E-025 The Power of Grant Logic Models with Julie Assel and Lucy Morgan

Episode Summary:

### Quick Episode Summary Grant Talks Podcast [#025]

*Intro ***.42***

* Fire Away Questions with Julie Assel and Lucy Morgan CPA***1:49***

* The Untapped Power of Logic Models***2:36***

* The Benefits of Logic Models in the Grant LIfecycle***4:04***

* Key Components of Logic Models***5:56***

* Picking the Right Type of Logic Model***8:29***

* Best Practices: Logic Models and Course Corrections***12:08***

* Using Logic Models to Highlight ROI***13:18***

* Spotlight: Mistakes in Grant Logic***14:31***

* Lessons Learned: Harnessing the Potential of Logic***15:50***

* The Last Word with Julie Assel and Lucy Morgan CPA ***17:09***

*Outro Audio GrantTalks Podcast with Lucy M. Morgan CPA ***18.18***

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 Introducing Julie Assel from Assel Grant Services

Intro: 00:04

Welcome to the Grant Talks podcast with Lucy Morgan. Lucy is the CEO and director of MyFedTrainer.com a leading provider of grant management training and templates for federal grant recipients. This show is for grant professionals looking to gain confidence managing their grants. In an age of increasing complexity, you'll hear from leading professionals on the best practices surrounding grants, what's involved in successfully managing the grants lifecycle and how to make sure your grants are managed correctly. Now here's your host Lucy Morgan. 

Lucy Morgan: 00:42

Welcome, everyone, to this conversation with Julie Assel, GPC. Julie is the president and CEO of Assel Grant Services and the president of the Grant Professional Certification Institute Board of Directors. She has written awarded grants totaling more than $156 million since 2003, both from federal and foundation funders for school districts, universities, hospitals, and nonprofit organizations.

And I'm Lucy Morgan, your host for this session. Welcome, Julie. I'm excited to be able to interview you for this podcast. So, I was really attracted to the big promise in your presentation at this year's GPA Conference. You talked about how to be more efficient in grant seeking, deliver more comprehensive proposals, manage up, down, and around with colleagues and clients, and increase the capacity to speak truth to power.

That's a pretty tall order for any presentation, let alone your conference presentation called "Bring Your Logic Model to Life: It's more than just a required attachment." And I can't wait to hear more about this topic. But first, I have a few fire-away questions to introduce you to our audience. Are you ready?

Julie Assel: 01:48

I'm ready.

Fire Away Questions with Julie Assel and Lucy Morgan CPA

Lucy Morgan: 01:49

Okay. So, first of all, you have a long history of service in a wide variety of organizations. Tell me what ignited that spark in you and what impact it has had on your life.

Julie Assel: 01:59

So, I originally started writing grants when I was a teacher for a school district in the urban core. And I was originally a music teacher. And in that process, no money in the urban core for music, so I wrote grants in my classroom. And then, I started writing downtown, and that introduced me to a wide variety of organizations: healthcare, homeless, STEM fields, you name it, I was probably writing about it even there. And I loved it. I loved researching more about it; I loved working with other people, implementing things. It was a wonderful opportunity to be able to impact my community.

The Untapped Power of Logic Models

Lucy Morgan: 02:36

And you say that speaking truth to power is one of the outcomes of breathing life into your logic models. What surprised you most about that untapped power of logic models?

Julie Assel: 02:47

Logic models give you a very clear way to point out to others faults in their logic without having to say, "You're wrong."

Lucy Morgan: 02:56

Well, that certainly got my attention. You know, one of the things I deal with is telling people how to be better communicators with each other. And if there's a better way to maybe point out that someone's going down a faulty path, it sounds like that could be a real benefit as well.

So, now that you've gotten our attention let's make sure we don't leave anyone behind in this conversation. How would you describe a logic model to someone who's not familiar with the concepts?

Julie Assel: 03:21

A logic model is a visual representation of a project. So, many of us, as grant professionals, are looking at something, and we're doing a lot of words. But logic models allow someone who's reading about your project, your proposal, your program to see a snapshot of it, the need, what you're going to do, the activities, and what you're going to measure all on one page from beginning to end, and in the end, like, what kind of impact you're even going to have on your community, and you're able to say, "Okay, I can see where you've got a problem, and I can see where you're going to solve the problem" altogether, and the flow is wonderful.

The Benefits of Logic Models in the Grant Lifecycle

Lucy Morgan: 04:04

What are some of the benefits of integrating the use of a logic model into the grant's life cycle? That oftentimes also seems to be a very visual type of process.

