How to Become a Grant-Ready Nonprofit

Many nonprofits want to receive grants to support their work, but are not successful in receive the grant awards. Dr. Toni Rockis shares her process for getting more grants.

Dr. Toni Rockis is a powerhouse in the world of education and grants. She began her career as a high school special education teacher, quickly rising to a statewide consultant for Vocational-Special Needs Education with the Illinois State Board of Education. From there, she became a Professor of Education at Illinois State University (ISU), all while working as a grant writer and educational consultant. On top of that, she served as Executive Director for two key organizations—the Illinois Vocational-Special Needs Professional Development Center and the Illinois Adult Education Center.

After leaving the university, Dr. Rockis brought her talents to the private sector as Vice President of R&D. In that role, she wrote winning grant proposals that brought much-needed career and STEAM development labs to elementary and high schools across the Midwest.

But that wasn’t the end of her journey with ISU. She returned to establish and direct the National Manufacturing Workforce Development Center, a major initiative under President Bush’s High-Growth Job Training Initiative, funded by the U.S. Department of Labor. Thanks to her leadership, community colleges across the U.S. launched successful workforce development projects that trained dislocated workers for lucrative jobs in manufacturing.

Over the years, Dr. Rockis has become a sought-after expert, writing professional development materials and speaking at national, state, and local conferences. She also had the honor of serving as President of the Grant Professionals Association. (GPA) Chicago Area Chapter for two years.

With an impressive track record of securing over $72M in grant funding for schools and educational organizations nationwide, Dr. Rockis continues to make an impact. She now leads Granted Inc., a consulting firm that helps nonprofits secure sustainable funding through grant writing. She’s also the visionary behind the Grants Made Simple Foundation, a nonprofit that teaches K-12 educators how to write grant proposals to expand their budgets and create new opportunities for their students.

Dr. Rockis is passionate about empowering others, and her dedication to education and community development shines through in everything she does.

More at – https://grantedwriters.com 

The Interview Transcript

Hugh Ballou:
Welcome to the Nonprofit Exchange. This is Hugh Ballou, founder and president of SynerVision Leadership Foundation. We work with leaders creating synergy around vision. We impact people’s lives. In order to do that, you know, we build a car. We learn to drive the car. Now we have to put gas in the car. So your nonprofit needs the fuel to be able to do it. And there’s eight streams of revenue. But we’re going to talk about one specific stream of revenue today. It’s grants. My special guest today is a friend and a professional colleague who understands grants and has a whole different perspective to help you get your head around being grant ready. As a matter of fact, title of today’s episode is How to Become a Grant-Ready Nonprofit. So, Dr. Toni Rockis, welcome to the Nonprofit Exchange, and take a minute to tell people a little bit about your background and how you got here, your passion for teaching people how to write grants.

Dr. Toni Rockis:
Thank you, Hugh. Yes, it’s interesting because everybody gets someplace in different ways. And mine was kind of circuitous. But I was a teacher, my background is education. And everybody knows that teachers get into that profession, not because we want to get wealthy, but because we want to help children and help people help parents, etc. So as a teacher, I realized that that was an important part of what I was trying to do. But I also realized very early on my into my career that I wanted to go on and be a university professor, because I wanted to help a different group of people as well. And as I got into all of that, I got into the grant world, which put me and to a very different perspective with regard to helping people. It’s amazing what you can do with grants. It is just fascinating how these nonprofits have so many different ideas about how to help the world and the people in it. And that got me. I was kind of hooked, if you will, when I got into the grant world. So I started writing grants. Oh, my goodness. Over 40 years ago, I think. And I’ve been doing it ever since. I can’t stop. I love it. I’m one of those strange people that’s that actually really likes to sit down and write a grant proposal. People will look at me like I’m a little strange when I tell them that. But I love it because of the outcome, not the process necessarily, although I don’t mind the process at all. But the outcome is you get to see so many different things happening in the environment that you’re in and the environment that other people are in, especially with the nonprofits that help people. All of these projects are things that make a difference in the world. So that’s my passion. And that’s why I got into grant writing.

