Where to, next?

I have identified my client organization, MamaBaby  International/MamaBaby Haiti, and met with Board President Kelli Beaty and Grant Writing Committee Chair Jenny Koch in two separate meetings.  Jenny has given me access to organization documents including the mission statement, goals, and objectives, their 2012 budget, the organizational flow chart, clinical statistics, and a list of clinical services provided in 2012.  She has also outlined a large and a small grant project that they would like for me to pursue. Since Jenny is familiar with the grant writing process, she listed four justifications for their large project and sketched the precipitating organizational changes and general economic benefits of the second project.  Jenny would like for me to submit a proposal to the Inter-American Foundation (IAF) for the larger project and suggested exploring RFPs from Wal-Mart and the LEGO Foundation for the smaller project.

My next three goals are to complete my pre-proposal within the next week, review and analyze Jenny’s suggested sources, and begin adapting sections of the pre-proposal to fit the guidelines of the targeted RFPs.  I should be able to complete the pre-proposal by carefully sifting through the MamaBaby Haiti GoogleDocs, my notes from my meetings, and by establishing my strategy for persuasion.  I have already begun reviewing the IAF Call for Proposals.  Its criteria open up a number of questions about MamaBaby Haiti’s eligibility for the grant.  I need to clarify MamaBaby Haiti’s status as an international or Haitian organization.  If there is not a specifically Latin American organization that will be the project sponsor, IAF will not be the appropriate source.  In this case, I will return to seeking a primary target RFP, along with the additional one which I will recommend as a backup.  There are a number of other requirements such as “counterpart contributions,” and community partnerships about which I will also need to inquire.

Once these preliminary issues are settled, I will begin adapting the information in the pre-proposal to the appropriate RFP guidelines.  I intend to review projects that have been sponsored by the target funders in the past and to thoroughly study their websites.  I will use what I learn about the funder to help me weave the goals of both entities into a proposal that will reveal a unified way to further the cause of each.

Along the way, I will be seeking other possible funders and collecting other documents that will need to be submitted with the RFP.