The competition for big grants is always stiff, even when the economy is booming. But this year’s stock market volatility and deep cuts in federal funding have contributed to an unusually crowded field of nonprofit competitors seeking big dollars. These days more than ever, landing major grants from foundations and corporate grant makers demands savvy approaches to stand out from the crowd.
“There’s this unwritten set of guidelines,” says Susan Schaefer, a consultant who specializes in large grants as principal of Resource Partners. “Major grants rely on relationships, and they are becoming more important this year because the competition is so fierce.”
Success will depend on creating opportunities to attract big grants and a communications strategy that helps capture the attention of funders who give them, she says.
The Chronicle spoke to Schaefer and three other experts who shared tactics for deepening ties with program officers, making a strong case for a six-figure grant, and securing the funding you need to sustain your operations for years to come. Here are their top tips.
Dedicate Resources to Seeking Big Grants
“Dollars and Change,” a 2024 report from Candid, GivingTuesday, and Network for Good, found that just 0.1 percent of foundations give out more than $100 million annually, yet they account for 35 percent of all the grant dollars awarded in a year. For nonprofits of every size, “There’s a place for the $10,000 grant, and then there needs to be a whole other strategy for a major-grants portfolio,” Schaefer says.
There’s a place for the $10,000 grant, and then there needs to be a whole other strategy for a major-grants portfolio.
Many nonprofits have fundraisers dedicated to securing major gifts from wealthy individuals. Schaefer recommends hiring fundraisers to chase down large grants, too. Those who do can build stronger relationships with foundations and corporate grant makers — and land heftier grants as a result.
“Nonprofits rarely discuss the largest foundations as a category. In my experience, the teams that think strategically about major grants have more success,” she says.
Jazz at Lincoln Center employs three major-grant officers on its team of 17 fundraisers, says Janna Spock, its vice president and chief development officer. They were pivotal in helping the performing-arts organization attract $4 million in foundation grants during its last fiscal year — about 20 percent of the group’s $20 million in fundraising revenue.
Dedicating a team to talk to big foundations has enabled the group to keep its footing despite a cloudy economic outlook, she says. Major-grants officers help program officers understand how closely the group’s mission is aligned with the funder’s priorities. At her organization, they emphasize jazz’s role in the history of the Black community, and how Jazz at Lincoln Center keeps those stories alive through performances and educational programs.
Strong relationships with institutional funders pay off during times of trouble, like now. Even though federal grants for diversity and the arts have vanished, those priorities have remained important to the group’s most steadfast supporters, Spock says. “Several foundations have been vocal that they’re going to double down and give as much, or more than ever, to make sure the organizations they support receive what they need.”
Use Tech Tools to Find New Prospects
The experts recommend a few places to start looking for foundations that award big money in your mission area. Spock’s team at Jazz at Lincoln Center uses Candid and GrantWatch as research tools.
Foundations are giving at historic levels. Nonprofits need to be prepared to have a bold vision that they can articulate to funders.
Mindi Jacobson, executive director and co-founder of Future Link, subscribes to Instrumentl to identify foundations that make large grants to groups like hers, which helps first-generation college students finish their degrees and receive career coaching before they enter the work force. She enters keywords, like “college completion” and “self-sufficiency,” into the software platform to generate a list of foundations that historically have given significant sums to groups focusing on related issues. After narrowing the field, she does her homework on each one.
“Dig through their 990s. See who they have funded in the past,” she says. If a grant maker only gives to large or national organizations, it’s probably not a great match for her group, but, “Are they looking to change the community, to empower people? Then it’s a fit,” she says.
Strengthen Ties With Existing Funders
If new prospects are like silver, then your existing funders are gold. Even if the grants you’ve been getting have been shy of the six-figure mark, now is the time to connect with the program officers you already know to increase your ask.
“Foundations are giving at historic levels. Nonprofits need to be prepared to have a bold vision that they can articulate to funders,” Schaefer says. It feels similar to 2020, she says, when foundations went into crisis mode to keep their grantees afloat, but limited their openings for first-time applicants. The current era might echo the Covid years, where trusted nonprofit partners received the majority of grant dollars through emergency funds, she says. “Some of them are already doubling down on their existing grantees.”
It’s also important to know whether any of your funders plan to spend down their assets over the next few years. If you’re a previous grantee of a sunsetting foundation, it’s “a favorable set of conditions for them to invest in you,” Schaefer says.
