(or, ‘THE MASSIVELY, FABULOUSLY, WONDERFULLY, MAXIMALLY OPTIMISED GRANT-WRITING MASTERPLAN’)
Last night I found myself awake at 4am, cooking 56 meals, for no other reason than that I was avoiding writing a grant. Today I nearly had heart failure trying to get my grant finished, and may have set a Guinness world record for ‘The Latest Online Grant Application Ever Successfully Submitted’. I have finally decided that I would like to try a gentler system, and have come up with this aspirational grant-writing timeline for future endeavours. (And with that, I’m off to bed after eating a lovely pre-prepared dinner … cooking-as-procrastination has some upsides, at least 😉 )
Cautionary note: Prepare yourselves for a foreign concept. This timeline aims to submit the day before the advertised submission deadline. WOAH!!
12 days before submission: Register for online system if necessary (takes 5 working days for Irish Arts Council). Invite referees to send letters; ask proofreaders if they’ll look at draft 1 of your doc in a week’s time.
11 days before submission: Analyse grant guidelines; get more info on objectives of the award by ringing awarding body (e.g Arts Council / hosting venue); brainstorm possible project activities.
10 days before submission: Choose project activity. Invite collaborators & ask for letter of support, costs & fees, CV, bio.
9 days before submission: Do draft schedule for project. Assemble all costings for project. Do draft 1 of budget
8 days before submission: Write CV
7 days before submission: Write ‘Statement of Artistic Practice’
6 days before submission: Assemble samples of creative work
5 days before submission: Do draft 2 of budget (… this time in Excel)
4 days before submission: Download and fill in first half of Application Form (for Irish AC, as far as ‘Details of proposal’)
3 days before submission: Finish Application Form, proofread, send for proofreading by others
2 days before submission: Assemble all letters of support, collaborators’ CVs and bios, references, any additional docs.
Day before submission: get proofreaders’ feedback and make final edits to Application Form
Day of submission: upload all files; double-check all files are uploaded; hit ‘submit’.
Day of submission deadline: relaaax! Maybe do some cooking!! 🙂