Alyssa: Welcome to another episode of Funding the Future, the stories behind the missions. Today I'm joined by Madlen Toumbourou from Madlen Toumbourou Consulting. Madlen's a highly skilled management consultant working with not-for-profits and for-purpose businesses to scale their impact. Madlen works with leaders to tailor their grant seeking and funding strategies, to write major tenders and grants, as well as offering bespoke consulting and mentoring services. You only need to have a read of the reviews on her website to see she comes highly recommended and has a wealth of experience. So welcome to the podcast, Madlen.
Madlen: Alyssa, thanks so much for having me.
Alyssa: And before we dive in, I'd just like to acknowledge I'm joining you on Ngai Tahu lands in Otautahi Christchurch. Where are you joining us from today?
Madlen: I'm joining from the lands of the Wurundjeri Woiwurrung people and the Boonwurrung people of the Kulin Nation.
Alyssa: Lovely, and we pay our deepest respects to elders past, present, and emerging. So to get us started, Madlen, do you want to give us a quick snapshot of your consulting business?
Madlen: Yes, sure, I'd love to, thank you. So I work as a strategic consultant in the for-purpose sector and broadly I help organisations to align their governance, their funding and their operational systems so that their impact is sustainable and where they seek it, scalable. I work with small and medium and also some larger not-for-profits and increasingly with social enterprises as well. A lot of the organisations that I work with are doing extraordinary work in their community. And my work spans the family and domestic violence sector, working with arts organisations, working with organisations who are doing direct humanitarian relief and support in the community, to name a few. They're doing extraordinary work, incredible impact, and where I come in often is where maybe their systems haven't kept pace with their ambition or maybe there's an area where they're needing to uplift some of their capability — it could be in strategic grant seeking, for example, it could be somewhere in their operations, bringing in some systems to support operational planning. Or it might just be a capacity thing. They might need someone that can come in and help them to get a few grants written or get some tenders written, develop some proposals. Often with that work, I will come in and want to be able to leave something behind more than the asset or the deliverable. So finding opportunities to work with the teams to build their skills as well.
Alyssa: That's really cool. And I'm sure there'll be a lot of listeners who will be interested in your experience, because I think it's quite valuable working across so many sectors and being able to see the commonalities and needs for systems change. So I guess that ties in nicely — what is something that clients typically approach you for, or they think that they need, versus what you think they actually need? Does the work often evolve as you're going?
Madlen: That's a really good question, Alyssa. We've started our conversations before talking about grants, so I might start there. Often I get approached because an organisation is seeking a grant writer. So the entry point can be — often is — that they've identified an opportunity that they want to apply for and either don't have the capacity or the capability at that current point in the organisation, or both. So the time or the skills. And we'll commence the engagement or even just at the discovery point, and I might realise that in the short term, there's absolutely a need for just getting this grant drafted and over the line. But actually what they would benefit from is some support around developing their theory of change — for example, how are they articulating what it is that they're doing and the impact that they're having. Their program logic, so being able to really step it out for funders — what it is that they're going to do and why. Or even just supporting to build some of what I would call grant readiness assets, grant readiness systems, in terms of developing a clear bank of resources that they need. So whether that's just having the key organisational information in one place, having their program logic clearly articulated in a way that can be inserted into multiple grant applications, having a clear system for organising previous grant applications, a grant calendar — I'm talking sort of this basic grant infrastructure stuff. Being clear on when the deadlines are, when the opportunities are coming up. But also building in more strategic thinking around the grant seeking process. So supporting organisations to do things like identify the opportunity cost of any given grant — if we're going to apply for this, what does that mean for the rest of our work? Doing a bit of an analysis — is it actually going to be worth our time? Thinking through what the implications are of winning this funding, making sure that they've got really good costing systems in place so that we're not applying for a grant that's $30,000 where we actually need $70,000 to run the program and we don't know where the rest of the funding is going to be coming from. I can develop these as processes for the organisation, whether in a digital project management system like ClickUp or Jira, or a simple Excel spreadsheet. There's lots of options. Part of my work is meeting the organisation where they're at.