Hugh Ballou:
Well, there is certainly a need out there. So, we’re talking about how to become grant ready. Those of you that are watching us on video, you’ll be able to see this handout. If you’re listening to it on the audio podcast, if you go to the non-profit exchange.org, the You’ll see the episode, you’ll see this episode on becoming grant ready. And then in that episode, you’ll have the full transcripts of you. Oh, I missed that. No worries. You can find it and you can capture it, but you’ll also have a link to download this document, but we’re going to, we’re going to talk through it right now. And that way you can. envision it in your mind, and then you can go to the website and download it. So, Toni, I’ve got the document to share here. There are seven different areas to become grant ready. So let’s highlight those areas first, and then if you’d go back and do details for each one.

Dr. Toni Rockis:
Certainly. I kind of call them the seven pillars of success for being grant ready for a nonprofit. And the first one is organizational foundation. The second is financial stability. The third is documentation. The fourth, grant management. The fifth, relationships and networking, which is so critical in everything we do, but especially with grant writing. The sixth is the impact that we make as a nonprofit. And the seventh is the marketing and communications that we do to get the word out about what we’re doing.

Hugh Ballou:
That’s so important. So now I’m getting ready to take notes. Remember, you can get the transcripts. So Tony, let’s unpack each one of these. And this organizational foundation, it’s the journey. By the way, my name’s Hugh Ballou. But for purpose of this conversation, I’m called HB, just not to confuse Hugh with you when she’s talking to other people. But that’s an aside. I’m still me. So part of the work that I do with nonprofits is help them do this foundational piece. You know, so it’s so critical for everything else. So I’m glad to see that you put it first. So organizational foundation, tell us the details on this one, please.

Dr. Toni Rockis:
Certainly, it is so critical. You’re absolutely correct, H.B. I was very fortunate because I have a nonprofit as well. And when I started my nonprofit just a few years ago, I was like many nonprofit leaders. I didn’t know a lot about running a nonprofit organization. So luckily, I was in a professional organization that H.B. was also in. We met. He said, I can help you. And I said, please do. And he did. So… He helped me with the organizational development from the perspective that we have to understand that the leadership of a nonprofit is absolutely critical. And that’s not only the founder and the staff, but it’s also the board. So we talked about visions and missions and all of the things that you need to outline in order to have an organization that you understand and that you can convey what you do to other people very clearly, very concisely, and sometimes in a compelling fashion. It’s a lot like writing grants. But the biggest part, oh, I’m sorry.

Hugh Ballou:
Go ahead. Yeah, no, no. The, I was going to say that when you do write the grants, the data you need is in this, this section here, your strategic plan, right?

Dr. Toni Rockis:
Absolutely. And you took the words out of my mouth because what you did was you told me what a strategic plan was and how to develop one. And what’s been amazing about that is that our foundation and Our board uses that strategic plan year after year after year. We change it when it needs to be changed. We leave it alone when it needs to be left alone. And it becomes a fluid document that is the life of the organization. So yes, that strategic plan is critical.

Hugh Ballou:
Love it. Love it.

Dr. Toni Rockis:
OK, we’ll move to number two, if that’s OK for a moment. And that’s financial and fiscal responsibility and stability. Being part of a nonprofit, I’m sure you can identify with the fact that the finances often are a big, I don’t want to say a big deal, but it’s something that looms in our minds all the time. Because without the money to support the organization and what we’re trying to accomplish, we’re kind of dead in the water. So you have to have fiscal responsibility and financial stability. And that means you have to have your budgets all in line. You have to know that everything’s balanced and working. You have to have financial statements. Now this from a funders perspective is really important. That and financial reviews and audits because what funders will want to know as you look at requests for proposals, if you will, and grants that are available to nonprofits is that Your nonprofit is financially stable that you’re a good steward of the money that you have, and that you will be a really good steward of the money that the funder gives you because when you work with a funder with a grant, you’re in partnership with that funder. And you have to work with them from a perspective that they understand what you’re trying to accomplish. They know that they’ve given you the dollars to accomplish it. And they know then, hopefully, because of your background and the stability of your organization, that you’re going to do a really good job handling their dollars and giving them the outcomes that you want. So that financial part of a nonprofit is a very large component to consider. Shall I move to number three?

