For most nonprofit agencies, grants are a must. Without them, these agencies will not be able to pay their employees or pay for the programs they create. As a result, they would have to close their doors and no longer help those in need. In order to guarantee their doors stay open, many choose to hire a freelance grant writer.
There are numerous reasons to hire a freelance grant writer, with the most important reason being experience. A freelance grant writer has written dozens, perhaps hundreds, of proposals. As such, this type of writer has a pretty solid idea of what it takes to receive a grant. Writing these types of proposals can be tricky and, if you don't know the ins and outs of it, you can easily make a simple mistake that will put your business out of the running.
For the most part, grant applications are quite picky. If you fail to follow the directions precisely, your application will be thrown out. Even writing the application in the wrong font can be enough to ruin your chances. Since a freelance grant writer has written so many of these, he or she knows how to write them in the manner that will improve your chances.
Hiring a freelance grant writer is also beneficial because it creates a fresh perspective. When you work closely with your business, it can become difficult to recognize all of the positive things you do that can be used in the application in order to improve your chances of winning the grant. For example, you may have a number of community partnerships that you have had for years. As a result, you might not think to present this information in your proposal. A grant writer has a fresh set of eyes that can look over your operation in order to pull out the best aspects of your business and present them in the most favorable light.
When selecting a freelance grant writer, you want to find a person with a proven record for other organizations. So, you should ask the writer to list the grants he or she has successfully won and for what organizations. Then, contact some of these organizations to ask them what it was like to work with the writer.
In addition to finding a freelance writer that has successfully won grants in the past, it is also beneficial to find one that has written proposals for other organizations such as yours. If you are looking for a grant to start a new business, for example, this type of style of writing might differ somewhat than a grant to pay the operating costs of a shelter for the homeless. The more experience the writer has that are relevant to your organization, the more likely he or she will be to ask the right questions and to write a proposal that is likely to be a success.
There are companies that specialize in grant writing. But, to help keep your costs down, you might want to consider posting an ad for a freelance grant writer. Rather than working with a company, you can work directly with the writer. You can find a freelance grant writer by posting an ad on a freelance site or, you can post your project on a bid board.
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Book/Writing Advice
By: cjdaves157 | 24-07-2008
I am writing a book. Below is an excerpt, looking for opinions and advice.
Given A Choice
I have often tried to imagine what my life would have been like if I could have picked my parents and circumstances in advance. If given a choice before birth I am sure I would have chosen a wealthy, high profile, investment banker father with a mother who spent her entire days planning fundraising soirées for the benefit of underprivileged kids.
My childhood would have been filled with lavish vacations, shopping sprees and summers studying abroad. All of my friends would line up for the chance to stay over at my five story one hundred and fifty room mansion located somewhere off the west coast where the sun was always shining and the olympic size pool was always inviting. My nanny, obviously from some foreign country, would take care of all the daily chores that would have helped me to grow into a responsible adult. My teenage bedroom would have been the size of a normal ranch style house with a closet the size of a three car garage. I would have been the envy of every teenage girl and the crush of every teenage and preteen boy.
I imagine I would have sailed through adolescence and breezed through young adulthood without any obstacles to help shape my moral values. I envision me selecting Civil Law as my profession and the standard successful husband and two and a half kids. My children would grow to become successful adults with professions in the medical, legal and political fields.
After spoiling tons of grandchildren and leaving my mark on the world, I would have died somewhere around the age of ninety-five, quietly in my home under the care of a most wonderful and loving Hospice worker. My life?s achievements and my husband?s pension would ensure that my children and their children would be set financially for life. I am sure that I am not alone in my thoughts of what would have made the perfect atmosphere for the perfect childhood. Some may have chosen more exotic locations, more wealth or maybe more high profile, celebutant parents. I envision that just enough for whatever I wanted would have been perfect enough.
Similar to how infertile couples pick out sperm at a sperm bank I use to think it would have been nice to review the details of what I was being born into. Looking back now I know that choice is not always a good thing. Most children born into the scenario I described above end up killing thirty of their peers in a school yard shooting, after which suicide seems to become their only way out. I believe that there is a higher power that does review the blueprints of families and has a keen sense for why you are placed where you are. Still, when I think back to the sperm analogy used above, I see my parents picking ?purple sperm? and I came out ?green?.
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