The most overlooked qualities in ourselves when applying for funding

Tue, 03 Sep 2024 12:26:54 GMT

The most overlooked qualities in ourselves when applying for (cultural) funding

- Determination

It's not always easy getting your idea on paper and sometimes you need a push or just space to receive inspiration.

For example: Start a mind-map, go outside walking and afterwards doodle down the ideas, set a timer everyday for 20 minutes of writing your unfiltered ideas, get a 'accountablity' buddy.

- The ability to take breaks when writing

One of the most underestimated qualities in being able to write a good proposal is the ability to take breaks . We live in a oversaturated information era. We rarely give our bodies time to pause, rest and reflect. Most of that comes from the constant need/pressure to constantly produce. But if you can carve out regular breaks when writing, it will be rewarding for you and your project. For example: do a 1 by 30. Write one hour and take a break of 30 minutes to do something else. Some people don't want to stop when they're in the flow of writing, that's your choice obviously. By all means - keep going. Just be aware to set a timer or another type of alarm to give you those breaks you deserve.

- Strategically connecting themes to the open call/funding scheme

This is an overlooked one that most of us are already doing: Association. Our ability to associate in this digital age has only grown!
We see a 'meme' or video and we immediately start to associate it with our daily life. Be it a new blender to make smoothies, something to mow the lawn with or a new hair product. Treat your plan the same. If you think about your idea, how can you associate it into your daily life? In what way will it inspire people? How is it relevant still for people today (even if it's just for a small group of people)?

Make it a game, make it easy and this will help you with the associations when writing your draft.
That said - don't be afraid to use digital tools to write. Just make sure it's still your tone and your idea.

- Having fun bringing your idea to life

This point bundles up the different aforementioned points together - with space (and grace) and patience for your process you will be able to write more then you think.

We always tell people, that if they can dance and/or feel the rhythm of a song or composition - they are able to write a text for their projectplan. It's about knowing the steps to take in the right moments.

How we can help.
Maybe you don't have that time or space or you want to delegate the tasks - we've got your back!
Our different packages will be able to help you forward with your funding proposal.

Package: 'Ready to go!': 51 Euro's an hour or 71 florins an hour

In short: 10 hours of work, 51 euro's per hour for Dutch (and European) clients instead of 80.
In short: 10 hours of work, 71 Aruban Florins per hour instead of 100 for locals.

Package: 'Next Steps Ahead!': 50 Euro's an hour or 76,67 Florins for 30 hours.

In short: 30 hours of work, 50 euro's per hour for Dutch (and European) clients instead of 80.

In short: 30 hours of work, 76,76 Aruban Florins per hour instead of 100 for locals.

Package: 'We're all in this together': 50.66 Euro's an hour or 64 Florins for 75 hours.

In short: 75 hours of work, 50,66 euro's per hour for Dutch (and European) clients instead of 80.

In short: 75 hours of work, 64 Aruban Florins per hour instead of 100 for locals.

Package: 'We're going big here'

If you or your company is ready for big change, this one's for you.

If you need our help and can't afford the packages- we encourage to still reach out to us. We'll see what we can do.
And again - Let's keep it fun!

Rebalancing* of Power Dynamics: Payment

Sun, 28 Jul 2024 18:38:18 GMT

In the world of Funding Creatives and (Grassroots) Organisations we see many unfair power dynamics.
That is one of the reasons why we offer the following forms of Payment.

Rebalancing*

This is a post that focusses on one of the key themes in our blog series: Rebalancing of power dynamics.

In the cultural and artistic field we see many creatives or even small organisations needing to fight for getting their overhead costs being met, focussing on 20 things at a time - and oh yeah - then also needing to get to writing grant proposals.
Power Dynamics
Here at Culturally* Services we see this as a bigger imbalanced power dynamic that we will be addressing more thoroughly in another post. For now we want to balance out the scales a bit when it comes to modes of payment for our services

Different Payment Options
When it comes to:
Individual Creatives: We open up ' Scholarship Positions' every 6 months to help you out for FREE.

This should be someone who is serious about learning how to grant write themselves and growing as a creative.
We will also share our other tips and tricks and give mentorship for up to 4,5 months.
The details of this 'Scholarship' will be discussed with the candidate and the terms and conditions will be shared when there's an open call.
When we open up these Scholarship Positions we will let a random automated computer choose, all we need are your names.
Once we grow more - we can give more of these scholarship positions!

Individual Creatives & small (startup) organisations: We have different prepackaged deals. Check them out here.

Individual Creatives & small (startup) organisations: You get a FREE 20 minute call with us to see what fits best and if we are a fit.

Individual Creatives: Payment options ánd a sliding scale is available.

Next to the Scholarship Positions, we have Sliding Scale options. We can discuss what fits best here. Again - we do an assessment beforehand to see what your capabilities are, where you want to grow in this area and to see how many hours you would need. We have this thing where we can go a bit lower with our prices when we can collaborate on a longer term. This is all in collaboration with each other. Please feel free to reach out.

___

Things should change from both sides
Cultural and Corporate institutions: We surely want to work with you as well - since the power dynamics often get off balanced when a bigger institution with more resources (time, money, space) often (unintentionally as well) becomes leading in the dynamic with another organisation or individual who has less resources in those forms.

We offer services where we can work on restructuring your funding models (and policy)
We offer services where we can work with your management layer of your company to pinpoint where and how these power dynamics take shape in your work culture and/or policy and models
We offer services where we can go case by case and see what is needed for that specific context - as long as the actions lead to investigating and altering dynamics.
You get a FREE 20 minute call with us to see what fits best and if we are a fit

This is just the tip of the iceberg of what we can offer and create together.

We don't know pertain to know it all, but we do pertain to bring pragmatic and applied change.

Click Here to make an appointment for your FREE 20 minute advisory session.

In the next blog posts we will focus a bit more on examples of real day situations where these power dynamics get imbalanced...

Culturally* Services: Tips, Tricks and Rebalancing Power Dynamics

The most overlooked qualities in ourselves when applying for funding

The most overlooked qualities in ourselves when applying for (cultural) funding

We always tell people, that if they can dance and/or feel the rhythm of a song or composition - they are able to write a text for their projectplan. It's about knowing the steps to take in the right moments.

How we can help. Maybe you don't have that time or space or you want to delegate the tasks - we've got your back! Our different packages will be able to help you forward with your funding proposal.

Rebalancing* of Power Dynamics: Payment

How we can help.
Maybe you don't have that time or space or you want to delegate the tasks - we've got your back!
Our different packages will be able to help you forward with your funding proposal.