Alyssa: That's a perfect example. I similarly face a lot of that in my business. I think it is fairly common — that issue of being constantly crisis-driven because you've got those deadlines looming. It really is important sometimes to take that step back and do the strategy work around grants, because there's nothing worse than getting a $10,000 grant and realizing you don't have the systems in place to deliver on it, or it's not actually what you wanted. So you've wasted all this time and effort and then you have to start again.
Madlen: Yeah, absolutely. And it can actually cost the organisation more in terms of effort to write the application. If we're talking about a $10,000 grant application, sometimes those applications take just as much work as a $100,000 plus application. So we're looking at a cost there in terms of the resources, then there's a cost in resources to deliver. And if the team is already stretched, there's going to be a cost and impact to having them deliver something that they don't necessarily have the capacity to do. And a lot of the conversations that I have with my clients, at some point I will say, you need to get more comfortable with saying no. I know that there feels like there's a real urgency and there won't be another funding opportunity and we need to just mold our programs and shift and under-cost things. But actually I think some of the magic is in being comfortable with being uncomfortable in saying no. It's not always comfortable, but being able to have some clearer boundaries around what funding we're going to apply for and what we're not. Because we don't necessarily know where the next funding opportunity is coming from. And if you've got a bit more capacity and breathing room, actually there might be an opportunity that can shift the trajectory of a program that's coming around the corner.
Alyssa: 100%. You might have time instead of investing in the 10k grant to invest in the 100k one, and that might set you up better. From your experience, what are the key things that separate organisations that consistently win grants from those that struggle?
Madlen: That's a good question, and I think just to extend on your thought, I would say it's less about the grant writing process than it is about some of the other factors. Being very clear on your theory of change, being very clear on your program logic — and when I say that, it doesn't mean that you need a consultant-developed 10-page theory of change with a full copy-edited narrative. It just means having it articulated clearly and well so that whoever's reading it understands what that theory of change is. Being clear internally on your program logic so that when it does come to writing a grant, you can very clearly articulate what is the problem that you're trying to solve, how are you going to do it, who is going to do it, what are the outputs, what are the outcomes, and how are you going to measure those outcomes. And also having clarity around who's going to write the grant and in what time frame, because often it can just fall to one person and it happens in a last minute dash. Sometimes it's unavoidable, but oftentimes it is avoidable. And also being really clear on who's delivering the programs and what's the plan if we win the grant in quite a concrete way. Beyond that, I think it's the organisations that are keeping some track — it doesn't need to be a full digital dashboard — but keeping some track of their hit rate, how many grants they're applying for, which ones they're winning, and those that always ask for feedback, whether or not they win. Particularly if you're unsuccessful, taking up any opportunity for feedback is going to be very helpful. It might sometimes be generic and that can be frustrating, but increasingly I'm seeing funders giving feedback. And if it is generic, often from government departments, it's detailed and still helpful.
Alyssa: I really can't agree more with your point around the program logic and theory of change. Even just sometimes having those things at an organisational level — if you're in a pinch, those are things that you can share. I know I've applied to Lottery West a few times and they really appreciate a good program logic. Just having them ready to go, they can be fairly quickly tailored to your program if you know where your organisation sits, what your overall impacts are. You've also got that cohesion from the organisational level to your program level. And also around the working with your existing systems — do you find organisations can come to you and think they need the next best system when sometimes if it's a small organisation, an Excel spreadsheet might suffice?
Madlen: Yeah, and I think yes, maybe the spreadsheet will suffice, but maybe it's not a leap to a full-blown CRM, for example. Let's find something in between if they're wanting to move to something a little bit more sophisticated. There's quite a bit of low-cost software and apps that can be used as well. But I would say absolutely an Excel spreadsheet can suffice. And also to that point in terms of impact measurement and impact tracking — I think having robust evaluation practices in place is great, but we can also overthink these things sometimes. And for a small organisation, keeping track of your numbers, keeping track of recipient, participant, community feedback is really important. Having a set of case studies, having a set of impact stories — that can all be captured in a Google Doc or a Word doc. I think it's less about the system that you're using and more about are we capturing these impact results consistently and are we doing it as a team. I would often recommend, whether it's in a weekly team meeting or fortnightly or whatever cadence the team wants, having an agenda item that's just impact stories or impact data and getting those data points from the team and having it in one place so that it can be quickly drawn upon when the time comes to put the stories in front of a funder.