Hugh Ballou:
Let’s go. That is the stability. We tend to follow the word nonprofit, which is not a good perspective. And we don’t want to think about money. But it’s really, you said financial stability and physical responsibility. That’s a paradigm shift for a lot of us. So thank you for that piece. So number three, documentation. Oh my goodness.

Dr. Toni Rockis:
Yes, and this in some ways is perhaps one of the easiest pillars to deal with once you get everything in place. Because what a funder will want as that funder is looking at your organization and deciding whether to give dollars to you or not for a project, is they’re going to want to know that you have all your documentation in place. They’ll probably ask for, most likely, a copy of your IRS determination letter to prove that you’re a 501c3. They want to make sure that you’ve got your bylaws in place, that your articles of incorporation have been done, and all the key documents and elements to make sure that your organization has a very strong foundation. Program descriptions are important as well because they want to know what you’re going to do with the money. what your outcomes will be with that project, who you’re going to affect. Your target audience is key to them. And I tell my students when I’m talking to them about proposal development that they don’t want to hear that your organization needs money. They want to hear that your target population needs the funds so that you can provide the services to that target population for the outcome that will help both you and the funder because your missions are intertwined. And that’s how you write a good proposal. And that’s how you will find that you get funded most often, because your mission statements and what you want to accomplish is completely parallel to the funders mission statements and what they want to accomplish. So it’s a really true partnership. It’s not you off on your own doing this. It’s you and the funder working collaboratively to make sure that your target population is served in the way they should be.

Hugh Ballou:
That is so critical. Speak for a minute. In a way, you’re a matchmaker. We have to figure out what nonprofit wants to fund what you want to do. Because a lot of people want to just make up stuff, and they say, OK, they’re going to fund this because it’s important. But it doesn’t match what the funder wants to do.

Dr. Toni Rockis:
Yes, and so many organizations, not just nonprofits, but all organizations that are looking for funds, don’t realize this, and they try to fit a square hole in a round peg, if you will. In other words, what they don’t want to do and what no organization wants to do ever is to chase the money. because that takes you off of your mission. It diverts you from what you’re trying to accomplish as a non-profit. So it’s important that there’s a synergy there between the funder and the organization and the way the funds are going to be spent. Did that address your question well enough, or is there something else you’d like to talk about?

Hugh Ballou:
That’s a paradigm shift for a lot of people, that they really have to do the research to figure out who wants to fund that match, who wants to fund what it is you want to do, and then They want to know how you’re going to deliver the results. So I think this piece is so, a lot of times people don’t understand this and they do a lot of work and they don’t get funded and they wonder why.

Dr. Toni Rockis:
Absolutely. You definitely want, you want a relationship with the organization. If you can, if you can get it, I can tell you stories and I might tell you one at a moment about the fact that you can get money without a relationship, but it’s so much more difficult. Don’t let that stop you. If you see a grant out there that’s got your name written all over it, and it’s exactly what you want to do, and the foundation is exactly a great match for what you’re trying to accomplish, don’t let the fact that you don’t have a relationship with the foundation stop you from applying. But if there’s any way that you can form relationships and do the networking and do all of that beforehand, it’s very helpful.

Hugh Ballou:
So you put a little teaser out there. You want to do the story now, or you want to wait a little later?

