Audit 07
In developmentGrant Readiness Audit
“If a funder said yes tomorrow, could we execute and report?”
What does the Grant Readiness Audit do?
Examine the documentation, policies, budgets, programs, measurement, and reporting infrastructure needed to responsibly receive and manage funding. It is independent and diagnostic: you receive findings and priorities, not a proposal. HxDF currently offers audits at no cost to qualifying organizations, requires no followup purchase, and refers to nobody, so what you do next is entirely your decision.
- Cost
- No cost to qualifying organizations
- Status
- Being built and reviewed. Not yet available to the public. Where a date exists it is stated; where it does not, nothing is implied.
What it looks at
The scope, stated before you agree to it.
This is what the audit examines. It is not a list of things HxDF expects to find, because nothing has been examined yet.
Whether program delivery is described the same way internally and externally
Budget and capacity planning behind the program a funder would be funding
Which policies exist, which are drafts, and which are assumed
How outcomes are currently measured, if they are
What reporting would require, and who would produce it
The gap between what a proposal would claim and what records could support
What you receive
Five things, written for the person who has to act.
Every HxDF audit returns the same shape, so you know what you are getting before you start.
- 01
Findings memo
What is actually happening, written plainly, with the evidence it rests on. No scores, no maturity grid, no vendor comparison.
- 02
Top priorities
The few things that matter most, ranked, with the reason each one is above the next.
- 03
Quick wins
What can be fixed in days rather than quarters, so the organization gets something back before any larger decision.
- 04
90 day action list
A sequence the organization can run itself, with the owner and the dependency named for each step.
- 05
Recommended measures
What to measure so that in three months the organization can tell whether anything changed. Baselines belong to the organization, not to HxDF.
Independence
What HxDF gets out of this.
Nothing, and that is the point. These four rules apply to every audit and are the reason this one can be trusted.
- No cost, and limited
- HxDF currently offers audits at no cost to qualifying small nonprofits and community organizations. There is nothing to buy at any point in the process. No cost does not mean unlimited: HxDF currently offers a limited number of audits each month at no cost, based on our capacity. When a month reaches capacity, requests are held for the next one and the organization is told where it stands. Availability can close when the capacity is reached.
- No obligation
- HxDF does not charge organizations for an audit or require them to purchase followup services. What an organization does with the findings is entirely its own decision.
- Independent
- HxDF does not refer audited organizations to any related commercial business and receives no compensation from anything an organization does after an audit.
- Practical
- Every finding names something a real person can do. An audit that only describes the problem has not finished its job.
Where this connects
What sits either side of this audit.
An audit ends with priorities. If you want the fix built, that is a Blueprint. If you would rather start alone, a tool covers some of the same ground for free.
- BlueprintGrant-to-Growth BlueprintProposed
- ToolGrant Readiness CheckerProposed
- ToolNonprofit Budget and Capacity PlannerProposed
- ReadingGrant ReadinessNothing published yet
Request it