Alyssa: So true. That can really mean the difference between winning and losing. Do you have any examples you could share of interesting client transformations you've seen, even if they're simple things? What did the client need, how did you support them, and what were the impacts?
Madlen: The one that comes to mind — and it's because in the previous question, I wanted to talk a bit about alignment between the board, CEO, and team, because I think that's another factor for the organisations that I see who are winning grants, having that alignment at all levels of the organisation. So I'm thinking about a client who were a small not-for-profit where there was a scatter gun approach to applying for grants. It came about in a number of ways, but I think for the most part, as it often does, it's because there's good people wanting to do good work and wanting to fund as much of that good and impactful work as they can. But also there was some misalignment between the board expectations — or I think it was more perceived expectations from the board — around how much funding would be won in any given year. And so there was this pressure, but I think that actually the target had been set inadvertently by the team as well. So what we did is we had strategic planning sessions looking specifically at the fundraising strategy — what were we trying to fund, first of all getting really clear on what it was that we were trying to fund and why, and then how much we would need to fund that, and just bringing some more alignment between what the board was expecting, what those targets were, the timelines, and how that was going to be achieved for the team. From there it was about having mechanisms in place for regular tracking and reporting into the board — some metrics around how many grants had been applied for, what the hit rate was, a bit of narrative around what the go-no-go decisions were around the grants. And what I noticed was that by virtue of just being more involved in this process, there was more buy-in around the grant seeking, and more buy-in from the board who then were able to leverage some of their skills, networks, and resources to support the grant seeking and fundraising. That particular organisation saw quite a significant success in the years following that and almost doubled their revenue in the two years following.
Alyssa: That's awesome. I'm sure it must have taken some of the pressure off too — because if the board has high expectations of the team and people feel like they're not performing, there's a complete disconnect in what's actually achievable.
Madlen: Yeah, and to be fair, it wasn't sort of high expectations. It was more perceived expectations. There just hadn't been that clarity around what is it actually that we expect here and how are we going to achieve that. And so by being able to break down some of that communication friction or just supporting a bit more clarity there, everyone realises that they're on the same team and wanting to achieve the same things. I think just more clarity in that instance was very helpful.
Alyssa: That's a really good example. Something I think people would easily overlook and then it can keep causing problems. So in terms of looking more broadly at the grants and fundraising landscape, are there any key trends or changes that you've noticed over the last few years?
Madlen: I think generally we're seeing that it's feeling more competitive. Often my clients are feeding back to me that it can feel, particularly the ones that are quite established and have been around for some time, that they're seeing less success with their grants. I think it's driven by a few things. It is increasingly competitive, with new charities every year. But also it's what is the funder appetite to fund particular types of programs and work. We see trends based on what's happening geopolitically, what's happening in Australia in terms of policy shifts and government priorities. So some sectors that might have been previously quite well funded and becoming accustomed to having that funding are then receiving less of it and having to pivot potentially to trusts and foundations and philanthropic funding. We also often hear around funders wanting to fund new programs and pilots. And so that becomes quite tricky for organisations who are delivering a much-needed, successful program year on year, but it's no longer new — it's actually got a proven track record. For those organisations, it's about finding the right audience and finding the right match, because there certainly are funders and grants out there for established programs. On a positive note, we're also seeing trends like the Pay What It Takes movement in Australia, which is super promising — that acknowledgement that in order to deliver impactful programs, we also need to fund what keeps the lights on, the overheads, and beyond program delivery. That extends to capability building within the organisation, leadership development, recognising that funding things like developing evaluation frameworks supports better outcomes for the community. I'm really on board with the Pay What It Takes campaign. And seeing more untied funding, and also seeing trends like more giving circles and crowdsourced philanthropic funding where people donate a relatively small amount each week, but the volume then allows large grants to be distributed.
