- - many proposals are so full of jargon reviewers have a hard time trying to figure out what is being asked for\n- clarity of thought from the first to the last page and any appendices is essential (this includes CV's, financial statements, budgets, letters of support etc.)\n- is it clear where you are, where you would like to go, what you are asking funding for?\n- ensure there is no ambiguity\n\n- I reviewed a proposal recently valued in the tens of millions, aside from glaring typos there was a great visual representation of the 4 or 5 different technical aspects of the proposal and how they connected; later in the proposal only 1 was described in detail with few connections to the others; needless to say it wasn't funded\n\n
- - this is one of the most common mistakes I have witnessed, businesses or nonprofits produce a hype document highlighting what they think will get them the funding\n- but now public sector bodies are requiring organizations to deliver on the &#x201C;promises&#x201D;\n- in a worst case scenario this approach can actually take a company in the wrong direction all in an effort just to get the money; in one case I am familiar with a start-up was successful in getting their proposal approved, however a recently appointed CEO turned down the contract because it would take them in the wrong direction\n- there is always an element of &#x201C;spin&#x201D; but just make sure you aren&#x2019;t spinning out of control\n\n
- - simple, you don&#x2019;t want any of these, one mistake is often enough\n- I don&#x2019;t know how many proposal I have reviewed that have glaring errors (like the name of the recipient!) wrong.\n- "They didn't even know who we were were just looked at us like cash cow" was the comment from one public sector funder. \n- even one error is enough to raise flags so reviewers will be LOOKING for more! I know I have been there\n- consider it this way, most of you have probably hired someone and had to review CV&#x2019;s, perhaps dozens or hundreds. What is your opinion of an applicant who has errors on their CV?\n- What do think about organizations with glaring errors on their marketing material including web pages?\n- the same applies here\n- Additionally, in many cases the proposal documents become a formal part of the contractual agreement. Errors in the proposal (for example budgets) can have drastic effects when it comes time to deliver\n- of course no proposal is perfect but you can significantly reduce your risk (of no funding or challenges during delivery) by having a process, planning the proposal process, having internal and external reviews etc. \n\n
- - Delivering on public funding seems by many to be easy, give me the money and let us deal with it after all we are the experts!\n- Unbelievably many organizations operate this way, a number of years ago a very famous non-profit organization actually stated this in writing in the public forum.\n\n
- - it all comes back to the plan, as mentioned before public funding is a continuum and the tighter the pieces are coupled together the easier it will be to deliver\n- your original blueprints, the plan outlined in your proposal and the processes you have put in place (whether simple or rigorous) become a key element in your execution or delivery plan\n- if you follow some of the guidance previously implementation will be relatively straightforward within the boundaries of typical project changes \n- the spreadsheet budget you prepared offline becomes a tracking tool, the spreadsheet used to calculate in-kind time of employees becomes a tracking sheet, your Program plan becomes the basis to deliver your project, if this is a consortia type of initiative the governance structure comes alive \n\n
- - stuff will happen that impacts your project and the program or financial plan you have developed\n- the simplest advice I can give is talk to the funders; make sure you have all the facts and potential backup plans in place\n- under no circumstance should you put this in writing the first time; remember these are public organizations and whatever goes into an email, or letter become part of the record and subject to public scrutiny\n- ask for advice and guidance, let them help you prepare the change control request (there may be specific language required)\n- see if they will accept a draft for comment and advice prior to submitting the final change control request\n- part of this also resides within your project plans from the beginning, you should have in place backups in the case something that is determined to be risky actually happens. \n- What are your backups should a partner walk away for example or a critical employee who accounts for most of your in-kind leaves?\n
- - the entire reason you should be pursuing public funding is to enable your organization to get to the next level whether that is a new product, new social programs, community infrastructure or expansion into new markets\n- it is meant to help you achieve something you were not able to on your own\n- if you approach public funding the right way you will achieve\n\n