Writing Effective Grant Proposals
for Collections Projects
Geology Curators Group, December 2014

I’m Nick Poole
CEO of the Collections Trust
since 2004, responsible for
writing £15m in successful
grant proposals since 2008

Collections Trust
The professional association
for people working in
Collections Management

www.collectionstrust.org.uk

What is a ‘grant’?
• Support (usually financial) offered by a funder to support specific
activities, usually following a competitive application process
• Usually without expectation of repayment (unlike a loan, financing or
capital investment)
• Commonly governed by specific conditions
• Occasionally requiring in-kind or match-funding support
• Mostly restricted (as opposed to donations or revenue, which are mostly
unrestricted)

Who offers grants?
• Governmental organisations or departments
• Arms-length public bodies
• Charitable Trusts and Foundations
• Non-profit organisations
• Educational charities
• Companies
• Private individuals (often through a grant making organisation)

Trusts and
foundations
26,600
Trusts and
Foundations
which don’t make
grants
Grant-making
charities
28,700
Other charities
which make grants
11,700
Trusts and
Foundations which
make grants
in the UK
Source: http://data.ncvo.org.uk

Benefits of grant funding
• Supports activity that may not (at least initially) be self-sustaining
• Supports speculative or innovative activity for which there is no clear
precedent (and for which it would be difficult to develop a business case)
• Supports research & development the outcome or exploitation of which
may be unknown

Challenges of grant funding
• Funded activities or funder priorities may not correspond to your aims
and objectives
• Tends to focus on short-term or time-limited projects which establish a
longer-term demand on capacity and resources
• May require specific methodologies for project management, risk
management and financial reporting
• Writing grant proposals is time-consuming and costly, and may not result
in investment

Changing attitude to grants
• All heritage-related grant funders are reporting significantly increased
competition and a corresponding reduction in the success-rate (from 1 in 6 in
one case to nearly 1 in 30)
• Reduced yields on investments is resulting in reductions in available grant
funding
• New approaches including social investment or loan finance, not always
suitable for collections-based projects without a clear financial return
• Increased tendency towards small/micro-grant programmes (£2-5k) in the
museum & heritage sector
• Emphasis on ‘additionality’ and outcomes rather than supporting core costs

Golden Rule #1
Only apply for grant funding
for activities that are
consistent with your
museum’s aims, forward plan
and core priorities

Why do you want the money?
• Most grant applications are written on a responsive basis (‘there’s a grant
programme, it looks relevant, we should go for it...’)
• A grant may provide upfront investment, but it comes with two sets of
conditions:
i. The short-term obligation to fulfil the conditions of the grant, and;
ii. The long-term obligation to sustain the outcomes of the grant-funded
activity
• A grant seldom exists to enable you to do what you want to do

Golden Rule #2
Be prepared

Put your idea together
• Grant proposals for well thought-through projects that have a clear case for
support are always more likely to succeed
• Before going out and seeking funding support, it is a good idea to put some
definition around your idea, including:
• The need for the project
• The scope, objectives and likely outcomes
• An idea of budget or resources
• Ideas about partners who can help you deliver
• Any research or relevant supporting evidence
• Potential funding sources (including an internal resource)
• Having your idea in hand means you are going to be in a better position to
respond to calls with short timescales

Seek appropriate funders
• Once you have defined your project, objectives and requirements you
need to consider who has active or forthcoming grant programmes in this
field
• Keep yourself informed - funding opportunities may be on a rolling cycle
or within a specific window
• Look at projects similar to yours (eg. in the trade press), visit the funders
websites and sign up for their alerts services
• Make Funding Central your new best friend – www.fundingcentral.org.uk

Golden Rule #3
R.T.F.M

Read the guidance
• All funders are different, and the conditions, objectives and scope of
every grant programme is different
• Funders pour time, effort and resource into developing readable, useful
guidance, setting out how you should apply
• Most funders are highly specific about the submission process, formats
and supporting documentation
• The fastest way to see your proposal dismissed is not to comply with
these requirements

Check eligibility early
• All funders will give clear guidance about
• Types of organisation that are eligible to apply
• Types of costs that can and can’t be supported (eg. salaries, overheads or
capital costs)
• Requirements for match-funding or in-kind support
• Ineligible proposals don’t even get read – they are just discarded

Speak to the funder
• The majority of funders would prefer to spend time in pre-application
support than seeing people waste time and effort on proposals that are
out-of-scope or not relevant to their aims
• Funders like to know how people are responding to their programme calls
• A programme or case officer will commonly be aware of the range of
proposals under development and will often give you a valuable steer
about what to avoid and what to emphasise

Golden Rule #4
Give yourself time

Preparing your submission
• Putting a good grant proposal together takes time – you can do it in
evenings & weekends, but your chances of success (and sanity) are much
higher if you treat the development of the proposal as a project
• Don’t leave it until the weekend before submission – many grant funders
require letters of support, documentation or other evidence which you
will need time to collate
• Always download everything, read through it and familiarise yourself with
it before you start drafting.

Use stories and data
• Funders are human, like everyone else, they respond to a good solid
hearts-and-minds story and hard evidence
• Many funders have one eye on the press release announcing a media-friendly
list of eye-catching projects – help them get there
• Don’t just focus on the facts – create drama, give insight. Why now? What
will happen if the project doesn’t go ahead? Why is the situation unique
or compelling?