Alyssa: That's so true. Also on your positive note, seeing more lived experience organisations popping up is really nice. And I think that's where the Pay What It Takes stuff matters so much — because there's that sustainability question in grants, how are you going to sustain the funding beyond the funding period? And I think sometimes I find it so unrealistic because some things aren't going to keep going without some level of support. There's certainly things that can become sustainable, but not everything. And that doesn't delegitimise the importance of a program.
Madlen: Absolutely, I agree. And your point around lived experience is a really important one as well, because the lived experience founder — it comes from such a place of passion and lived expertise, and probably some learned expertise as well. I think funding those organisations is so important so that we don't risk as a community exploiting individuals who are so passionate about a cause and relying on them to do the work of something that should be publicly funded or funded more broadly. I think we have a social responsibility, a community responsibility to support those organisations provided that they are doing impactful work.
Alyssa: That's a really good point. Not just filling a gap that should be covered elsewhere.
Madlen: Yes, absolutely. And I had a thought as well when you were saying, you know, that question around how is this program going to be sustainable beyond this grant — it reminded me of another tip. It's going to depend on the type of grant, but if it's a grant that has come about through a relationship with a philanthropic funder, really drawing on that relationship and having the conversations around who else might you introduce us to, who else do you think would be interested in supporting this work. Having those conversations — this grant might not be able to sustain us, but could you give us some advice? Could you introduce us to some peers? Being clear on your numbers, being clear on what you need to sustain the program, and then not being afraid to make those asks at the right moment.
Alyssa: I love that. My head's often in the grant space, but it goes to show the importance of pairing it with relationship and partnership building with major donors. The two can work really nicely together — you might get that pilot funding through the grant, and then you've got the proof to go out to major donors who can continue it as well. So I guess we often celebrate winning a grant, but what do you think organisations underestimate about what comes next? Implementation pressure, compliance, acquittals, that sort of thing.
Madlen: I think across the board, organisations are underestimating the cost of what it takes to implement a grant. I think that is driven by funders often only wanting to fund program costs — that is a factor. But also it comes from organisations always trying to run it as lean as possible in order to win the grant, or at least it's perceived that they need to do that. So there's a bit of a chicken and egg situation happening. Not considering the very practical implications of what happens then — is the team then too stretched, how are we going to fund the rest of the delivery of this program? I don't think that organisations are not aware of it. I think there's just not enough honest decision-making conversations that happen upfront about that. I would also like to see happening more is front-loading some of the work around program or project management and also data collection and evaluation. Rather than being deep in delivery and then thinking about the evaluation at the end or the acquittal at the end — as I mentioned earlier, collecting those data points as you go along and setting up the infrastructure at the start to do that. When everyone is busy — small but mighty teams doing a lot of work — it can feel difficult to carve out the space to front-load some of that work. Developing your project management plan, making sure that you've assessed the risks, being clear on how you're going to mitigate them, setting up your systems to capture the data. But what we see is if that's not done at the start, there's often a scramble at the end, and that scramble will then impact the capacity to seek out other funding opportunities. There will be a cost somewhere. And also going back to my point before around alignment with the board — making sure there's clear reporting into the board, transparency around where the funding is coming from, how we're utilising it, and making sure that it's aligned to strategy, aligned to the fundraising policy, and taking the organisation in the direction they want to be going.
Alyssa: Those are excellent points. I especially like your point around front-loading the project management, because it is so easy to overlook. And then you get the funding and it is a scramble, and often you've set deadlines around when you're going to achieve things by and you watch the milestones tick on.
Madlen: And just one more point on that — project management is a skill, it's a discipline in itself. I think also just making sure that capability is in the organisation. People that work in not-for-profits are wearing many hats and having to organically manage a lot of projects and different things. But making sure there is the capability within the organisation to the extent that the organisation needs at that given point in time. So if you've just won your first $100,000 or $500,000 multi-year grant, have you got that capability to manage delivery, reporting, and the budget along the way? If you don't, it's a good time to invest in some of that as well.
