What a CSR committee checks before shortlisting an NGO

In many companies a junior officer in the CSR cell does not read your proposal first. The officer runs it through a series of gates. A failed gate can end the review. Below are five gates in a plausible order, what makes each one close, and what to put in your folder so it stays open. Companies differ, so treat the order as a guide and ask for each company's own checklist.

The officer is also protecting themselves. Someone who recommends an NGO answers to a board and sometimes to an auditor, so they want papers they can staple, not promises.

Gate one: is the organisation what it says it is?

The officer looks for the registration certificate, the trust deed or society bylaws, the PAN and whatever tax-exemption papers you hold. If one is missing or its expiry date has passed, the file may wait.

Which documents apply depends on your structure and on what the company's policy asks for, and the rules change, so confirm the list with your chartered accountant. What you control is the state of the copies. Send clean scans with the expiry date in the file name, not a photograph of a photocopy that someone has to squint at.

Gate two: has it accounted for money before?

Next come audited statements and annual returns for recent years, plus utilisation certificates or end-of-project reports for past grants, with the funder named. The aim is a record of money accounted for, not a large budget.

If you have no audited accounts, many companies will not go further, and no folder can cover the gap, so fix that before approaching them. A new trust with one year of accounts should say so plainly and offer a smaller first project.

Gate three: is someone in charge?

A named board, the dates of the last two meetings, and a programme head with a mobile number. Committees are wary of an NGO that is one person and a bank account. Famous names are not needed. What helps is a short note on each trustee and the date they last signed the accounts. If two members have left, take them off the list before anyone else notices.

Gate four: is the work real?

A video of a function proves little. A normal day shows more. Send dated photographs with place in the caption, a sample attendance register with names hidden, and a signed note from a head teacher or panchayat member who knows your work. Offer a visit and keep the date open.

Photographs of beneficiaries need consent, and children's images need a parent's or guardian's permission. Do not use any photo you could not show the person it depicts.

Prepare for a visit as you would for an inspection, with staff present, registers up to date, one beneficiary or parent willing to talk if they choose to. Do not stage a crowd. An officer who has visited many sites can spot it.

Gate five: does it fit our policy?

This one is yours to check before you send anything. Read the company's CSR policy. If it does not name your cause or your district, do not send the folder; CSR funding for NGOs sets out how to read a policy first. If the committee wants a project far from your area of work, say so rather than stretch.

The folder that passes all five

Put it on a shared drive with a cover sheet listing each item, the year it covers and the date last updated. Number the files to match.

01 Registration certificate, trust deed or bylaws
02 Tax-exemption and other registrations (expiry in file name)
03 Audited statements and annual returns, three years
04 Utilisation certificates from past funders
05 Board list, roles, dates of last two meetings
06 Programme note: one page per programme, one measure
07 Field proof: dated photos, register sample, local official's contact
08 Child and vulnerable-person protection note, if relevant
09 One named contact and an open visit offer

Write "not applicable" beside any item that does not apply. A blank looks like a gap. Say only what you hold; how an NGO should present credentials covers the wording.

A proposal that stopped at gate one in Rourkela

Take an invented trust training young women as mobile-phone repair technicians in Rourkela. It sent a proposal to a company near the steel belt and got a polite request for documents. The trust found its last utilisation certificate in a trustee's email, one registration copy was an old scan with a lapsed date, and the board list still named two members who had left.

The officer paused it. The trust asked its auditor for clean copies, updated the board list, wrote to its earlier funder for the certificate, and put a cover sheet dated that week on top. The earlier funder took a month to reply, so the file stayed paused for most of it. When the company next asked, the answer went back at once, and the committee asked for a visit. A visit is not a grant: the committee then asked for a smaller first batch of twenty trainees, and the trust had to decide whether that was workable. Nothing about the project had changed. The delay came from the state of the paper.

Keeping the folder fresh

Set a reminder against every expiry date and change the cover sheet date each time you replace a file. A folder that says it was updated two years ago tells the officer something you did not mean to say.

From folder to proposal

A committee that has seen a clean folder reads the proposal with less doubt, so the folder goes first, then the costed project. The costing is the work of proposal development. When a company issues a formal call with its own forms, expect to answer it separately from the folder. Other work for trusts and temples is under non-profit.

Build the index this week, even if half of it is empty. The blanks are your task list, and the first one to fill is whichever item an officer would ask for first: the registration copy. If you want help preparing the folder and the pitch, tell us what you need.