Tips and tools for preparing grant reports for your funders
By Brian Satterfield, TechSoup.org
The grant proposal you spent weeks writing has finally paid off, securing much-needed funds for your nonprofit's latest project. Yet even though you have acquired the grant, your obligation to your funders isn't over. Once your organization accepts a funder's money, you also accept the responsibility of preparing and submitting a grant report to them, letting the funder how you spent their money and what sort of impact your program or project has had.
Individual funders often provide specific guidelines as to what a grant report should contain, yet most funders will want to see detailed financial statements; information on the project's outcome or predicted results; and whether you delivered on the promises outlined in your proposal.
How many reports a grantee must submit and how often they must do so also varies from one funder to another. If your organization has secured a one-year grant, for example, you might be asked to submit an initial report after six months and a final report six months later. If, on the other hand, you've received funding for multiple years, you may be required to submit annual reports followed by a final report once the grant ends.
Yet no matter what the guidelines or deadlines for your particular grant, you'll eventually need to sit down and explain to your funder how you spent all those dollars and cents. Before you begin writing your report, it can be useful to know what information you should include, what steps you can take to make your report more effective, and what software you might use to get the job done.