Alyssa: Great point. So while we're on the systemic, structural parts of grants and funding — a bit of a miracle question: if you were given the space to fully redesign the grants and fundraising system, what key things would you change?
Madlen: I love this question and I also kind of hate it. It's a very big question. Look, I think for me, what I see is a lot of organisations wanting to collaborate and wanting to partner with others and recognising that they can't do it all, and that often the impact is greater than the sum of its parts — if we do it together, we can magnify the impact. So what I would love to see is more investment in infrastructure to support organisations to collaborate well and to be able to leverage pooled resources. Because I think that is where the magic happens. Shared resources, pooled resources, supporting really genuine partnerships, which would include power sharing across organisations — that's where I'd like to see some investment. And as well as that, another thing that I would love to see more of is devolved funding for organisations, particularly community organisations, grassroots organisations. Seeing some of that funding flow through directly to individuals that need it and supporting their autonomy and agency to be able to spend in the ways that they know will serve the community.
Alyssa: Absolutely. Your point on partnerships made me think about consortium applications for grants — there's never the time to put in the work. I've seen consortium applications where they're coordinating information from 10-plus organisations. How on earth is six weeks enough time? I think on your infrastructure point, also changing basic things like timeframes for partnership engagement.
Madlen: Yes, the timeframes. We've all seen it — it's not pretty, but we've seen it. I'm applying for this grant in 10 days, can I please get your letter of support? And this is how we're going to partner and we'll work out the details later. Sometimes that just has to happen. But for genuine partnerships, there needs to be that relational stuff first — trust, clear communication, power sharing between the partners, being really clear on who's doing what, how decisions are made. Partnership governance is really important — clearly articulating how decisions are going to be made, how risks are going to be managed, where the responsibility sits. And that stuff takes time, it takes work.
Alyssa: What led you to work in the not-for-profit space, and what inspires you most about working in this space?
Madlen: Two different questions — I'm going to decide which one to answer. What led me here is a very squiggly path. I was actually a chef in a previous life and a previous career. And then I worked in community mental health services and kind of found my way along the path to this space, and actually cut my teeth doing large tenders for a national not-for-profit, which was a very steep learning curve. But in terms of what inspires me — it's the people. The people that I get to work with and the people that I get to meet who are just really good eggs. Really great people doing great work, such impactful work, and being able to contribute to that work in the way that I can, drawing on my skills and traits around pattern recognition, being able to recognise what the challenges might be for a given organisation and what are the opportunities to build their capability to solve some of those challenges. It's often translating quite a bit of complexity into some really clear and structured processes. I also really love, and increasingly so, the storytelling part of it — being able to translate this complex, nuanced, values-driven work into narratives that are clear and fundable. And I see a lot of organisations, particularly founder-led and lived experience-led organisations, where there's such a heavy reliance on one individual or two individuals. If the work needs to continue and they're doing really important impactful work, then supporting that organisation to put in place what they need to steward the work moving forward and not just rely on one pretty extraordinary individual. That's what drives me to do my work.
Alyssa: That's a really beautiful answer. I love the good eggs. I couldn't agree more — I don't think I've had a client where I've been like, this person's intentions are misplaced. It just doesn't exist in this sector, at least not that I've encountered. So a key thing we want to cover in this podcast is the role of technology in grants and the space more broadly. What role do you see technology and AI playing in the future of your work as a consultant?
