How the City of Boston operationalized constituent empathy in their grantmaking process

The City of Boston runs dozens of grant programs for both nonprofits and individuals, spanning departments and city budgets. These programs range from “Age Strong Rolling Grants” supporting older adults, to the “Bridge The Gap Veterans' Services Grant” helping veterans thrive, to the “SuccessLink Grant Program” providing summer and school year employment opportunities for the City’s youth. Grant funding is a key component of the City’s investment in making Boston a safe, healthy, and vibrant place to live for all its residents. 

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More funding, more problems

During the Covid pandemic, the City of Boston’s grantmaking escalated significantly. With the influx of funding, the City struggled with inefficiences brought on by each department operating grant programs in a different way.

“With the influx of funding from ARPA during the COVID era, all these bottlenecks started showing up that didn’t exist before, just because of the amount of funding and the number of grants that were given out,” said Peter Meachem, Community Grantmaking Coordinator within the Procurement Department. He characterizes Covid as the “real critical pain point” that pushed the city to invest in a centralized platform.

The City of Boston wanted to explore a new system to prioritize the constituent experience. A centralized portal for grant applicants could make a real difference for overworked nonprofit staff.

“I think it shouldn’t be under-estimated the amount of administrative burden and the mental load it takes for someone who is fundraising on behalf of a mission-driven organization" to have to learn a new software or process each time they seek a grant from the City.

The turning point

The City now runs over 35 programs on one grant management software, Submittable. Moving to one solution significantly enhanced how the City approaches grantmaking and how community groups partner with grantmaking departments.

A “standout” reviewer experience

The City’s application review teams sometimes span committees of over 20 people. Rather than wrestle spreadsheets, emails, or printouts, all reviewers can now use the same portal to access all of their assignments and conduct their reviews side-by-side with applications. In Peter’s words, it’s “faster, easier, and more convenient”, and he’s gotten consistently positive feedback. 

By simplifying their experience, the City ensures that the busy individuals on review committees can focus more time on the other aspects of their job. It also shows them that the City values their time and cares about their experience.

Improved program visibility 

With a centralized platform, the City’s various grant programs have better visibility in the communities they serve. They’re now casting a wider net to reach more eligible nonprofits. “I would say anecdotally, we’ve seen more cross-applications, from eligible community groups across grant programs," Peter said.

More time for programmatic execution

In addition to expanding the reach of each grant program, the City’s investment also means that “applicants can spend a lot less time dealing with submitting an application and a lot more time partnering with the city on actually executing their proposed projects that they’re receiving grant funding for,” Peter said.

It’s a win for the City’s grant program managers as well. “The more that this platform is utilized by the city, the more it blends into the background.” When the software is baked into the grantmaking cycle, program managers can focus more of their energy on supporting grant recipients and fostering those relationships. 

Peter explains some of the highlights of the City’s experience in the clip:

Striking the right balance with compliance 

Sitting within procurement, compliance and protocol are always top of mind for Peter and his team. But they don’t believe that compliance should create additional burden or delays for applicants. “It’s a balance here; we want to maintain the things that are easy to do about grantmaking, but we also need to check for compliance and protocol.”

A true partnership is “the most successful part”

As with any seismic software shift, there have been some learnings along the way. Peter and his team have been able to work with Submittable staff to resolve hiccups. And every time they do, their experience benefits all City programs. They're able to share new strategies across programs. The collaboration, according to Peter, has “been the most successful part for us.”

What’s next for the City of Boston?

After a year and half since the adoption of the new platform, the City has successfully standardized the intake process across more than 35 programs. What’s next? Expanding to a few remaining grant programs, as well as standardizing reporting and post-award monitoring.

As the City continues to expand its grantmaking, they have a people-first mentality toward their software. In Peter’s dream state, the platform becomes a seamless component of the grantmaking ecosystem—it becomes invisible. And invisible means that everyone who is a part of the process spends more time and energy on the community-focused elements of their impact.