Yesterday we launched the Grants Program Canvas and Playbook! This is a set of open-source (creative commons) resources designed to empower growth leaders to create and manage high-impact grants programs within the web3 space.
The project was birthed out of a question that we kept getting asked: “How do I launch a grants program? Where do I even start?”
So we went to work building a simple design tool that breaks down each step into manageable pieces that makes it easy for the most novice of grants operators to launch a program.
Streamlined Grantmaking with the Grants Program Canvas
Our launch is mainly focused on introducing and driving adoption for the Grants Program Canvas — which is a tool that visualizes the different elements of a grants program in phases (Define, Design, Execute and Learn), each with specific quadrants leading users through a complete process for program design.
Taking inspo from the business model canvas, we believe that this framework could become a standard for more comprehensive and streamlined grantmaking that has been a major gap for web3 ecosystems.
The exciting part about this tool is that it can be used for both grants program creation AND evaluation and elevation of existing programs.
We are already using this too internally to evaluate the Citizens Retro and are incorporating the tool in our grants services offerings as well.
You can download the canvas here and upload it into any whiteboard tool to get started with it.
Dive Deeper with the Grants Program Design Playbook
The comprehensive 100+ page guide dives deeper into each quadrant of the Canvas, offering invaluable tools insights. It features helpful worksheets, templates, useful examples and case studies that pull from the biggest grants programs in web3.
The playbook really does support a deeper understanding on how to…
- Maximize Impact: the methodology emphasizes the creation of clear objectives and strong impact measurement, guaranteeing a program delivers meaningful results.
- Simplify Planning: our step-by-step approach ensures a comprehensive plan without the overwhelming complexity.
- Stay Growth-Focused: the structured process allows for continuous learning and adaptation, ensuring a given program evolves alongside its community’s needs.
At the moment it’s also free so you should probably just download the playbook.
Enabling any community to fund what matters
We’re bullish on grants.
As an org, working to turn the hype around grants into purposeful and impactful grant-making in the web3.
We’re excited to see how the canvas will move the needle towards this objective. And I’m personally excited to see how Gitcoin itself will use this tool to support its grants ecosystem! (GG community rounds, Citizen Grants, rounds running on Grants Stack).
I think this is just the beginning, in lockstep with the open-source ethos of Gitcoin, the canvas is a creative commons tool that can be remixed, repurposed and reused by anyone in our community and beyond. We hope that those in our orbit really embrace the power of this tool and continue to prove that grants = growth.
Download the canvas and playbook here!
We’ll be at EthCC diving into different aspects of the canvas on July 8! Get your tickets here.