Julie Assel: 04:14

Sure. With the grant life cycle, you have so many different stages, right? You have the planning stage where you're sitting down with your program staff and saying, "What do you want to do, and how can we make this into a proposal that is really exciting to funders?" And again, you're able to kind of pull those details through, and so you have that planning process, and then you put it in this nice visual representation, so that's part of your proposal process itself that gets submitted.

And then, at the end, when you go to implement it, you can go back to that same staff and say, "Here's the quick snapshot what we said we were going to do and how we're going to measure it." And I'll talk to you about all the different ways that are almost kind of variations on that logic model to be able to say, "Okay, this is how during this life cycle we're going to talk to it, and it's all going to make sense."

Lucy Morgan: 05:06

Walk us through some of the downsides when you look upon the logic model as just another required attachment, to quote your words in your presentation, but not necessarily a dynamic planning tool.

Julie Assel: 05:18

So many people look at logic models and say, "Ugh, this is so much work." For them, it's a fight, right? And they're fighting something instead of using it to plan, right? They miss out on that, and they do it last instead of first.

And so, if you've written your whole entire project and now you've gotta do the attachments at the end, then you're trying to fit what you've written into a chart, and that doesn't always happen cleanly. Versus, if you flip that, use it as a planning tool, then you've laid out the whole entire project, and then the writing comes easy.

Key Components of Logic Models

Lucy Morgan: 05:56

I use that technique, but I'd never thought of it as a logic model in doing presentations where I might have a written component, but I like to do the PowerPoint presentation first because that helps me really define what order things need to come in a logical manner.

So, I'd never appreciated that as that same process for logic models. When we talk about logic models, what are the key components of a logic model, and how are they used to address some of the main problems that grant recipients are looking to solve?

Julie Assel: 06:25

So, the main components of a logic model, the most basic kind of logic model, are what are the resources or inputs, what are the activities, what are the outputs, what are the short-term outcomes, what are the impact. Now, let's go back and define what all of those words mean, okay? The resources or inputs. What do you need to actually do your activities? This is a great opportunity to talk with your program staff to say, "Do you need a qualified person that you have to pay to do these activities? Do you need a curriculum? Do you need a space to do it in? You know, what do you physically need?" Especially when I used to work for the school district, I would say to teachers, "What do you want to buy? Why do you need a grant," right? Because so many teachers, they knew they weren't going to get paid more to implement this, they needed the resources. And that's really, like, that resources and that inputs piece. And then, "What are you going to do for activities? Are you tutoring? Are you meeting with parents?" There are so many different projects out there.

And then, outputs are simply a measurement of the activities, okay? So, I'm doing six tutoring sessions for two hours a week. I like to use for outputs frequency and duration, right? So, I'm doing 25 students, 2 hours a day, for 12 weeks. And those are your outputs. You're just measuring the activities. Versus your outcomes where you're saying, "What kind of impact?" What you're really saying is, "How do you believe that this is going to change the attitudes, knowledge, and behavior of the people you're serving? How are you improving their lives?"

Lucy Morgan: 08:07

So, that's really the transformation piece.

Julie Assel: 08:09

It really is. And then, the impact is how is this really making a difference long-term. You might not be measuring it at that point, outcomes are more measurable, but that broad scope of once a child can read by third grade, what difference does that make? That means they're now reading to learn.

Picking the Right Type of Logic Model

Lucy Morgan: 08:29

And, you know, I think these concepts, we're all probably familiar with them one at a time, but not put together in quite that format. So, it's really fascinating to me; I'm not a grant writer, I work, you know, after the award comes in, to just start thinking about it differently from a grant writer standpoint, and how that gets processed, and some of the beneficial impacts that a grant manager can provide to a grant writer too to say, "Hey, these are some of the challenges that we have run into before in measuring some of those outcomes as well."

Well, in your presentation, you talked about the main variations of the logic model. What are the primary types of logic models, and how are they best used depending on the circumstances?

Julie Assel: 09:11

Sure. For us, we see a planning logic model, we see an implementation logic model, and we see an evaluation logic model. Now, in a perfect world, there would be one giant logic model, but it wouldn't be very pretty, and it certainly wouldn't fit on one page. So, what you end up doing is you start taking a look at what's that whole picture from the planning perspective, and a lot of that is those simple columns that we talked about.

But you might also say, "As I take a look at the planning side, what is the need in the community, what are my goals, what are my objectives? Then, what are my inputs?" Okay? And then, at the far right are my activities. That's my variation, all dealing with planning. When I go to implement, the need and the goal are less relevant at that time, but what is important is for me to know what my objective is of what I'm trying to accomplish. So, my logic model kind of starts at that column.

