The “DNA” of Grant
Management Processes
Alex Sirota
A Story
• Summer Company is yearly entrepreneurship experience for 15-29
year olds.
– www.ontario.ca/summercompany
• Business Process Reengineering began in 2002
• Now in v9
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eService Business Consultant wrote requirements with program input
Economics and Business Cluster implemented code
Yearly project charter < $100,000
Total budget spent - $400,000 over 5+ years
Summer Company Registration, Eligibility and Evaluation Network
(SCREEN) is result
• Reusable internally by other clusters
The problem
• Fix program mechanics & measure results
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Lead time for applications too short
Not enough applications to fill 300-600 grants
Incomplete and non-standard applications
Identifying “successful completion”
Reporting measures of success
The solution
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Yearly continual iterations to improve
Build Front and Back Office together
Workflow built in based on grant best-practices
Easy to learn and use
Provide access to pre- and post-approval application
processes for ALL stakeholders
• Rudimentary Reporting and Integration with Finance to
Disburse Cheques
– https://stage.ontariocanada.com/screen (Front Office)
– https://stage.ontariocanada.com/screen_bo (Back Office)
Status Quo
• All paper applications have been deprecated
– SCREEN has processed over 15,000 applications since 2003, over 2000
approved applications.
• Privacy Impact Assessment (PIA) completed by OCIPO with 10
recommendations to continue to remove private information from
all existing paper-based processes (disbursement requests to
Finance)
• Organizations have recently approached us to use the code and
model
– Issues: Liability, timing, support, open-source, making system a
generic platform, cost not usually an issue
In short…
• Success in grant management is *much* more than effective
processing and administration
• Important to properly address:
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Privacy
Complete applications
Provide control to proponents during pre/post-approval
Relationship management
Measuring financial forecasts/actuals
Tracking the “story” of the project
Measuring success
Reporting longitudinally
And Privacy, again
Agile Guiding Principles
• Individuals and interactions over
– processes and tools
• Working software over
– comprehensive documentation
• Customer collaboration over
– contract negotiation
• Responding to change over
– following a plan
A proposal…
• Approach in incremental steps, implementing only
shared, common needs and functionality
• Work from a “strawdog” approach, testing a standard
logic model
• Leverage an “open source” model of development both
from a business process and a code perspective
– Build an abstraction layer to benefit all who use the system
• Build a strong community of practice with process and
code as the backbone
Benefits of Proposal
• Incremental approach will yield quick wins for
organizations that can adopt proposed grant model
• Creating a shared grant logic model will make it easier
for others to install-and-run
• Open-source will make it easy for organizations in the
BPS to contribute and receive benefits from code
library
• Learning from each other’s successes and failures in a
community of practice centered around the “project”
How unique are grant processes?
• Is there a shared “DNA” between
different grant processes?
• Imagine:
– An easy to configure, scalable, inexpensive
grant management process that is available
to anyone in the OPS or the Broader Public
Sector.
True or False?
• We have plenty of time to get this right?
– Culture change takes 5+ years, not 1 or 2, consultants are
always available to “help”
– Government collects and spends money, we are good at
collecting, but spending effectively and measuring outcomes?
• Technology solutions are the answer?
– Appear to solve the mechanics problem (20%)
• We know how to measure performance and outcomes?
– Program measurement, performance and outcomes are not
usually addressed effectively (80%)
One “DNA” strand for GM
• A logic model:
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Eligibility Check
Application Inquiry (aka Part A)
Authentication
Formal Application (aka Part B)
Submission
Recommendation
Evaluation
Approval/Initial Disbursement(s)
Project Monitoring
Successful/Unsuccessful Completion
Project/Outcome Reporting
References
• Lawrence Lessig “Code is Law”
– harvardmagazine.com/2000/01/code-is-law.html
• Agile Methodologies
– www.agilemanifesto.org and www.agilealliance.org
• Independent Blue Ribbon Panel “From Red Tape to
Clear Results”
– www.brp-gde.ca
• Project Streamline report from foundations in US
– www.projectstreamline.org
• Open Proposal Appraisal http://sourceforge.net/projects/opa
• Vista – Veteran’s Administration open source solution,
runs Mexico’s health care system
TODO
• Create mapping of SCREEN modules to Common
Process Model/Workflow
– Intake, filtering, funding provision, monitoring &
closure
– Agreement Management, Financial Management,
Information Management, Operations, Performance
– Information & Referral, Client Advice, Community &
Industry Advice, Service Development & Monitoring,
Governance, Framework Management, Integrity
Management need to be worked out
Explore ROI of Build vs Buy
• Solutions for grant management are
immature, long term cost for support
could be a lot larger than you think –
customization is always hidden cost
• Building your own, deployment on cloud
computing systems like Google’s “App
Engine”