Researching grant opportunities, applying for grants, and then reporting on them, as per federal and institutional regulations is

Cut Grant Administration Costs with IT Works

essential; however, manually tracking the funds takes a great deal of time and effort. The same is true for actually completing the research and then maintaining records. Many administrators have to wonder, isn’t there a way to streamline the grants management and effort reporting tasks without spending too much of the grant money on administration costs?

There is, and it’s called grant management software. Yet, to date, many organizations have not made the jump to using a complete software package. The reason? An effort to maximize grant funding.

Grant administrators often think that software solutions are not cost-effective. In other words, they believe that it is wiser to direct their spending toward the proposed project for the grant award and not on organization expenses. In many cases until now, this has been true of out-of-the-box grant management solutions – not anymore.

Save with Software

While it makes sense to choose administrative spending carefully, forgoing the use of grant management software is not always the best course of action. Software packages for grant administrators can actually help to save money.

There are many advantages to using grant software. Implementing a comprehensive software package can help grant administrators to do the following:

• Find and review grant opportunities
• Regulate the accounting procedures used by the organization
• Track all grant operations and financial transactions efficiently
• Facilitate document generation and effort reports automatically
• Integrate grant management with Internet-based interfaces
• Ensure that grant fund use is within grantor compliance

Simply put, grant software works to streamline the tasks of the grant administrator. This adds up to saving time – therefore, saving money.

Time is Money

Every grant administrator wants to increase staff efficiency. Productivity, after all, leads to saving money. Using a computer-based system is the best way to achieve this goal.

Many organizations continue to follow the “old” methods of grant management. This typically involves separate systems for dealing with each operation. For instance, many companies use spreadsheets, databases, and word-processed documents to track every grant. Working with each grant operation on an individual basis, however, can be rather inefficient, and leads to spending precious time and even more precious grant money that would be better spent on actual research.

A software package makes the entire process of dealing with grants simpler. Software not only allows administrators to automate grant-related tasks, but it also enables organizations to view all grant procedures for evaluation transparently. Software solutions such as Effort Administrator, Department Manager and Department Accountant include comprehensive and targeted services that address every aspect of the grant process, and it is just this type of efficiency, simplicity and productivity that the powerful yet cost effective grant management solution that institutions need to keep up with the future of grants.

Invest in Grant Management Software

Before choosing a software package, grant administrators need to look at their current problem areas as well as the specific grant procedures required by their organization and the grantor. Understanding these areas is essential find the grant software best suited to an organization.

Grant management software may offer solutions for the entire grant life cycle. Some software choices have a focus on either pre-award or post-award management. Regardless of which type of package best fits an organization’s needs, it is certain that grant software will help to cut costs by boosting efficiency.

If you have not yet switched to software-based grant management, then you should consider how much time and money could be saved should your organization implement one of the many customizable grant management ad effort reporting solutions offered by the IT Works team. There’s a system available for small and large schools, universities and research labs alike.

You’ll be amazed at how time- and cost-efficient our solutions are, leaving you to wonder why you haven’t considered switching before. Contact IT Works today to find out more information on how one of our out-of-the-box solutions can help cut your grant administration costs.