chapter EIGHT
The Budget
Translating Your Story from Words to Numbers
One of the most essential components of a grant proposal is not even written in words. It is the all-important budget. A budget is really nothing more than the translation of your agency’s narrative story into another language, the language of numbers. Just as some of us jump to the end of a book to read the ending first, some funders will begin their review of your proposal story by looking at the budget. Eventually, all funders will spend considerable time reviewing the budget, so you need to take care when preparing it.
If you are not an accountant or an MBA, the numbers portion of a proposal can seem especially intimidating, frustrating, and confusing. But like them ...