Can we hire a consultant to write proposals for us?

Proposal writing is a task that can seem quite intimidating for NGOs. There are so many rules to follow, so much competition to beat and so many thoughts to take into consideration. So sometimes, it seems like a good idea to outsource it to not have to deal with it at all. But does it make sense for NGOs to hire proposal writers?

In this article, we take a detailed look at the issue of hiring a consultant.

There is no guaranteed success, but a guaranteed cost

There are proposal writers who write proposals on commission. However, for most NGOs, hiring consultants to write proposals do not amount to good use of resources. It will not guarantee to fund and even if you hire a very successful proposal writer, you will never know for sure. Sometimes foundations might have run out of funding or other reasons than the quality of the proposal might play into it. Nevertheless, consultants typically have a fee which they charge regardless of the success or failure of the proposal. So if you pay a lot of money for a proposal writer and do not win the grant, your NGO will effectively have made a loss.

At the same time, your staff will probably still have to invest a significant amount of time, even if the task of writing the proposal is outsourced. The consultants don’t have the needed detail knowledge and expertise to write every part of the proposal, so your staff will have to get involved – the time saved by hiring a consultant can be marginal, depending on the experience the consultant has.

It is more sustainable to develop resources internally

More importantly, writing proposals are something organizations must do repeatedly. It is an essential skill every NGO relying on grants to fund projects must possess. The resources put into hiring a consultant might be better spent developing internal capacity in proposal writing. With the same money that a proposal writer would cost, your staff could participate in training or you could hire an in-house trainer to support your own people. In the long run, this will pay off as you can internalize many tasks within your organization that would cost a lot of money if you would have to hire a consultant every time.

Should we work with consultants at all?

Consultants can be great resources in certain areas. They can conduct donor research, organize field research, create marketing tools, etc. External staff can also review and edit proposals written internally. All these tasks are added to the actual proposal writing process. If your own staff has the ability to write a quality proposal, consultants and volunteers can help them to make them perfect – with much higher chances of success.

If you are looking for training opportunities for your staff, check out our database with training opportunities worldwide.