How to Develop a Great Budget for Your Grant Proposal (Part 2)
How to Develop a Great Budget for Your Grant Proposal (Part 2)
GrantWritingOnlineCourse.com - As we learned in Part I of How to Develop a Great Budget for Your Grant Proposal, the budget must accurately reflect what you have proposed in your narrative. The more effectively they correspond, the fewer questions the prospective funder will have about how well you've thought through what you propose to do.
It will also lend credibility to your proposal in that it evidences how serious you are about what you want to do and how intentional you are about proceeding with your plan.
If you are asking for a multi-year grant (assuming the foundation is open to such an arrangement), set out your budget according to how much and where you will spend the requested money each year across the grant period.
You may find it helpful to include a budget narrative for those line items that aren't readily recognizable from the project description in the proposal text. You can also use the budget narrative to define and/or quantify line item entries.
If the foundation requires significant evaluation measures to evidence your success, they may also be willing for you to include in your budget hiring an outside consultant to perform the task.
Keep the budget relatively simple to view and understand. By the time a prospective funder reads your proposal, the budget should not have any surprises or leave the reader with questions that she can not answer herself! This will require you to place yourself in the shoes of the funder and raise important questions with yourself that they might want to know.