Define the problem
• Don’t focus on your collection as the problem – focus on the problem to
which your collection is the solution
• Very few funders will support core or ongoing costs for collections-focused
activity
• What is the problem you’re trying to solve (eg. lack of participation by
children and young people, need to improve educational services to reach
non-engaged communities) and how does improved access to or
conservation of your collections address it

Create a credible workplan
• Funders need to know what you’re going to do, how you’re going to do it
and against what timetable
• Observe the requirements of the grant guidelines – give people a clear
indication of the sequence of events within the project
• Be realistic about costs – under-pricing proposals leads to long-term
problems for your organisation

Golden Rule #5
Understand how your
proposal will be assessed (and
write it accordingly)

Common assessment process
• First-pass check to verify eligibility
• Proposal passed to a case officer or programme manager
• Second-pass read-through for relevance/quality/potential impact
• Proposal passed to external/expert assessor (depending on programme)
• Assessments collated and scored
• Long-list of proposals reviewed by case officer or programme manager
• Final list signed off for funding

Assume nothing
• Your proposal (much like a CV when applying for a job) may pass through
several people for checking before it reaches someone who knows what you’re
talking about
• Never assume prior knowledge or technical expertise on the part of the
assessors
• Avoid jargon, expand acronyms, eschew obscure references (especially self-citation!)

Ask people to read your bid
• A successful grant proposal is almost never a solo effort
• Always ask friends, colleague, family to read through and critique your
proposal prior to submission
• Don’t be precious about what they tell you – if the core idea isn’t clear, the
case for support isn’t compelling or the evidence isn’t strong enough, change it

See the funders perspective
• The funder will almost always provide a context to or rationale for the grant
programme
• Read through this documentation and try and understand what the funder’s
world-view is
• Look at the assessment criteria, and review your proposal dispassionately to
see how your idea fits with their concept of value
• Always quote the funder back to themselves, especially if the quote is from
something they’ve published other than the guidance material (it shows you
care and aren’t just firing off applications on spec)

Golden Rule #6
Positive mental visualisation

Be positive
• Every successful bid I’ve ever written has contained the word ‘successful’
• Write from the position of assertion (we will do x,y,z)
• If you feel excited about it, let it show
• Pictures really help – we work in a sector of left-brained visual thinkers, so
always create a picture of what you’re going to do, whether its your style or
not

What makes a good proposal?
• A good idea
• Relevant to the scope and aims of the grant programme
• Legible and well-argued
• Supported by evidence of need
• Realistic in scope, ambition and budget
• Proportionate to the problem being addressed
• Authentic and honest

What makes a bad proposal?
• Hubris
• Dishonest about aims (telling the funder what you think they want to hear)
• Disorganised, illegible, repetitive or verbose
• Unrealistic or over-ambitious
• Not answering the question
• Death by citation
• Focus on process not outcomes

Golden Rule #7
Build your reputation

Reputation really counts
• If the assessor has heard of you or your organisation, if they have had a
positive prior experience of your work or you are known for successful
delivery of previous projects, this is a significant impact on funders and
assessors
• Profile in the sector and trade press, speaking at events, sharing information
all helps build awareness of your museum as a credible delivery partner.

Golden Rule #8
If at first you don’t succeed...

Try, try again
• Most grant proposals fail
• Always try and focus on the long-term objective, not the short-term outcome
of a given programme
• Read any feedback carefully and reflect on it
• Look for alternate funding sources – the obscure trusts & foundations receive
fewer proposals and are often more amenable to ‘core’ collections activities

Funding sources for
collections projects

Heritage Lottery Fund
• UK’s largest heritage funder
• Grants between £3,000 and £5m
• Sharing Heritage (£3,000 to £10,000)
• Our Heritage (£10,000 to £100,000)
• Heritage Grants (over £100,000)
• Young Roots (£10,000 to £50,000)
• Landscape Partnerships (£100,000 to £3m)
• www.hlf.org.uk

Heritage Lottery Fund
• Surrey Museums Geology Project
• Lapworth Museum of Geology Development Grant

MA Esmee Fairbairn Fund
• Funding to promote engagement with and use of collectons
• £1m per year through 2016-18
• Grants of £20,000 to £100,000
• Promoting projects that are developmental & innovative and leave a legacy
• Visit the programme website

AHRC
• Most funding currently allocated
• Range of programmes relevant to museums & humanities
• Visit the programme website

Collections project funders
• Anna Plowden Trust – CPD & training in conservation & collections care
• Art Fund Jonathan Ruffer Grants – supporting research & travel for curators
• Charles Hayward Foundation – heritage & conservation grants
• Clore Duffield Trust – funding focused on learning & engagement
• English Heritage - currently in transition, has provided curatorial grants
• Ernest Cook Trust – projects involving children, countryside & conservation
• The Leche Trust – small grants for historic conservation & research projects

Collections project funders
• ACE/V&A Purchase Grant Fund – purchasing for non-national museums
• NIMC Accredited Museums Grants – 2014/15 call closed 19th November
• Paul Hamlyn Foundation – focus on social/educational outcomes
• Pilgrim Trust – grants to support conservation of collections
• Summerfield Charitable Trust – focus on Gloucestershire, heritage projects
• Plus any others that you know about!

Small Grant Funds
• SHARE London Museum Development Grants
• AIM Sustainability Grants
• Federation of Museums in Wales
• South East Museum Development grants programme
• Museum Galleries Scotland Small Grants Programme
• Check http://www.theheritagealliance.org.uk for more

Keep in touch
• We offer several ways of keeping in touch with our work and with each
other
– Collections Management LinkedIn community (8,200 members)
– Fortnightly email newsletter
– www.twitter.com/collectiontrust
– www.facebook.com/collectionstrust
– www.slideshare.net/collectionstrust