Whitepaper: Risk management and the grantmaking lifecycle

Don’t make your grants a gamble, get a good handle on risks
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From catastrophic floods to the ongoing health and economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, grantmakers in recent years have faced an array of threats that have disrupted well-crafted funding programs.

Grantmakers with established risk management frameworks and practices have weathered those storms better, and will be better placed for the inevitable ones to come.

Those grantmakers will always have the capacity to be more responsive and agile in the face of unpredictable events in every area of their portfolio: program management, finance, workplace health and safety, human resources, the political environment, media management and much more.

SmartyGrants has produced a white paper to help grantmakers to manage risk, avoid trouble, embrace opportunity and make the most of their grant programs.

The benefits of managing risk well include:

  • Improved efficiency
  • Improved effectiveness of grants programs and hence increased impact
  • Better meeting of compliance obligations
Cover Risk Management White Paper Smarty Grants Feb2021

The benefits of a healthy understanding of risk
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Grantmakers who manage risk effectively are able to reduce the administrative burden on their organisations and on grantseekers by avoiding excessive interventions, leaving their programs free to flourish.

Implementing and maintaining a well-formed risk management program will pay dividends in terms of your time, your effort and your impact.

This white paper explores risk management in the context of each step of the grantmaking lifecycle. In applying it to your organisation, you should also consider your existing risk management frameworks.