RESEARCH LOG
This is a research diary, so expect contradictions, dead ends, and changes of mind. If you see a connection I’ve missed, or have a case study I should know about, reach out at hello@grantedimpact.com
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2025-02-01: Granted Log #1
2025-02-01: Granted Log #1
If you’re reading this, you probably know the story already - grant processes take time, energy, and a special kind of strategic stamina.
Applicants, funders, assessors - everyone I’ve spoken to acknowledges the tensions. Nobody likes the bureaucracy, although it is accepted as reasonable and necessary. Governance, accountability, scarce resources, organisational risk - the reasons are familiar, real, and often embedded within larger structures and dependencies which limit alternatives.
This is the first of my intended weekly logs for Granted, a research project focused on grant distribution systems, asking how we can imagine alternatives without just adding another layer of software on top. I’m Cassandra, and I’ve spent the last five years working in and around grant systems in NZ and the UK, and I am currently based in Vienna, Austria. I’ve seen incredible projects get funded, but I’ve also seen brilliant people burn out on bureaucracy, or be excluded from the process altogether.
So here’s the plan: I’m going to try one post a week. These will be looking into case studies, interviews, sharing my messy research notes, failed experiments, and maybe the occasional rant. Nothing peer-reviewed, everything open to debate. A total work in progress.
I’ll start by reflecting back on the past year, where I shifted my interest in grant distribution from internal musings and observations to direct external engagement.
1. Techno-solutionism?
In February 2025, I took my musings and interest in grant management systems to JKU’s Founders Week. I met remarkable people who shared my drive and ambition and we got to work identifying a strong problem-solution fit. We workshopped it with many experts from different fields who both encouraged and challenged the concept, and at the end of the week, we won the competition. That felt great, and totally validated the idea… right?
When I was left with my thoughts and returned to musing, I realised that really, what they validated was the frustration, not our proposed solution. Everyone in that room recognised the same friction, the endless application forms, the reporting, the feeling that you’re doing admin for admin’s sake, and that all you really need is the resource to get on with it.
So why does it matter? The win confirmed the perceived problem, it did not confirm that building another digital platform is the answer. In fact, I’m increasingly suspicious that digitising bureaucracy often just interfaces inefficiency and further obscures relatedness. You end up trading social benefits for technical debt under recursive, siloed and rigid systems. The experts at the competition were very encouraging, and believed such a system has commercial viability and a market in Europe. However, after some months of working on a product, it became clear to me that more time and input was needed to prevent reproducing this identified systemic waste and harm.
2. What if we started with the people, not the application?
For years, my systems-brain default was: Build a better system. Centralise. Streamline. Create interoperable frameworks.
But the more I observed, the more I realised the problem isn’t just technical debt, it’s relational debt. Most grant tech is built around the application as the central object. What if we built around the project, or the community instead? A system designed for interoperability by default, where information moves with people, not between siloed application portals.
The technical and governance challenges here are huge. But the alternative is… more of the same?
So what’s the point? I’m not attempting to build that system, not yet anyway. First, I want to understand why it doesn’t already exist, what alternatives have been tried, and how we can make meaningful adaptations for more equitable outcomes.
3. Many are trying but almost nothing is sticking.
Over the past five years, I’ve been quietly archiving attempts to “fix” grantmaking.
I’ve seen a sort of Tinder-like grant matching platform which shut down after two years of operations, centralised databases of funding opportunities which drown in technical debt and outdated info, local councils and ministries who have trialled direct relational funding approaches, grant writing trainings, consultancies and a growing number of enterprises offering “AI integrated” grant management platforms - all promising smoother workflows and increased success for applicants and funders.
What opportunities and challenges arose from these different approaches? What created new problems or dependencies? What can we take forward?
If we don’t learn from these experiments, we’re doomed to repeat them. I want to talk to the people building, using, developing, expanding or pulling the plug on these funding system alternatives to better understand the landscape.
4. Context changes everything.
My current studies in Austria have revealed a different approach to funding in the EU compared to the UK and NZ. In Austria, this “bottom up” funding is generally distributed by only two major funding bodies. Many applications include unstructured proposal documents, and major funders report awarding over 80% of applicants. This raises a central question to me - within different social, cultural, economic, legal and political environments, how is the grant process adapted? How and why do the goals of the system shift?
Why does this matter? What could it reveal?
System design is not neutral. By studying contexts and conditions, we can identify what and when intervention may occur to break from path dependency and recursive process.
5. This research is about connecting dots, not just joining them.
There’s still a part of me that wants to build infrastructure. A system that actually helps. I’m aware of many individuals, organisations and companies all over the world who are actively working to transform the funding landscape locally, regionally and nationally for the benefit of their communities. I hope that this research may be a conduit to connect like-minded and experienced leaders in the grant distribution space.
Right now, I’m in listening mode. This year is for mapping the landscape, the failures, the half-successes, the workarounds, and the adaptations.
So, what now? If you’ve got something to contribute to this research, I want to hear from you! This log is a starting point for conversation. Feel free to share your thoughts and respond.
Ok. That’s the first one.
This is a research diary, so expect contradictions, dead ends, and changes of mind. If you see a connection I’ve missed, or have a case study I should know about, reach out at hello@grantedimpact.com
Another one next week, will try for Sundays.
Cassandra Q.
Reading: https://www.academia.edu/2112278/The_social_shaping_of_technology
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