Tech Blog

Many people have asked me about Meyer Memorial Trust's GrantIS software – a database and online application system that we designed to process grant requests and awards.  They want to know the what/when/why/how details and what we learned along the way.  So, I've tried to summarize about five years of work on the project below to provide the scoop.  Many other foundations have gone through a software design process and may have similar or completely different experiences.  This is just our story.

Before I move on, I must take a moment to thank and give credit to our amazing and fabulous software development team, Aaron Nelson and Grant Kruger.  They are the power behind the machine and have built GrantIS almost from the ground up. (And they have put up with our endless new feature requests!)  Aaron and Grant are also co-authors of the project summary below.

GRANTIS HISTORY

Mission.  The mission of GrantIS is to provide a user-friendly and streamlined application process for MMT applicants and to increase staff productivity.

Origins.  In the early 2000’s, Meyer Memorial Trust began investigating moving from a paper and postal mail-based grant application system to an online process.  At that time, the Trust accepted proposals by mail and entered data manually into a Filemaker database for tracking.  We had conducted initial tests using online application forms for the Support for Teacher Initiatives and Small Grants programs, but these early forms were clunky, not user-friendly, and didn’t import directly into the Filemaker database.  We realized that we needed a more robust application system in order for it to be effective for both staff and applicants.

In 2005, we researched the commercial grants management software options that were available and found the choices to be limited, extremely expensive, non-customizable and Windows-based. (MMT is an all-Mac office.)  We then determined that for the same cost as purchasing a commercial product that didn’t meet our needs, we could build our own customized system instead.  In keeping with MMT’s spirit of sharing, we decided to build it using an open source, LAMP (Linux/Apache/MySQL/PHP) based system.  We began this work in 2006.

Current Features.  As of December 2010, GrantIS provides the following functionality:

For Applicants:

• An Organizational Profile that can be saved and updated instead of requiring re-entry of information for each new application.
• Online application forms.
• A status display to indicate where a proposal is in the review process.
• A historical list of all their organization’s applications and outcomes.
• Online uploading of grant reports and a visual display indicating where a report is in the review process.

For MMT Staff:

• Automated tax-exempt eligibility checking via a Guidestar Charity-Check plug-in.
• Automatic receipt of applications into the database.
• Dashboard tracking of applications by program, status, and assigned program officer.
• Award processing, including award letters, grant agreements, and check requests.
• Report monitoring system to process reports, and track grants monitor and program officer summaries.
• Writeup editing system for program officers to author application summaries.
• Automated compilation of writeups for board book dockets.
• Instant payout and award reports.
• Ability to edit and post grant descriptions directly to MMT’s website.
• Ability to work from anywhere that has an Internet connection.

FUTURE OF GRANTIS

We’ve learned that there is no completion date for GrantIS’s development.  It is an organic system that will grow along with MMT as we add or change grant programs and processes.

Because it is a customizable system, we continue to collect feature requests from both staff and applicants.  The priority features to be included in the next version of GrantIS (2.0) are items that will further increase productivity and were not able to be implemented in earlier versions due to time and resource limitations:

• More Flexible Application Design – GrantIS was initially designed with two types of application forms:  a one-step process for small grants, and a two-step inquiry/ proposal process for large requests.  However, we now need a more flexible system to allow quick addition of user-friendly application forms for new programs or RFP’s as they come up.

• Workflow and User Roles – Staff workflow and dashboard tracking will be improved with an expanded user role system.

Sharing GrantIS with Others.  An open source project is generally designed for broad audiences and, as such, must meet the needs of a group rather than an individual entity. However, like many other foundation custom software projects, GrantIS was designed with the Trust’s needs in mind first.  Therefore, it is currently too customized to MMT’s processes to be useful to others, and it also contains some older code that needs to be cleaned up and/or replaced.  In order to make a shareable version, we’d need to create a completely separate version that incorporates the features of the upcoming 2.0 noted above, and also allows for processes other foundations would need that we don’t currently use ourselves. This could take significant time to accomplish without dedicated staff to work on it.