Dr. Toni Rockis:
We can do it now. I can explain this. I did another course with teachers, being an ex-teacher. My heart’s in education, of course. And so I developed, so that I could get to more teachers, I used to do professional development. And it was kind of like one-on-one and one on small groups, one on large groups. But it wasn’t the reach that I really wanted. So I decided to develop an online course for the teachers. And we did a beta. We brought a group of teachers in, and they knew nothing about writing grants, or very little. A few of them had written one or two. Some of them had gotten funded. But for the most part, they were new to the experience. And one of my teachers that I worked very closely with said, I’m a science teacher, but our school needs band instruments really badly. We’ve got kids sharing instruments. And even in concerts, they have to pass their instruments on to other people to play in order to make the concert work. And I said, let’s go. Let’s try it. So we found a funder. We knew no one at that organization. We had no contacts, no information about the organization except what we did for research. And we did. We looked at the 990s and we figured out who they funded, we figured out how much information they provided, how much money they’d given out historically. That’s all the kind of research you want to do about an organization that you’re going to be writing a proposal for. So we did all of our homework and it looked like it was still a good match for us. So they wanted a letter of intent first. And that’s simply for those of you that may not know what that is. It’s just a short letter that you write. Generally, it’s only one page, sometimes two, about the project that you want to project and give to that funder to consider. And they got 1,200 letters of intent. Now, this was for a small amount of money, all in all. So that’s a very competitive situation. The funder looked at those 1200, we were told by the funder, and they immediately took more than half of them, more than 600 of those letters came out, because the people simply didn’t either know how to write a letter of intent, didn’t pay attention to what they asked for in the letter, etc. We made that cut. And then they, they went through the letter of intent, and they did an interview. And out of that, roughly 580 possibilities, there were 12 that they said, OK, we’re going to invite you to write a proposal. So that’s what we had to go through to just write the proposal. Well, we were one of the 12 and we were so happy about that. It was amazing. We wrote the proposal and out of the 12, they funded nine and we were one that got funded. So that it doesn’t happen all the time. But I say that and I want you to know that is the networking and the relationships are critical. But don’t let it stop you.

Hugh Ballou:
If you think you’ve got a good project and a good proposal, that is so inspiring, but you did your homework. There’s no shortcuts with that. Is there?

Dr. Toni Rockis:
There is not because by looking at the nine 90, you can tell pretty quickly. Um, if in fact, you’re going to be a good match for them. If you’re in a geographic area that they’ve served before. There are all kinds of informational pieces you can get from a 990 and you definitely want to do that prior to submitting a proposal.

Hugh Ballou:
Now, let’s go back to that documents. 990 is the tax return we do for IRS. But there are a number of smaller startups that don’t generate a lot of revenue, and they don’t need to do a 990. You file online, or you do this little postcard. So what about those organizations? Can they be grant ready?

Dr. Toni Rockis:
Yes, they can be. Obviously, it’s easier as your nonprofit grows and you get more documentation and you get more experience, you get more wins, if you will. It is always easier to write a proposal and get it funded. So I want to put that on the table. But this was a school had no experience with writing grants at all and and got $10,000. for that band and for all the kids in that band that didn’t have an instrument, they now have one. So yes, don’t let those kinds of things stop you, but just know that there are certain steps you want to take that will make it a little easier for you.

Hugh Ballou:
So this is a wealth of information. We’re finished three out of seven. Next one is grant management. Talk about that.

Dr. Toni Rockis:
Yes. Well, that’s having somebody in your organization that knows how to write grants, that’s interested in writing grants, or someone that you can, in some cases, contract with to write the proposal for you. But the whole idea of the grant writing skills, you have to have somebody that at least knows the basics. And in working with these teachers, they didn’t until we worked together. And it’s not hard. This is what I want everyone to understand. And I’m not sure why grant writing got such a bad reputation with it being so difficult. It is not rocket science. It is not hard. You just have to have a system. You have to have a process. You have to know what the funder wants. You have to know what they want from you and give them what they want from you. And it all falls into place once you have that. So grant writing is not something you should shy away from. I didn’t know what I was doing when I started either, but it hooked me. And I just kept learning year after year. So that’s why I think that just having somebody around, whether it’s a professional grant writer, whether it’s somebody within your organization, whether it’s a volunteer that perhaps has written grants, just having somebody there that has a little bit of a background on grant writing will help you tremendously.

Hugh Ballou:
I think it’s fair to insert at this point that you are, as we speak the next day, tomorrow, we’re in 2024. People might be listening to it in some year in the future. They will be. So you’re launching a beta group. So you’re teaching people how to be self-sufficient and learn how to do this and have somebody in their organization to train to write these grants. So I just wanted to highlight that. Any more you want to say about that? That’s sort of your purpose is to help people be self-sufficient here, isn’t it?

Dr. Toni Rockis:
Absolutely, yes. And it was amazing when we kind of put the word out how many nonprofits had people within their organization that wanted to learn how to write grant proposals. A few of them are a little nervous about it, but we’ve talked about that. And I think the nerves have gone with regard to knowing they can be successful. So it just takes, again, a little bit of guidance and direction. Looking at proposals, reading proposals that have been funded, just doing the things that we would do if we were learning any still.

