As professional grant writers, our job sometimes ends once we submit the grant. Other times, we help our clients with post-award tasks like grant reporting and site visit consultations. For larger, often federal grants, there may also be additional management tasks associated with the grant award. So what does a grant manager do?

Grants management 101

After a federal grant award is announced, the recipients’ work begins a new phase. They must now manage the grant award, and prepare to track and report on how they have spent the funds. Because this is often a heavy lift on its own, many organizations will opt to hire a grants manager. They can also assign this work to someone already within the organization.

Grants management may include a range of tasks, from the pre-award stage all the way through post-award. These complex grants may involve multiple partnerships, complex budgets and numerous purchase orders, multiple staff members, a matrix of performance metrics, and communication across various stakeholders. It can be helpful to have one person providing oversight.

What does a grant manager do?

A grant manager is a vital part of a grant award. Overall, their role is ensuring a recipient spends federal funds correctly, and that the project goes smoothly. The range of tasks could involve:

• Designing and implementing grant policies and procedures
• Providing relevant trainings to organization staff
• Communicating with the federal government and stakeholders
• Tracking performance goals and metrics
• Supervising staff in the implementation of the grant
• Overseeing compliance to government regulations
• Processing the close-out of the grant award at the end of its life cycle

Depending on the length of the project and the complexity, a grants management position can be full-time or part-time work. It’s also possible to spread the work across multiple people, though it’s helpful to have a central contact person.

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