Grant Writing Grant Writing Ethics 1 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: A freelance grant writer is offered a fee equal to 15% of any grant funds secured for a nonprofit client. Why is this arrangement considered unethical by professional standards?
- It violates IRS rules on nonprofit contractor payments
- Percentage-based compensation creates an incentive to overstate project needs and undermines funder trust (Correct answer)
- Freelancers are prohibited from working with nonprofits under AFP guidelines
- It is only unethical if the grant exceeds $100,000
Correct answer: Percentage-based compensation creates an incentive to overstate project needs and undermines funder trust
The Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP) and most professional grant writing associations prohibit percentage-based fees because they incentivize inflated proposals and compromise the integrity of the grant-seeking process. Funders expect proposals to reflect genuine need, not a contractor's financial interest.
Question 2: A grant writer who consults for multiple nonprofits inadvertently shares a funder's private feedback — given to one client after a rejected proposal — with a second client applying to the same funder. Which ethical principle has been violated?
- Stewardship
- Confidentiality (Correct answer)
- Accuracy
- Competence
Correct answer: Confidentiality
Confidentiality requires grant writers to protect proprietary information shared within a client relationship. Private funder feedback given to one client is not the grant writer's information to share, even if it might help another client's application.
Question 3: A grant writer is preparing a letter of support from a community partner organization, but the partner director is traveling and cannot sign it before the deadline. The grant writer drafts the letter and submits it with a forged signature, intending to get approval afterward. This action is best described as:
- An acceptable workaround under time pressure if the partner later ratifies it
- Fraud, because submitting falsified documents to a funder constitutes misrepresentation (Correct answer)
- A minor procedural violation that does not affect the grant's merits
- Permissible if the grant writer discloses the situation in the proposal narrative
Correct answer: Fraud, because submitting falsified documents to a funder constitutes misrepresentation
Submitting forged documents to a funder is fraud regardless of intent or subsequent ratification. It misrepresents the organization's partnerships and support base, which are material facts the funder relies on in making funding decisions.
Question 4: While reviewing a funder's RFP, a grant writer notices an eligibility criterion that is ambiguous and could be interpreted to either include or exclude their organization. What is the most ethical course of action?
- Interpret the criterion in the most favorable way possible and proceed without comment
- Contact the program officer to seek clarification before submitting (Correct answer)
- Submit the application and address the ambiguity only if the funder raises it
- Omit any mention of the criterion in the proposal to avoid drawing attention to it
Correct answer: Contact the program officer to seek clarification before submitting
Proactively contacting the funder for clarification ensures the organization submits only when genuinely eligible and demonstrates respect for the funder's intent. Self-serving interpretations of ambiguous requirements without disclosure can amount to misrepresentation.
Question 5: An organization's executive director instructs a grant writer to describe a program as 'evidence-based' in a federal proposal, even though the program model has never been formally evaluated. The grant writer should:
- Follow the instruction since the executive director bears ultimate responsibility for the proposal
- Refuse to include the claim and explain to the director that submitting inaccurate information to a federal funder may constitute grant fraud (Correct answer)
- Use the term but add a footnote clarifying the program is 'emerging'
- Include the claim only if a similar program elsewhere has been studied
Correct answer: Refuse to include the claim and explain to the director that submitting inaccurate information to a federal funder may constitute grant fraud
Falsely claiming a program is evidence-based in a federal proposal can constitute fraud under the False Claims Act. Grant writers share ethical and legal responsibility for the accuracy of submissions they prepare and cannot simply defer to a supervisor's instruction to misrepresent facts.
Question 6: A grant writer leaves a nonprofit and begins working for a competing organization in the same service area. They want to reuse sections of a proposal they wrote for their former employer to apply to the same foundation. The primary ethical concern with this is:
- Copyright infringement, since proposals are always protected intellectual property
- Breach of confidentiality and loyalty, because the former employer's strategies, data, and program details are proprietary (Correct answer)
- Plagiarism, since the grant writer cannot cite their own prior work
- There is no ethical concern if the grant writer was the sole author of the original proposal
Correct answer: Breach of confidentiality and loyalty, because the former employer's strategies, data, and program details are proprietary
Proposals developed for an employer contain that organization's confidential program models, data, and competitive positioning. Repurposing this material for a competing organization violates the duty of confidentiality owed to the former employer, regardless of who wrote the text.
Grant Writing Grant Writing Ethics 1
A freelance grant writer is offered a fee equal to 15% of any grant funds secured for a nonprofit client.
Why is this arrangement considered unethical by professional standards?