Hugh Ballou:
And this, this grant management piece, you’re going to set up at the beginning, you’re going to set up the data collection to do the reporting because it’s essential to report on how you spent the money and the impact. So I’ve seen nonprofits scramble. Oh, we got to get the data together to do our report, but speak just a minute about setting up those metrics at the beginning.

Dr. Toni Rockis:
Well, it’s very important to set those metrics up. And that’s where the documentation comes in. And that’s where I’m assuming, and if I’m off track here, let me know, that you’re talking about the evaluation piece. Because you definitely, and I will tell you, I’ve been a reader at the federal level, the state level, at the foundation level of proposals that come in, and being competitive myself and having written a lot of proposals, I know that evaluation is where a lot of points are lost. And it shouldn’t be the case because evaluation is not difficult, again, if you know how to set it up and you know how to explain to a funder how you’re going to show that you’re going to make an impact with your target audience. That’s really what it’s all about. You’re going to use their money to impact the people they want you to serve that they want to serve as well. for a positive impact. That’s what evaluation is.

Hugh Ballou:
And then you’re going to have those metrics and you collect them as you go through the process of spending the money, right?

Dr. Toni Rockis:
Absolutely. You have both formative and summative evaluation if you want to get technical. Formative evaluation is the evaluation that you do as you go along. And it allows you to do a couple of things. The biggest thing is it allows you to adjust. If you’re evaluating as you go along and you’re seeing that something that you thought would work isn’t quite working the way you thought it would. You just adjust it. And you in some cases, you don’t have to call the funder. And in some cases, you will call the funder and say, hey, I think we’re going to do this this way instead of this way. And they’ll almost 100% of the time, they know you’re the expert at what you’re doing. And they’ll say, absolutely, just go for it.

Hugh Ballou:
And that’s a piece I believe most people don’t really understand. Most of it we don’t understand, but that’s a big, big part of it. So that’s great. So five, six, and seven, this is really good, Toni.

Dr. Toni Rockis:
Thank you. Well, five is relationships and networking, and I’m sure everybody listening knows how important networking is. And I will tell you, being an introvert, networking is not easy for me. much more comfortable standing in the corner and listening to conversations and having people come to me, I’ve learned to get over it, to be honest. It’s really, really important. And what you learn as an introvert is people want to hear what you’re doing. People want to hear what you’re experiencing. They want to hear what’s working, what’s not working. So you just have to get over the introverted part of it. And the more people you know, the more people you talk to, the more people you talk about what you’re doing, the more you listen, because networking is a lot about listening as well, the more you listen and the better listener you are, you’ll start picking up pieces and parts of things that other people are doing that resonate with what you’re doing. And you’ll say to yourself, I should try that with this project. And you’ll be able to share what you’re doing that’s worth that’s worked for you with them, and you may be able to help them as well. So the relationships and the networking are just incredibly important, and as are the partnerships. And I want to go back to that for just a minute, because partnerships are what makes funders and people who receive funding from funders work. Because you have to understand when you write a grant, you are going into a partnership with that funder. You’re not out there doing things all alone. You’re taking someone’s money, you’re doing what you said you would do, and you’re working with them along the way to make sure that everything’s working the way it should. You can do that. A lot of funders will want reports quarterly or reports semi-annually, or they may just want a final report. But the bottom line is, however your reporting is to them, you need to have contact with them as you go along because Things will come up and you may want to run it by that funder. You may want to change something like we just talked about. But that partnership is critical. And it’s something that is almost sacred between a grant writer and the organization that’s been funded and the funder itself.

Hugh Ballou:
Impact. This is what it’s all about, isn’t it?

