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When your organization uses disparate applications to store and access your grant data, you’re likely to experience some challenges. According to one 2024 report, 89% of organizations have trouble transferring data between systems, which impacts their ability to communicate with key stakeholders, collaborate with grantees and report on grant progress.
Software integration is the process of connecting different applications and letting them “talk” to each other, or freely transfer data between platforms. These connections help you save valuable time on processes like grant management, accounting and more.
Explore the benefits of integrating grant management software with financial systems such as ERP platforms, accounting software and budgeting tools.
Financial visibility is essential for maintaining accountability after a grant has been awarded. Whether you use a software platform developed in-house or a basic SaaS program, your financial system should be able to provide insight into a grantee’s performance and progress.
Access to these insights helps grantees improve their decision-making when allocating resources and planning transactions.
The insight a grantor has into their grantee’s spending is critical for determining the ultimate success of a grant, as well as detecting fraud.
According to a study from the U.S. Government Accountability Office, the federal government loses as much as $521 billion to grant fraud annually. While this study includes data on pandemic-related spending, it still reveals a key shortcoming of relying on legacy systems. Platforms without real-time visibility into every transaction can obscure instances of fraud until it’s too late, and fraudsters can hide behind solutions that don’t integrate with the systems in your tech stack.
Modern grant management tools address these challenges. By uploading your data to a secure cloud, a web-based grant management solution creates a centralized location where both parties can view and track:
If you spot any potential abnormalities, you can quickly get in touch with grantees to verify what’s going on and why.
Integration makes it easier to meet reporting deadlines because it ensures financial information is available when and where you need it.
As a grantee, you must include financial expenditures as an essential component of the reports you send to your grantor. These reports verify that your work adheres to industry and legal requirements.
With an integrated system, you save time on manual data transfers and report generations by using the automated reporting workflows your system offers. All your financial data flows automatically into your grant management system after every transaction, so all you need to do is select the proper report template and let it generate.
Integration with payment processing tools like PayPal and Stripe helps save valuable time in grant processing by automating the disbursement of funds and tracking payments to grantees. You can also integrate your grant management solution with accounting platforms like QuickBooks and Sage Intacct to facilitate and trace grant-related transactions as they occur.
Automated grant management workflow capabilities also eliminate the need to manually transfer financial data between systems, preventing human error from impacting your reports. All data will automatically flow into your centralized grant management solution, and your automated workflows can quickly process the incoming data for storage and analysis.
A grant management solution that can integrate with budgeting platforms can help grantees ensure their award budgets align with their organization’s overall financial plans. For example, IntelliGrants® IGX fully integrates with a wide range of budgeting and forecasting tools like:
These integrations create a centralized view into your grantee’s incoming and outgoing transactions, which enables grantors to follow what their grantees are doing. They also help prevent overspending and overplanning, which are common mistakes that quickly deplete awarded funds and send projects over budget.
Selecting a platform with award management capabilities augments an integrated budgeting solution’s efficiency by enabling clear communication between all involved parties. With complete visibility into funding agreements and the ability to organize all your grant data for easy monitoring, you ensure both grantors and grantees have the information they need to effectively make decisions at a glance.
Grantors can stay up to date on grant progress by monitoring updates in real time, which keeps the relationship between both parties open. Grantees can use the organization’s capabilities to more effectively allocate funding and resources. This helps improve their overall efficiency by reducing overspending and tracking cash flows.
Disparate systems that hold different data can cause issues when information doesn’t automatically transfer between platforms. What the grantor sees on their screen may differ from what’s on the grantee’s screen, leading to discrepancies in reporting and compliance issues.
When you integrate a centralized grant management solution with your financial software, you create a single source of truth for all your financial information. Thanks to advanced application programming interfaces (APIs) and similar gateways, data flows automatically from your financial platforms into your grant management system. You can pull the information you want from just one screen without having to cross-check.
Grant recipients often encounter unexpected obstacles during the grant life cycle. Staff turnover, hidden costs, scope creep and other challenges may impact their ability to deliver on promised outcomes. Inaccurate financial data can exacerbate the issue.
Because it creates a single source of truth, integrating financial solutions into your grant management platform provides additional flexibility when your team encounters a roadblock. You can make more informed decisions when you have the right information at your fingertips. You may even be able to find previously hidden opportunities by connecting data points between your grant software and your financial platform.
