Grant or Tender
Application Review

This is perfect for grant writers who feel confident in their application but want a final check for clarity and professionalism.

What’s included:

• Through the assessors eyes: We’ll review your answers as an assessor and let you know any areas that don’t fit, are contrary or don’t seem aligned to the purpose of the grant. We’ll also identify where you haven’t answered the question (the most common reason applications lose points at the assessment table!)
• Proofreading: A thorough read-through to catch typos, grammatical errors, and punctuation mistakes.
• Clarity Check: We’ll flag any sentences or paragraphs that are unclear or confusing to a new reader.
• Formatting Review: We’ll ensure your document is formatted cleanly and consistently, as many funders have specific requirements for font, spacing, and headings.

Best for:

• Applications that are largely complete and you’re just looking for that final polish.
• For those working on a tight deadline or a limited budget.
• Simple applications or pitch documents with few components (e.g., a one-page letter of intent).

“Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom – we are still using what we have learnt in other applications.” Sally Hetherington, Human and Hope

What’s not included:

• Strategic Feedback: You will not receive a comprehensive feedback document analysing the strengths, weaknesses, or strategic opportunities of your proposal.
• Content Suggestions: We will not provide specific in-line comments or suggestions on how to rewrite sections to make them more compelling or persuasive.
• Alignment & Outcomes Review: There is no strategic review of how well your project aligns with the guidelines or requirements, nor an assessment of your outcomes mapping or evaluation metrics.
• Budget Review: We will not review your budget for clarity, accuracy, value for money, or alignment with the project.
• Compliance Check: This tier does not include a detailed review to ensure your application is fully compliant with all specific requirements listed in the grant or tender guidelines.
• Review of Supporting Documents: We will not review any attachments such as letters of support, detailed project plans, or CVs.
• Consultation Calls: This package does not include any phone or video calls to discuss the application or feedback.
• Review of Revisions: There is no second look or review after you have made changes to the document.

Example: We recently reviewed a philanthropic application. The key areas we identified was how to strengthen the positioning of the application to highlight alignment to the purpose of the funding. This was a big shift in the overall messaging of the application that immediately strengthened their approach. 

This is our highest level of service, designed for complex, high-stakes applications where every detail counts. We act as a thought partner to ensure your proposal is substantive from every angle.

What’s included:

Everything in the “Substantive & Strategic” tier.

• Initial Strategy Session: Where we meet to review the strategy, key messages and points of alignment. We’ll also discuss the competitive and political influences including policy alignment. This also includes our research into the funder and review of all related funder documents. 
• Detailed Review of all Supporting Documents including Budget: We’ll review your letters of support, project plans, budgets, work plan, and other attachments to ensure they are consistent with your key messages, project opportunities and strengthen your case.
• Check-in Call: A 30-minute phone or video call with your reviewer to discuss the feedback and answer your questions live. This is an opportunity to talk through our suggestions and brainstorm solutions together.
• One Round of Revisions Review: After you’ve made your changes, we’ll do a second, quick review of the revised document to ensure your edits have effectively addressed the feedback.

‘This was the best process we’ve experienced. The way you broke it down and brought strategy into the conversation. Not only was it an excellent application, we also value the learnings about your approach and the submission process. We’ve now developed an internal process for our new fundraising and grants staff member.’ J.G., Youth organisation

Best for:

• Multi-partner or highly technical proposals.
• Grant applications that are critical to your organisation’s purpose and future funding.

Tender example: The client had completed their budget and through this review, we identified nearly an additional $200,000 the client could put into their budget to ensure all costs were included. This was because the client hadn’t included all the cost of the deliverables which is an easy mistake to make when the deliverables aren’t obvious, a lot of these were ‘hidden’ in the specifications and the contract. This client won the tender. The project management/contract firm gave us feedback that it was the best tender submission they’ve seen. In their words ‘not the best financially, but the best value for money related to strategic outcomes, it exceeded all the specific requirements we’d asked for and it ticked all the compliance boxes’. This client won the initial tender of $697,000 and has since gone on to be placed on their preferred contractor list and has to date completed a further 2 jobs with this company.

Grant pitch (not an open program) example: We worked with a state-based representative association who was pitching a core funding request to the Department. They had heard the minister was considering pulling their funding. Once we worked with them on the initial strategy we undertook a substantive and strategic review This highlighted opportunities to strengthen their pitch, ensure the key messages were strongly presented and consistently reinforced in various ways and clearly demonstrated a substantial return on investment for the funder. This resulted in just over $5.4 million in core funding awarded. 

What’s not included:
While we don’t include the below, we can customise a support package that includes some or all of the below.

• Writing or Rewriting Content: We act as your thought partner and reviewer, but we do not write entire sections of the application or proposal for you. We provide suggestions and feedback for you to implement. 
• Application Submission: We do not submit the application or tender on your behalf. You are responsible for the final submission process.
• Unlimited Revisions: The package includes one review of your revised draft. It does not include multiple or unlimited rounds of back-and-forth reviews.
• Project Management: This service does not include the overall project management of your application process, such as coordinating with partners or managing internal deadlines.