Following sector-wide efforts to adjust to the COVID-19 pandemic, nonprofits are now spending less time on grant applications and reporting, a study from the Center for Effective Philanthropy (CEP) finds.

The report, Before and After 2020: How the COVID-19 Pandemic Changed Nonprofit Experiences with Funders (14 pages, PDF), found that post-pandemic, grantees spent 25 percent less time on both proposals and reporting and evaluation requests. Time spent per application averaged 15 hours, compared with 20 hours before 2020. Time spent on reporting and evaluation per request also decreased, on average, to 6 hours, compared with 8 hours.

The data gathered from 61 funders that are regular participants in CEP’s Grantee Perception Report (GPR) dataset also indicates an increase in the number of grantees receiving unrestricted funding—30 percent of grantees now receive unrestricted funds, compared with slightly more than 23 percent before 2020. Moreover, two-thirds of funders surveyed indicated that they plan to maintain the higher proportion of unrestricted support in the future.

“As a funder, one of our priorities is to make it easy for our grantees to do their job,” said Virginia Foundation for Healthy Youth director of programs Michael Parsons in the report. “If it’s a choice between making a difference by working with kids or doing paperwork, we would rather them be in the field working with kids.”

“Flexibility is always relevant but particularly in the context of a pandemic,” said Grove Foundation program officer Alicia Harris in the report. “[T]rying to be as accommodating as possible is a basic thing we can do to be supportive.”

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