When deepening ties with program officers at wealthy foundations, use the same methods you use to steward major donors, Spock says: “We invite them to our concerts. We invite them to see us in action in the classroom or out in the field. We send them videos and interviews with Wynton [Marsalis] or other members of the leadership team.”
When deepening ties with program officers at wealthy foundations, use the same methods you use to steward major donors.
She sees a particularly impressive return on communications from Marsalis, the famed jazz trumpeter and artistic director of Jazz at Lincoln Center: “We’ve had foundations reach out to us directly after receiving the year-end email from Wynton.”
Finally, Spock reports, members of her board of directors’ development committee make their connections at relevant foundations feel valued and close. “Sometimes they serve on the boards of foundations themselves. It amplifies our impact.”
Create Giving Opportunities That Benefit Both Organizations
Amy Ellis Hauser, president of the VHC Health Foundation, says corporate donors in particular “want to see their name in lights.” You can harness that desire by creating opportunities that serve both your needs.
In her previous role as chief philanthropy officer at Conquer Cancer, Hauser led a campaign to create 25 endowments to mark the research group’s 25th anniversary. A milestone year speaks to longevity, which she emphasized when she asked longtime funders to increase their giving to support early-career cancer researchers in perpetuity.
The campaign “helped us hone in on our mission and articulate the power of the endowment,” she says. “Instead of giving a $10,000 grant, now they can endow it under their [company’s] name for $100,000.”
The caveat, Hauser says, is that staff turnover tends to be higher at company foundations than at independent foundations, making it harder to sustain connections with corporate program officers. “The corporate world is very volatile, and you may not be working with the same contact year after year,” she says. “It’s hard with the landscape that we’re in to maintain a solid relationship.”
Lock In Multiyear Support
Multiyear grants come with benefits for both parties. Because large grants are often paid out over several years, receiving one enables you to make long-range plans with more certainty. It also spreads out the amount that a foundation pays over a longer timeline with checkpoints along the way, which might make it more palatable for grant makers than agreeing to a significant lump sum upfront.
With one-year grants, Jacobson says, “you’re constantly on the hamster wheel” of filing semiannual reports and then applying for renewal. She says the ideal is a three-year grant: “Five years is too long. A lot can happen in five years. Three years is the sweet spot.”
Ask for the three-year grant and if they say no, you might still get the one-year grant.
Jacobson estimates 90 percent of her foundation contacts have given grants to Future Link for at least seven years, and some have been with her since she founded the group in 2008. When speaking to these trusted program officers, she describes how she envisions her programs growing in the future, with details of what she plans to accomplish this year and beyond. Then, she tells them, “You have been such a gift and a boost and you’ve watched me throughout all the growing pains. Can I count on you over the next three years?”
She says the timeline is always up for negotiation: “Ask for the three-year grant and if they say no, you might still get the one-year grant.” It’s a strategy that has created security for her group, Jacobson says: Six multiyear grants currently account for 49 percent of Future Link’s total expected income of $1.1 million this fiscal year.
Be Open and Transparent
Schaefer says she’s noticed a sea change since 2020 in how foundations are staffed, with fewer academics and more program officers who are former executives at the types of nonprofits the grant maker supports.
Program officers with front-line leadership experience are valuable allies. “There’s a more empathetic ear at these foundations than there has been in the past,” she says.
You cannot change your mission to chase the money. You have to stay true to who you are as an organization.
When that’s the case, you can be truthful about the headwinds your group is facing. You can send updates about challenges and ask for what you need to survive in tough times, she says. Honesty and transparency are the underpinnings of any good relationship, and your candor will help you cement your connection with funders.
“Smaller grants tend to rely on the writing, whether it’s the proposal or introductory communications,” Schaefer says. “Larger grants tend to rely on relationships. Relationships have shaped all of the major grants I’ve been involved with in my career.”
Jacobson agrees that integrity is crucial. She says you should never tweak your programs to fit a foundation’s criteria just for the sake of winning a big grant.
“You cannot change your mission to chase the money,” she says. “You have to stay true to who you are as an organization.”
But you should be honest about the other grant makers you’re working with because it conveys a positive group mentality. For example, you can say you’re looking for four foundations to support a program, and ask if you can count them in.
“Funders like to play in the sandbox,” she says, and they like to know they’re in good company. When they see who else is giving to you, “that’s when you start to build that momentum.”