In addition, should we release a shareable version, other foundations would likely request our assistance in implementation and providing technical support, which would be taxing on our limited technical staff.  Therefore, MMT has decided not to pursue that option at this time.  We are, however, happy to provide support to other foundations by offering advice and lessons learned through its own software design process.

WHAT WE LEARNED ALONG THE WAY

1. Software development is challenging and time consuming.  There’s a reason that software companies have large staffs and take many years before they release a product.  Software development requires significant resources, staff time, and testing to create an effective and useful end product.  Make sure you take that into consideration before jumping in.

2.  If you don’t have in-house technical capability, vet software consultants/programmers carefully.  MMT hired a firm that worked on the project for the first 18 months, but we didn’t find out until much later that while the software looked good from the user side, the underlying code was not well written and required significant redesign later on.  Much of this was due to the fact that the team assigned to our project shrank from several programmers and a project manager to just a single programmer who also had multiple other projects that he was working on.  This caused the firm to cut corners to meet deadlines. In hindsight, we would have had a third-party review the code intermittently during development since we did not have the in-house technical capability at that time to do this ourselves.

3. Don’t put the cart before the horse.  It was a MMT priority to make its application forms electronic by a specific deadline, so that is what we focused on first, rather than designing the overall core functionality and underlying database. This led to later complications in trying to make the core work around the application forms, instead of the reverse. Developing a project in the proper sequence at the outset, even if it slows down implementation, will deliver a better outcome.

4. Don’t limit yourself.  Our early design was based on how our grantmaking had been conducted in the first 20 years, which was relatively static.  However, a year after we started the GrantIS project, MMT went through a strategic planning process and rolled out several new programs and initiatives. This required us to go back and rework much of the code that had already been written in order to allow implementation of the new programs.  Therefore, when designing software, be sure to make the system flexible, because you can’t assume that everything will always stay the same.

5. Just because you use open source software, it doesn’t make it a true open source project.  We initially thought that once GrantIS was finished, we could just post our code publicly for others to use. However, we later learned that a true open source project is one that is designed for broad audiences and where those who own it provide a level of support that includes:

• Having a home on the web where the code can be obtained.
• Providing documentation and support for the installation of the product.
• Providing a mechanism to assist in the ongoing maintenance of the software, such as questions, error reports, enhancement proposals, etc.
• Providing a mechanism whereby other programmers can contribute to the project, by fixing errors or adding functionality.

All this means that you have to allocate ongoing resources to the project. This may be worthwhile if many others rally to the project and start contributing improvements of their own. However, given the small size of the foundation community and how few of them would have staff to implement and customize the software, there is no guarantee that this would happen.

6. We are not the only foundation creating custom software.  When MMT started this project, there were only a handful of grants management software products on the market which were very expensive and non-customizable.  Therefore, we chose to follow the path that many other larger foundations had taken and designed our own system instead.  Over the past few years, additional commercial and open source products (such as Fluxx) have become available, so at least there are more options for foundations to consider now. (See Idealware’s report).

7. While foundations essentially perform the same work overall, the variety in how they conduct the work is immense.  When demonstrating our project to others or discussing their software needs, we found that while GrantIS perfectly suits MMT’s processes, it doesn’t necessarily match up with how others do their work.  For example, community foundations need the ability to manage individual donor advised funds and scholarship accounts, which GrantIS is not designed to do.  Likewise, in looking at other foundations’ custom software, we’ve found that theirs is not a good fit for MMT either, often lacking the ability to accept electronic applications or automate board book production.

8. Developing custom software was and continues to be the best choice for Meyer Memorial Trust.  While it’s taken several years, our fabulous technical team has created a customized, robust grants management system that enables staff to do their work from any location and allows applicants to keep track of all their applications and awards via a personalized home page.  We are pleased with our choice and look forward to bringing both applicants and staff additional improvements and features in the future.  Please continue sending us your feedback any time you have questions or suggestions about the application system.

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