Developing Project Proposals Step by Step for NGO in Development & Humanitarian Sector

I started working as a Field Motivator for a local NGO (PREP) in Chittagong in 2007. Later, I worked with different organizations and institutions. I started working as a Project Coordinator for UTSA since October 2020. After that, I worked in project & program management level and managed different development, emergency and humanitarian projects and programs with a broad spectrum of stakeholders and donors.

One of the main responsibilities of a project manager is developing project proposals (project concept note, project proposal, project guide, project quotation, etc.) and one of the major responsibilities of a program manager is to lead grant management & fund raising team & activities, working with project & program proposal team and consultants, finalizing the proposals to go ahead and coordinating with different teams like finance, logistics, security, gender, and human resource departments who are interlinked with proposal development.

To work with project proposals, I was in need of training myself on how to develop project proposals, framing project budgets, creating project budgets and project cycle management. I took part in different online and offline training and workshop to equip myself with the necessary required knowledge on project proposal development. I also read extensive technical documents too.

In the meantime, I took part in the development project and program proposal development. There was a time, when I started enjoying the task and worked extensively with different teams and organizations. Later I turned my passion into a business and started my consulting business which is now Zafari Institute of Project Management. I started training project staff and managers through my organization. I got so many feedbacks from my students to develop a holistic guide on developing project proposals.

Finally I took all my notes and experiences on table and this guide is the outcome of the work I undertake as a project manager.