Dr. Toni Rockis:
It is. Yes, it is. And impact is number six. Nice transition, HB. Nice segue there. Impact, measurement, go hand in hand, okay? You want, when you write your proposal, to have very clear outcomes. You want to make sure that that funder knows exactly what you’re going to do, which means you have to know exactly what you’re going to do. So I tell all my students to write a summary statement before they even get started that outlines, and it’s just a couple of sentences, it’s so easy, that outlines for them what they’re going to do, how they’re going to use the money, and who they’re going to affect. And that’s the impact. And that those outcomes are your evaluation plan. That’s how simple evaluation really is. Whether you do it in a formative fashion along the way, or whether you do a summative evaluation at the end, my recommendation is always to do both. Because then you can gauge things as they’re going along and fix something if you need to. And then at the end, you want to know for sure, did you accomplish what you said you were going to accomplish? Because that funder wants to know that. And if you accomplished what you said you were going to accomplish and you worked well with them, there’s always the chance that you’ll get funded again, which is what you’d love to have happen.

Hugh Ballou:
Bingo. That’s the missing, one of the missing pieces. So here’s one that’s, that’s not only good for grants, but overall operations, marketing and communications.

Dr. Toni Rockis:
Yes.  And this, we can look at this from a variety of ways. Storytelling is something that I teach in my programs because some people are incredible storytellers. My husband is an incredible storyteller. HB is a great storyteller. If you’ve got that and it comes naturally, that’s fabulous because you’re a step ahead. I’m not a great storyteller. I wasn’t when I got started in all of this. So I had to learn how to do it. And again, it’s a learned skill. It’s something that has a process and a system, and it has steps, and you just learn how to do it. But storytelling is what will set your proposal apart from your competitors’ proposals. Because if you can wind a good story into what you’re doing in your proposal, and when I say story, I’m talking a few paragraphs, maybe one sometimes. I think it was Ernest Hemingway, had the greatest short story ever written. It was seven words. I think he was in a bar one night, and one of his colleagues said, can you write a short story in seven words? And he said, yes. And let me count these, because I’m not sure it was seven. It was baby shoes, for sale, never worn. Six words, sorry. So Ernest Hemingway, I think he won $1,000 or something like that from the person that gave him the bet. In six words, he told a short story. Because with those six words, you know exactly or you can certainly surmise what that story was about. And that’s as simple as storytelling is. So you use storytelling to get the emotional aspect of your proposal to the reader. You got to hook that reader because that reader is important to you. And if they’re reading three dozen proposals, five dozen proposals, who knows how many they have in front of them to read. You want something in your proposal that’s going to make it stand out so they remember it. So that when they go in to talk to the board of that organization that’s going to fund you, They can say, yeah, let me tell you this story that was in the proposal. And you’ve got the board hooked, you’ve got the reader hooked, and you’ve got a memory. So they remember what you’re trying to do. And it really is so dynamic and so important in grant writing. That’s my impression and my suggestion for you as grant writers.

Hugh Ballou:
Tony Rockis, you’ve covered a very complex topic in summary form today. And so there’s numbers of ways. Center Vision has a community. It’s a nonprofit community.org. You can find us there. You can learn. There’ll be links on the page to download the document that she used to talk. It’ll be her website and some other things, which is currently being rebuilt, but it’ll be up and running soon. So this is so helpful, and we’re grateful that you took time to tell this story today. It’s a multifaceted story. So as we end this really helpful interview, what’s the thought, a key tip or a thought or a challenge that you want to leave people with?

Dr. Toni Rockis:
The challenge, I believe, would be or the thought would be I hear so many people say, I could never write a grant. I don’t know how to write a grant. And for nonprofits, it is one of the eight funding streams, it is something to consider. And it we don’t want only one funding stream, because we know that will probably not be good for your organization if something happens like COVID. But it’s one of eight that you should look at. If you’re at all interested, you need to talk to somebody who is a grant writer. Start looking and talking with people who are with nonprofits that have funding coming in through grants and find out what they’re funding. Find out what the programs are that sound really interesting to you, that relate to what you’re trying to accomplish with your nonprofit, and consider it. It’s not, as I said, rocket science. You can do it. And I certainly hope you choose to do it somewhere down the road, if not right away. And let us know we’re around if you need anything.

Hugh Ballou:
Dr. Tony Rokas, who’s been our guest on the nonprofit exchange today, this was so helpful and you walk us through it and it’s very understandable and I know people want to know more. So watch for this episode at the nonprofit exchange dot org. So, Tony, thank you so much for sharing today.

Dr. Toni Rockis:
Thank you for the offer.