In today’s world proposal development is very essential element for social development. Now day’s donors are very systematic and needs all detailed information before accepting any proposal from NGO. With the social sector acquiring more and more professionalism day by day, proposal development is written by only domain level experts. Now a days, usually there is a format and certain specified guidelines which need to be followed while developing a proposal. Also, presently, utmost care is taken so that the community / target group/ beneficiaries’ for which the proposal is written is impacted the maximum with a focus on sustainability. This is because, a proposal being time bound, after completion, there happens to be a sense of loss. Also, many companies have earmarked ‘Corporate Social Responsibility’ agendas and ask for sharp to the point proposals from implementing agencies. Many donors also ask for a brief concept note or a Letter of Intent from the implementing agency before accepting a full-fledged proposal. They even come to the community and see the viability of the project before awarding the grant. Now, the donors remain concerned with the impact the project will bring to the lives of the community people, and ask for specific numbers, which need to be mentioned in the proposal. All these factors have evolved more and more over the past few years. The influx of domain level experts having background in social science, MSW has meant that proposals have taken a professional shape now days. This, in turn helps benefit the target groups only, as the activities are done methodologically and meticulously, impacting the last person in the community. Whereas, previously people only depended on at best a hotmail or yahoo mail to send across ideas, nowadays with different social network platforms like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube having sprouted up, the linkages and networking have become much quicker and effective. People use these platforms extensively to share their views and send across their messages in the development world, an alien concept ten years back. Also, a decade back, people used print media or a telephone or surface mail to send across a proposal or make modifications to it. Things have changed now. The mushrooming of mobiles as a necessity, rather than luxury in the hands of all excepting a negligible few along with laptops, secure internet connections in remote areas – all these have speeded up the proposal development process. Even if one is on the move, people use “blackberries” or similar applications to discuss strategies and plans, modify, approve proposals, whereas a word like “blackberry” ten years back implied a fruit which can be eaten only. Also, though the allocated funding amount have increased over the years, stringent clauses of checks and monitoring guidelines implies a proposal has to be strong all round, justifiable and sustainable in order to get sanctioned. With such new adage evolving concepts, skills, diversified knowledge, Funding Opportunities, learning institutions, stringent monitoring by donors, it doesn’t come as a surprise that ‘proposal development in social development space’ have come a long way…. But the road isn’t traversed full…. The process will cross many vistas in the days and times to come. Amit Sharma is an expert content writer. He is very experienced content writer. He has written many articles on Striipes. Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/causes-and-organizations-articles/the-evolution-of-proposal-development-in-social-development-space-in-the-last-decade-6510657.html
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