Supporting Grantee Capacity Strengthening Effectiveness Together
In Supporting Grantee Capacity: Strengthening Effectiveness Together, we look at how funders approach building capacity with grantees. Through examples from foundations ranging in size, mission, and geography, we explore various strategies for capacity building and the types of awareness that funders can choose to incorporate in decision making to facilitate informed, thoughtful judgments about strengthening organizations.
Listen to our Strengthening Effectiveness podcasts, which elaborate on themes explored in the guide using the spoken wisdom of funders from around the globe; read our online-only case study examples of aspects of capacity building; print and share our illustrations of key themes entwined in capacity building; review our GrantCraft community survey results; and explore resources from the field in our related IssueLab special collection. Additionally, if you would like to share your experiences with capacity building through a guest blog post, let us know.
Discuss these resources and help spread the word using #supportingcapacity.
This guide and related content were supported by a generous grant from Open Society Foundations.
What's in the Guide?
- Broadening the Grantee Capacity-Building Conversation: Funders worldwide are thinking about how to strengthen grantee organizations. We provide our definition and approach to capacity building and share important frameworks for the conversation.
- Exploring Investment Approaches to Capacity Building: Foundations approach grantee capacity-building efforts differently and agree that there is not one correct investment approach. We provide a menu of investment approach options along with several examples exploring how and why each has been used in various situations.
- Lenses to Focus and Inform Grantmaking: Decision making around capacity-building support comes down to the ability to make sound judgments. We share important ideas for funders to consider before determining if an investment should be made and how.
- Knowing Your Own Capacity: Many funders do not truly have the capacity to undertake certain capacity-building efforts themselves. We share five important questions for foundations to reflect on to help inform what kind of capacity-building partner they would be.
- Acknowledging Power Dynamics: Every funder-grantee relationship has power dynamics, which become especially important to recognize in conversations about capacity building. We share suggestions from funders about tuning in to these dynamics and how to create an environment that is as candid and level as possible.
- Assessing the Impact: The Holy Grail: Measuring the impact of capacity building is challenging but important to encouraging greater investment within foundations and to the recipient organizations themselves. We provide process-oriented advice from funders about how to investigate impact from the beginning of a capacity-building engagement and what to do with what you learn.
- Putting It All Together: This guide shares many perspectives about how to approach capacity building with grantees and also underscores that there are no right answers, only informed judgments. In these two composite case studies, we put you in the analysis and decision-making seat and encourage you to see how your ideas align with those of your colleagues.
- Plus, special insert sections on
- When you're the lone voice for capacity building
- Engaging the right capacity builders
- How to address issus of grantee capacity

Categories
Content type
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Link to The Meyer Foundation
Deserts and Dilettantes How to Engage the Right Capacity Builders Within Marketplace Extremes
Capacity builders provide invaluable support to foundations and nonprofits all over the world. While there are many providers doing good work with foundations and nonprofits, as the TCC Group identifies in Building the Capacity of Capacity Builders, quality and quantity problems within the capacity-builder marketplace also exist.
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Link to The Meyer Foundation
When Reporting Out on Grantee Capacity Building
Get better at telling grantee capacitybuilding stories. Storytelling is a powerful tool for assessing and publicly showing the value of capacity-building investments. Multiple funders shared, “We could do better at turning existing data — quantitative and qualitative — on capacity-building efforts into comprehensive stories that demonstrate why capacity building is an important investment for grantmakers to make.”
Read more -
Link to The Meyer Foundation
Throughout Your Interaction with Grantees
Engage your grantees in the evaluation design and implementation. Many grantees feel cautious or hesitant when working with foundations on capacity building, which can color the funder-grantee interaction, especially when it comes to assessment.
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Link to The Meyer Foundation
Before Making Capacity-Building Grants
Define your capacity-building theory of change. Being able to identify the primary purpose of your capacity building and then translating that into a theory of change is key to assessment.
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Link to The Meyer Foundation
Assessing Impact: The Holy Grail
Even grantmakers with deep experience funding capacity building sigh when asked, “How do you know capacity building makes a difference?”
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Link to The Meyer Foundation
How Should Your Foundation Take Action In Setting Parameters on Its Engagement?
Even when grantees recognize their own capacity building as important, it’s not the reason they exist.
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Link to The Meyer Foundation
How Can Your Foundation Build Its Knowledge on Capacity Building?
At most foundations, the levels of capacitybuilding skills and experience vary significantly because, as a number of funders put it, “Most foundations hire grantmaking staff more for their issue-based rather than their organizational development expertise.”
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Link to The Meyer Foundation
Who are the Dominant Voices (Champions and Nonbelievers)?
This may be a tougher topic to discuss openly, but certainly one raised consistently.
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Link to The Meyer Foundation
How Can Your Foundation Sharpen Its Capacity-Building Purpose?
Interviewees suggested that it can be useful to periodically come back to the question of “why capacity building?” at your foundation and compare that to how capacity building is manifesting with grantees.
Read more -
Link to The Meyer Foundation
What Is Your Foundation’s History of Grantee Capacity Building?
Even if you think the answer is “none,” don’t skip this reflection.
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In Supporting Grantee Capacity: Strengthening Effectiveness Together, we look at how funders approach building capacity with grantees. Through examples from foundations ranging in size, mission, and geography, we explore various strategies for capacity building and the types of awareness that funders can choose to incorporate in decision making to facilitate informed, thoughtful judgments about strengthening organizations.
Listen to our Strengthening Effectiveness podcasts, which elaborate on themes explored in the guide using the spoken wisdom of funders from around the globe; read our online-only case study examples of aspects of capacity building; print and share our illustrations of key themes entwined in capacity building; review our GrantCraft community survey results; and explore resources from the field in our related IssueLab special collection. Additionally, if you would like to share your experiences with capacity building through a guest blog post, let us know.
Discuss these resources and help spread the word using #supportingcapacity.
This guide and related content were supported by a generous grant from Open Society Foundations.
What's in the Guide?
- Broadening the Grantee Capacity-Building Conversation: Funders worldwide are thinking about how to strengthen grantee organizations. We provide our definition and approach to capacity building and share important frameworks for the conversation.
- Exploring Investment Approaches to Capacity Building: Foundations approach grantee capacity-building efforts differently and agree that there is not one correct investment approach. We provide a menu of investment approach options along with several examples exploring how and why each has been used in various situations.
- Lenses to Focus and Inform Grantmaking: Decision making around capacity-building support comes down to the ability to make sound judgments. We share important ideas for funders to consider before determining if an investment should be made and how.
- Knowing Your Own Capacity: Many funders do not truly have the capacity to undertake certain capacity-building efforts themselves. We share five important questions for foundations to reflect on to help inform what kind of capacity-building partner they would be.
- Acknowledging Power Dynamics: Every funder-grantee relationship has power dynamics, which become especially important to recognize in conversations about capacity building. We share suggestions from funders about tuning in to these dynamics and how to create an environment that is as candid and level as possible.
- Assessing the Impact: The Holy Grail: Measuring the impact of capacity building is challenging but important to encouraging greater investment within foundations and to the recipient organizations themselves. We provide process-oriented advice from funders about how to investigate impact from the beginning of a capacity-building engagement and what to do with what you learn.
- Putting It All Together: This guide shares many perspectives about how to approach capacity building with grantees and also underscores that there are no right answers, only informed judgments. In these two composite case studies, we put you in the analysis and decision-making seat and encourage you to see how your ideas align with those of your colleagues.
- Plus, special insert sections on
- When you're the lone voice for capacity building
- Engaging the right capacity builders
- How to address issus of grantee capacity