Monthly Webinar | Funding Your Organization’s Future: Don't Wish for It, Plan for It-Video Recording

Video Transcription

Video Summary

NGMA Executive Director Tip Tucker Kendall opened the webinar with updates for members, including the upcoming Annual Grants Training in Washington, D.C., last-day voting for five open NGMA Board seats, and the launch of NGMA’s redesigned website and Grants Management Academy. She highlighted new resources such as an improved “JamBot” guide, template library, a forthcoming Introduction to Grants Management cohort course, and expanded options to earn CPEs. Moderator Brittany Curtis (Crow LLP) reviewed housekeeping: chat disabled for attendees, questions via Q&A, slides available in the Academy, and CPE/Certificate of Completion eligibility requiring responses to three live polling questions.<br /><br />Presenters Timothy Cutler and Patrick Swinnick (BerryDunn) delivered “Funding Your Organization’s Future: Don’t Wish for It, Plan for It,” emphasizing strategic grant management over reactive, deadline-driven behavior. Tim covered pre-award planning, noting common reasons proposals fail (misalignment with mission, weak goals, sustainability gaps, poor budgeting, and inadequate stakeholder coordination). He recommended grant readiness assessments, structured project planning, early budgeting, risk assessment, compliance mapping, differentiated proposal narratives, and proactive submission logistics.<br /><br />Patrick focused on post-award strategy across four phases: award setup (deep review of terms, financial systems, kickoff meetings, RACI roles, and internal controls), active monitoring (budget oversight, reconciliations, risk-based subrecipient monitoring, and consistent policy adherence), reporting (shared calendars and impact storytelling), and closeout (reconciliation, record retention, and building files throughout). The session concluded with guidance to start by strengthening organizational readiness and standardizing processes to improve compliance, performance, and future funding competitiveness.

Keywords

NGMA webinar

grants management

Annual Grants Training Washington DC

grant readiness assessment

pre-award planning

post-award compliance

subrecipient monitoring

internal controls

grant reporting and storytelling

grant closeout and record retention