And then, these are the resources. Have I bought them all? Do I have the proper staffing? Where am I doing this? And then, those outputs, that's what I really care about, am I meeting my targets, so that as I'm implementing it, I'm able to say, "Oh, we're behind, we don't have as many people showing up for this training," or, "How do we get more parents involved?"

Because I haven't gotten to the evaluation part, so I'm not so worried about the outcomes, but at the time, it allows me, as the process is happening, to say, "I've got a problem early, and I have time to fix it." Then, the evaluation aspect of it, to start saying, "Okay, here are my outputs, my activities. And how is this really affecting the people that we're serving?" And then, the long-term impact for the community. And I like to think of that as swinging then back around to say, "Based on these outcomes..." It swings back around to the planning because then that becomes part of the description of my need for my next planning grant.

Lucy Morgan: 11:14

And do you find that that implementation phase is the part that may be human nature is in a bit of denial that we aren't spending the money fast enough on the right things or that we're getting off to a slow start and we wait to confront that?

Julie Assel: 11:29

Yes, absolutely. And I would say that of all of those variations, that's probably the variation that people ignore, they don't do that well because the program people are so busy trying to do it, they're not assessing for themselves what's called a formative assessment, they're not assessing for themselves what's really going wrong.

And if things aren't going quite as well as they should, their tendency is to pour more heart into it instead of taking actually a step back and saying, "Okay, what do we need to fix? And what resource do we need to add? Who do I need to partner with to make this work?"

Best Practices: Logic Models and Course Corrections

Lucy Morgan: 12:08

Yes. And I see that from the grant management perspective where people, maybe they have a sense that something isn't happening quite fast enough or they even logically know that things are not happening fast enough, but rather than that being a call to action, it's a call to paralysis.

And the more time that we can build into the ability to correct what might be going wrong, the more we have options. We have options to do other services, possibly, serve less people but serve them more, things like that. And if we get down to that two weeks before the end of the period of performance, you know, there's only so many things that you can still be doing, so.

Julie Assel: 12:45

Interim reports, I believe, are wonderful things in that regard, right? Especially if you're a foundation or you're a federal government funder, requires some form of either quarterly or semi-annual report.

Because if you get off to a slow start and you're doing those types of implementation logic models and formative assessments, you have the opportunity to let your funder know early, "Hey, we are having this challenge. Don't surprise the funder." And so, using those implementation logic models gives you that opportunity to be aware of where you are.

Using Logic Models to Highlight ROI

Lucy Morgan: 13:18

I think I'm going to get a tattoo or a T-shirt that says that "Don't surprise the funder." Well, since we started this conversation, we were talking about service. How can a logic model be used to highlight areas that you know you're doing a really good job on?

We've talked about when things aren't going as expected in kind of a negative context, but what about highlighting those areas that we're really doing a good job on and that we could maybe do more of those things for our community?

Julie Assel: 13:45

Absolutely. So, both with the implementation logic model and the evaluation logic model, you're able to see almost like an ROI, right? So, it cost us in time and money and resources. And you're able to follow that logic going across to say, "When we put in these items, these resources, this is what we're getting."

And there are times that as a nonprofit or any kind of institution, really, you can say, "We only have X number of dollars," and I can take a look at that very clear logic and the logic model to say, "Okay, this number of dollars achieved this outcome. While successful, this number of dollars only achieved this." And so, you can almost take a look at your cost-benefit ratio.

Spotlight: Mistakes in Grant Logic

Lucy Morgan: 14:31

Is that one of the mistakes or gaps that you commonly see visible through the logic model process, and are there any other things that really just stick out like a sore thumb when you look at them through the lens of a logic model?

Julie Assel: 14:42

In my opinion, a logic model is a great resource to find mistakes in logic, right? That's the whole point; it's a logic model, a visual representation of whether what you're doing makes sense. So often people tell me when they ask us to come in and write a grant, as they say, "Well, this is the way we've always done it." So, we sit down, and we do this, "Let's sit down and do a logic model." And I sit down with them, and I said, "Okay, you're doing these activities, and you're doing these outputs, but you never measure the actual outcome with your participants, or the thing that you're measuring doesn't line up over here to the actual need, and so it doesn't work with the full cycle. And in addition, like, you have this great opportunity to measure something that you've always felt like you've done a good job. Now let's find a good tool, maybe an evidence-based tool that can really lift up this program and help you show the community, your stakeholders all the wonderful work you've been doing."

Lessons Learned: Harnessing the Potential of Logic

Lucy Morgan: 15:50

It's nice to not only have to report the bad things, but also report the things that you're doing really well, so I appreciate that perspective of not just always looking for what's going wrong, but also what's going well as well.

