Every grant application generates valuable information about the applicant and reflects the effectiveness of the funding process. In practice, philanthropy pays far more attention to the former and neglects the latter.

Most applications end with a funding decision; a decision with relatively little opportunity for either applicants or funders to learn from the process.

For applicants, an unsuccessful proposal often means weeks of hard work without a clear understanding of why it fell short. For funders, it means losing meaningful insight into how their processes are experienced.

While philanthropy routinely expects organisations to reflect, adapt, and improve, it rarely asks what grantmakers should learn from the thousands of organisations that pass through their grantmaking process each year. As a result, learning flows largely in one direction: funders learn about applicants, but far less about the quality of their own grantmaking.

Word on the Ground

Recently, my colleague, Sarah Bradley, and I have been facilitating peer resourcing circles with grassroots organisations from various countries and contexts. Across these conversations, similar patterns emerge: inadequate fundraising capacity, shifting donor priorities, unequal access to networks, and growing competition for funding. One recurring theme in these discussions has also been the lack of meaningful feedback on unsuccessful applications.

What participants found most difficult was not rejection itself, but the limited opportunity to learn from it. Without understanding the specific weaknesses in their proposal, it becomes extremely difficult to determine whether subsequent applications could be improved or if they were a match for the grant.

In a sector that prioritises impact and effectiveness, this ongoing practice of investing in applications without sufficient information raises a significant concern about how much organisational capacity is avoidably being wasted within funding processes.

Asymmetric Intelligence​

These discussions point to a persistent asymmetry in how information circulates through philanthropy.

Funders accumulate knowledge about emerging issues, local contexts, organisational capacities, and strategies for social change with every application cycle, enabling them to refine their approaches and make informed decisions about future collaborations.

Read the full article about the missing feedback loop in philanthropy by Zainab Aliyu at Alliance Magazine.