Data-driven decision-making eliminates guesswork and inspires confidence. Strategic integration with a financial software program helps organizations improve decision-making efficiency by reducing the need to switch between applications when collecting information.
Without constantly switching between programs, you can forecast grant budgets with significantly higher accuracy, model complex what-if scenarios and gain insight into outcomes versus spending.
When grantees, grantors and stakeholders all work from the same financial data, collaborating and communicating are much easier. That’s especially true when it comes to monitoring finances in grant management, as file security and financial regulations make sharing documents and data more challenging.
A web-based system is ideal because it displays the same information regardless of who is accessing it and where. For example, IntelliGrants IGX enables collaborators to edit the same document in real time, whether they’re in the office or on the go. Real-time updates within the system eliminate confusion on what information is most recent, improving accuracy and ensuring everyone involved knows what the true financial situation is.
Once a grantee secures funding, they must correctly manage those funds to avoid issues like overspending. Improper resource allocation is a significant issue for many grant recipients.
For example, it’s common for organizations to spread their resources too widely and run out of funding before project completion. Integration with payroll and HR platforms helps organizations balance grant funds against ongoing costs like employee paychecks, reducing the risk of exceeding their budget.
An integrated grant management and financial solution helps simplify the auditing process by ensuring grantees can quickly create the documentation they need.
IntelliGrants IGX automatically generates reports for any needed analysis, including:
Custom templates configured specifically for your organization help you save valuable time when generating reports. Simply open the template you need and allow your grant management software to insert the information automatically.
Accounting teams can use an integrated grant management platform to automatically generate invoices and drawdowns in each funder’s preferred format. Integration also enables users to attach the latest versions of supporting documentation with ease — no need to spend extra time searching for files in other locations.
These capabilities allow your organization to focus on improving key performance indicators (KPIs) such as:
Software integration can be challenging without proper preparation. Here’s a quick overview of how the integration process usually works:
Before taking any concrete steps toward integration, determine your organization’s end goal for grant management. What specific KPIs can you monitor to demonstrate implementation success? How will you determine whether the expense is justified? Answering these questions and creating a clear goal for your grant is essential for executing a complete integration.
Using the right technology can make or break your software integration. Many platforms offer an integration toolkit that automates some or all of the integration process.
For example, IntelliGrants IGX features APIs that facilitate seamless integration with various software programs beyond ERP systems. These APIs enable quick connections and uninterrupted data flows, so you save valuable time and effort in implementation.
Developing an integration roadmap helps you identify key milestones in your software integration and ensure you’re on track for success. Once you understand your goals and the steps you need to accomplish them, you can get started checking off tasks.
A grant management solution like IntelliGrants IGX makes integration easy with a wide variety of software platforms:
It even connects to legacy financial solutions developed in-house, which is a unique benefit for organizations reliant on older digital infrastructure. This connectivity provides extra value and streamlined integration for all grant management processes.
A clear understanding of who owns what data in your organization helps you set up the appropriate permissions for your grant management and financial platforms. For example, role-based access control allows grantees to prevent specific team members from viewing sensitive financial data beyond their typical work requirements.
These policies help you stay compliant with relevant financial and data security regulations, mitigating risk and reducing potential financial penalties.
Ongoing monitoring is essential for any grant management process, including software integration. With the support of our team behind you, your organization can confidently connect any compatible software platform to your IntelliGrants solution and ensure complete integration. Ongoing monitoring through analytics and reporting assists in identifying potential issues and opportunities for improvement.
Integrated software platforms are vital for modern grant management, especially in organizations with complex in-house legacy systems.
IntelliGrants IGX is a highly adaptable grant management software solution for organizations that receive, award and regrant funds for various causes. It integrates fully with other software programs, including legacy platforms, to create a seamless flow of data across your entire organization. Plus, you can configure key elements of the program to better match your organization’s workflows and compliance requirements.
We also offer IG Essentials, a simplified version of IntelliGrants IGX, for organizations with tight budgets and timelines. You can jump into action with an accelerated implementation timeline and a wide variety of preconfigured roles, workflows and forms for your organization.
Discover how easy it is to integrate our software with the rest of your tech stack. Request your free demo today to see our solutions in action.