Madlen: The future of my work and my current work as well, I would say. I think I was a relatively early adopter of AI in my work. I certainly had a point of being very interested in it and really focusing on experimenting and learning about it. I think AI is — I am seeing that most people are using it in some way. There is a lot of uptake and I don't think it's going anywhere. My recommendation would be for organisations to get on board and at least, at the very least, learn about how it might potentially support the work of their organisation. Because particularly for grant writing, what it brings is an opportunity to be quite a bit more efficient in the way that you're writing grant applications and potentially more effective depending on the skills in the organisation. There are caveats though. I am a strong believer that individuals and organisations need to invest in building the skills and capability to use AI well and to use it ethically. AI is not the source of truth — it can make stuff up, and people are probably not as aware of that as they should be. Learning how to do quality prompting, or utilise something — I've tested GrantDrafter — learning how to invest in learning how to use it properly, getting really clear on what are the inputs that you need to put into it in order to get high quality outputs, is really where it's at.
Alyssa: I really like that point. There's so much fear mongering around AI replacing jobs, but as you're saying, human judgment is still a key component.
Madlen: So key. Even with grant writing, you always want the human lens on it. I would never recommend that anyone draft a grant with AI and then just hit submit. You want to be reviewing it, making sure that what it's drafted for you is accurate. And particularly with using AI, all of those fundamentals that we spoke about earlier are even more important. Being very clear on your impact data, your program logic, having all of that clearly articulated — because that's what you want to be able to put into GrantDrafter or whatever other AI you're using to ensure accurate outputs.
Alyssa: That's definitely why from our perspective building GrantDrafter, we wanted it to be a drafting tool. It's not your final version because AI just isn't there yet. And you should never be in a situation where you're not reviewing your work before you submit. Overall, do you think it's a change for the better for the sector or the worse?
Madlen: I think that's a very philosophical question. What I do know is that it is a tool that's not going away. It can absolutely help to find efficiencies in your work. Increasingly, organisations will be using AI to draft grants. Grantmakers are already seeing that across the board — I'm hearing that. Also, what I'm hearing is that often it's the organisations that have had a human come over the top and make sure that the responses aren't generic, that they're very tailored to the organisation, have the right accurate information — those are being differentiated from the mass AI responses that are happening. It can be a very useful tool. And beyond even grant drafting, there are so many use cases for not-for-profits. AI can help with identifying gaps in your programming, doing a rapid synthesis of key documents that will support your grant writing. There are a lot of different use cases and ways that you can use it even leading up to applying for grants that will then support funding applications.
Alyssa: So true, it's not just one limited use case at all. What gives you hope about the future of impact-driven work?
Madlen: The thing that gives me hope is the people doing the impact-driven work. There are always people willing to step up and do this work, that believe in this work, that believe in a better world, myself included. We do this work because we believe in a better world, in a more just world, in a world where people can express and live their human rights. And that's what gives me hope — that I am surrounded by people that continue to do this work despite the state of the world and the many injustices that we see around us. They continue to persevere for a better world.
Alyssa: I love that. That's so well said. We'll close out the podcast with my quick fire round — three questions. Can you give me one word to describe management consulting in the for-purpose space?
Madlen: Alignment.
Alyssa: Ooh, I like that. What's the most underrated skill in nonprofit consulting?
Madlen: Relational skills. People skills.
Alyssa: Nice. And finally, do you have a not-for-profit hero? Someone you look up to in the space — could be an organisation or an individual.
Madlen: So many, like there are just so many people doing incredible work across all of the different arms of this space — the people working in charities, people doing the funding, intermediaries like myself. But the people that inspire me — it's not one person. It's the people that are working in grassroots organisations, leading grassroots organisations, leading movements, and particularly those who are from more marginalised groups who typically don't see the funding flow through to them as often, and yet they persevere. They're doing this incredible work in their communities, often the quiet work, the untold work. Those are the people that really inspire me.
Alyssa: It's hard to name just one, isn't it?
Madlen: I couldn't. Too many incredible people.
Alyssa: Well, that's a nice way to close us out. Thank you so much for your time, it's been really awesome speaking with you and getting your wisdom. And just a quick note that the podcast is powered by GrantDrafter, helping organisations to draft their next grant in five minutes or less. If you haven't already, check out the GrantDrafter website at grantdrafter.com. And for those listening, we hope you're feeling inspired to get out there and maximise your impact.
Madlen: Amazing. Thanks, Alyssa. Thanks for having me.