Investing in Community Solutions: Creating a Pipeline of Funding Bids

It is more important than ever to think ahead when it comes to securing grant income. Due to the significant demand for grants, it can take funders longer to make a decision as they are receiving large volumes of applications. Smaller grants can take four to six months for a decision, while larger grants with a two-stage application process can take up to 12 months.  

Factoring these longer lead-in times into your planning process will ensure that you don’t have a funding gap between one grant ending and another starting. Avoiding funding gaps is vital because job uncertainty can, unfortunately, lead to the loss of experienced staff members and disrupt service delivery.  

The Charity Commission previously studied over 100 charities that ran into financial difficulty and said the biggest difference between those that recovered and those that didn’t was their ability to plan ahead. By regularly setting aside time to review what you’re doing, where you’re heading, and what resources you need to get there, your organisation is more likely to be financially fit, with sufficient income from a range of sources. Having a clear funding pipeline can reduce the likelihood of funding gaps as it helps you track your applications to make sure that funding is secured in good time.  

If you apply for a lot of grants, for example, you’ll know that there’s a lot more to the process than simply writing an application and sending it off. There are different internal deadline dates for gathering the information you need to write your bid, deadlines for different application stages, and once a grant is awarded, there are monitoring and reporting deadlines. There’s also the question of finance – when will you get paid? Will it be in quarterly instalments or one lump sum? Is it payment in advance or arrears? Creating a funding pipeline helps you quickly see where you are at with all your funding applications:  

• Decide what tool you will use - it doesn’t need to be complicated, and tools such as Excel or Trello are simple options.  
• Define the headings or stages that work for you so you can see at a glance what grants have been applied for, what stage they are at, key dates and outcomes.  Headings may include Potential, To-Do, Next Up, In Progress, Applied, Secured, Unsuccessful, Key Learning and similar.
• Keep the pipeline document up-to-date to identify where action is needed. For example, if one particular bid is unsuccessful, what alternative action could you take?
• It can be helpful to record how many hours you’ve ‘invested’ in particular bids or tenders and to set this calculation against the outcome or the ‘financial return’ to help identify where your time is best spent.  

We know how skilled operators are at making money stretch further for the benefit of passengers, and at CTA, we’re using #CTWeek24 as an opportunity to highlight the incredible work you do and to continue making the case for greater investment in the sector.  

Useful links

The VCSE Strength Checker https://vcsestrengthchecker.org.uk/ is a free diagnostic tool that includes a quick financial health check and generates an instant short report highlighting any key strengths and weaknesses to consider.  

The Charity Commission guidance on Charity Finances (CC12) https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/managing-financial-difficulties-insolvency-in-charities-cc12 emphasises the responsibility of trustees to have a clear picture of their charity’s finances so that they can act on early warning indicators.