What lessons learned would you offer a grant recipient? And maybe they're struggling a bit to kinda get their arms around the potential of using logic models. Maybe they've used them in the past, but they didn't really recognize the full potential. You know, maybe they've heard your presentation at the GPA Conference, and they said, "Now I want to use these logic models in a more meaningful way." What are some of the lessons learned that you might give them as a cautionary tale?

Julie Assel: 16:27

What I would tell you is sit down with your program people, and talk them through column by column, and ask them, "Tell me what activities you want to do." I know of no project who doesn't know what they don't want to do. They don't always know how they're going to measure it, they don't always know who they're going to serve, like, who those services are best for, but they know what they want to do.

So, I like to start with, "What are you going to do?" Then, I back up and say, "Now, what do you need to do this well? Let's start there." And then, everything else, you start building the logic around that.

The Last Word with Julie Assel and Lucy Morgan CPA

Lucy Morgan: 17:09

Well, thanks for giving us a quick tour through the world of logic models and the potential of logic models. I'd like to give you the last word. Is there something I should have asked, but I did not?

Julie Assel: 17:21

Who on your team should be involved in the development of a logic model? I am an advocate of leadership. So, if that's your executive director, somebody who's in decision-making authority, a program person who's actually going to implement it, as well as your evaluator, your quality assurance, quality improvement person, and then, of course, whoever's developing the proposal.

Lucy Morgan: 17:46

Thanks for that insight. If someone would like to find out more about you and Assel Grant Services, how should they get in touch?

Julie Assel: 17:54

Well, we'd love to hear from you. You can check out our website at asselgrantservices.com. You can always give me a call or email me. My email address is [email protected]. 

Lucy Morgan: 18:06

Thank you so much, Julie, for participating in this Grant Talks podcast. Listeners, you can find all the episodes out on granttalks.com, and thanks for tuning in.

Outro: 18:18

To learn more about how MyFedTrainer.com makes grant management more manageable, visit MyFedTrainer.com. That's MyFedTrainere.com. You'll find all the Grant Talks episodes at GrantTalks.com. That's GrantTalks.com.

More About Julie Assel:

Julie Assel, GPC, is the President/CEO and a Senior Writer for Assel Grant Services. Julie has a varied background in grant writing including writing for school districts of varying sizes, universities, and non-profit organizations. So far, she has written awarded grants totaling more than $138 million since 2003.

Her expertise is in federal level grants with the Department of Education, National Science Foundation, National Institute of Health, and the Environmental Protection Agency. At the state level, she has successfully written to the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, Department of Higher Education, and the Missouri Technology Commission among others.

 Julie earned the Grant Professional Certification (GPC) in January 2010 from the Grant Professionals Certification Institute. The GPC is a certification program that measures an individual’s ability to provide quality grant-related services within an ethical framework. Julie currently serves as the President of the national Grant Professionals Certification Institute Board of Directors and is the past President of the Heart of America GPA Chapter in the Kansas City area and past facilitator for the GPA Consultants Special Interest Group.

 She holds a Fundraising Certificate from the Midwest Center for Nonprofit Leadership, a service, and outreach unit of the Department of Public Affairs in the Henry W. Bloch School of Business and Public Administration at the University of Missouri Kansas City and a Bachelor’s Degree in Music Education from Luther College in Decorah, Iowa.

 Prior to starting her own business in 2008, she worked as the Grant and Medical Writer/Quality Assurance Officer for Cardiovascular Imaging Technologies and the Coordinator of Grants and Special Projects for the Kansas City Missouri School District. She has also worked as the Grant Writer for KidsTLC (formerly TLC for Children and Families).

 

More About Lucy Morgan CPA:

Lucy M. Morgan is a CPA, MBA, GPA approved trainer, speaker, and author of 3 books including “Decoding Grant Management-The Ultimate Success Guide to the Federal Grant Regulations in 2 CFR Part 200.” As a leading authority on federal grant management for nonprofits, institutions of higher education and state, local and tribal governments she has written over 250 articles on grant management topics featured in LinkedIn, various publications and on the MyFedTrainer.com blog.

She is a sought-after presenter at national conferences sponsored by organizations such as the Grant Professional Association (GPA), National Grant Management Association (NGMA) and American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA).

Lucy is also a highly regarded trainer whose techniques and teaching style come from real-world experience. Having faced many of the same challenges her audiences have endured, Lucy understands that what looks good on paper may not always work in the real world. Because she has been there, she provides people of all professional backgrounds with practical tools to advance their careers and make a bigger difference in the world. She can be reached at [email protected].

>>Hear more about Lucy's story in Episode #004 

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