Written by Bob, Implementation Consultant at Fluent Technology, office ‘Flex-pert’, keen musician and resident Dr Love.
The work involved in getting a submitted application to award should not be tedious, it should not be difficult, and it should not be time consuming. After all, your real efforts should be focused on ensuring your awards are being put to good use.
Submit. Click. Award.
Wouldn’t it be nice? An application is submitted, you click, and hey presto it’s either awarded or it isn’t.
I have worked with numerous grant giving organisations, helping to modernise their methods of grant management. Some came from an entirely spreadsheet based process, others were transitioning from older systems. A common topic of conversation I find myself having with clients involves the number of clicks it takes to get an application from submission to award (I call them ‘click tolls’ in the hopes that it might catch on). A few clicks to check a particular application response is valid. A couple of clicks to check budgets are balanced. Some more clicks to confirm the application is eligible. You get the point, the clicks have become part of the process. Grant managers don’t want the road to the real meat of an application’s assessment to be riddled with click tolls, and it doesn’t have to be.
Things have come a long way from the traditional paper based application of yesteryears. Online application forms can be deemed ineligible before they are submitted, project expenditure can be calculated and graded automatically, objectives and outcomes can be identified and monitored, returns on investment and value for money can be calculated behind the scenes. We may not be at the stage where a system can read an application’s descriptive content and determine its viability but we are working on it 🙂
In the meantime why not push some of the grunt work onto the machine so you can focus on what’s important? Unfortunately, until advances in technology usher in the age of A.I. (Artificial Intelligence) and we all become slaves of the machine, us mere mortals will have to do most of the clicking. But take a look at your current process and consider what changes would help bring your grants closer to submit, click, award. You might be surprised with what you find!
Say goodbye to the crapplication and hello to A.I. (Application Intelligence).
Share your ideas, engage with us, and together we can make this vision a reality.
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