How-To Guides

Step-by-step guides for everyday grant, finance, safeguarding and program work, by topic.

Program Design

Run a needs assessment
A practical guide for program staff to identify community gaps and assets to inform program design.

Proposals and Fundraising

How to write a concept note for funders
Turn a project idea into a short concept note that gets a funder interested and, ideally, invited to send a full proposal.

Grants Management and Compliance

Create a grant compliance tracker from a grant agreement
How to pull obligations out of a grant agreement and turn them into a working tracker, by hand or with an AI assistant.

Finance and Budgeting

Allocate shared costs across grants
Learn how to split shared expenses across multiple funding sources using defensible allocation bases and a written plan.

Safeguarding and Accountability

Set up a complaints and feedback mechanism
A practical guide for organizations to build a safe, community-led system for receiving and responding to feedback and complaints.
Reporting safeguarding incidents to funders
Learn how to notify funders of safeguarding allegations promptly and correctly while protecting survivors and maintaining confidentiality.

Humanitarian Response

Run a rapid needs assessment
Learn how to conduct a quick and credible assessment of basic needs to decide how to respond in the early days of an emergency.

AI for Nonprofit and Development Work

AI for grant writing without inventing facts
A workflow for using an AI assistant on proposals while keeping invented statistics, fake citations and false organizational claims away from your funder.
Using AI for Donor Reports
Learn a step-by-step workflow to use AI assistants for drafting donor reports while ensuring every figure and claim remains accurate.