I thought it might be helpful for me to add my own thoughts, as a fund manger at EAIF (Note Iām speaking in a personal capacity, not on behalf of EA Funds or EV).
Firstly, Iād like to apologise for my role in these mistakes. I was the Primary Investigator (PI) for Igorās application, and thus I share some responsibility here. Specifically as the PI, I should have (a) evaluated the application sooner, (b) reached a final recommendation sooner, and (c) been more responsive to communications after making a decision
I did not make an initial decision until November 20. This was too short a timeframe to provide Igor a final decision by November 24.
I did not reach a final recommendation until November 30th. This was due to the final recommendation we made being somewhat more complex than the original proposal.[1]
In February, I did not provide with a full response for Igorās request for an update on his application.
Second, Iād like to apologise to any other applicants to EAIF who have faced similar unreasonably long delays. Whilst we get back to the most applicatants on a reasonable timeframe (see other comments), there are a few cases I am well aware of where we deadlines have been missed for too long. Iām aware of a couple of instances where this has caused significant stressāagain, I would like to express my deepest regret for this.
As broader context, I think itās worth emphasising that EAIF is highly under-resourced at the moment. Itās fairly common for orgs to say theyāre ācapacity constrainedāābut I think this is more true for EAIF in the last ~3 months than any other period:
In summer 2023, EAIF had five part-time fund managers. With OPās distancing from EAIF, we dropped down the three. In late 2023, we then dropped to just myself (part-time), and Caleb as acting EAIF chair.
Given these changes, I would be suprised if EAIF has run on more than ~0.25 FTE over the past three months.
As such, it has been a challenge for EAIF to fulfil all of itās key responsibilitesāas well as developoing a coherent strategy and fundraising given constraints.
We are now recruiting /ā onboarding new fund managers, so this pressure should be alleviated soon.
Iām happy to go into details as to the details about changes we proposed and why, although I donāt think they are especially relevant to this situation
Specifically as the PI, I should have (a) evaluated the application sooner, (b) reached a final recommendation sooner, and (c) been more responsive to communications after making a decision
This comment feels to me like temporarily embarrassed deadline-meeter, and I donāt think thatās realistic. The backlog is very understandable given your task and your staffing, I assume youāre doing what you can on the staffing front but even if thatās resolved itās just a big task and 3 weeks is a very ambitious timeline even with full staffing. Given that, itās not surprising that youāre falling short of your public commitment, and I want to look at what changes could be made to make a better experience for applicants without a change in capacity.
All of my ideas are going to be shots in the dark given how little information I have, but maybe theyāll spark something:
Set a longer timeline for grant decisions. No one is going to complain if they hear back early.
Give decision-times with percentiles. E.g. 50% are decided in 3 weeks, 75% at 12 weeks.ā¦ Then when someone gets a slow response they can think āI guess I was in the 10%ā rather than āEAIF missed the deadlineā
Update applicantās expectations if a grant looks likely to run long, either on the website or upon first review of the application. It sounds like some projects fall into buckets that cause predictable delays, but applicantās donāt know if they fall into that.
Give applicants timelines for when you will follow up, and when they should bug you if you failed to do that. It is really demoralizing to sit there plotting how long you should wait on a grant maker and what the consequences of a mistake will be.
@Tom Barnes thank you for this insight. Your team and Caleb must work under a lot of pressure and this post, even when important, must not be nice for you to read.
It was clear to me from our EAIF applications and interactions that your team is overworked, understaffed and or burned out. I think itās so important that you are honest about that, and you work on a process that keeps your quality high. It seems from this post that EAIF is not meeting timelines, not communication clearly, and it was clear from the feedback on our application that it was not carefully reviewed (I can share the feedback and the errors and inconsistencies in that).
Can you limit applications somehow and focus on making better decisions on fewer applications with clear communication? Iād rather wait for your team to carefully consider our application, so I donāt have to waste time drafting it every 6 months and it not being carefully reviewed.
I thought it might be helpful for me to add my own thoughts, as a fund manger at EAIF (Note Iām speaking in a personal capacity, not on behalf of EA Funds or EV).
Firstly, Iād like to apologise for my role in these mistakes. I was the Primary Investigator (PI) for Igorās application, and thus I share some responsibility here. Specifically as the PI, I should have (a) evaluated the application sooner, (b) reached a final recommendation sooner, and (c) been more responsive to communications after making a decision
I did not make an initial decision until November 20. This was too short a timeframe to provide Igor a final decision by November 24.
I did not reach a final recommendation until November 30th. This was due to the final recommendation we made being somewhat more complex than the original proposal.[1]
In February, I did not provide with a full response for Igorās request for an update on his application.
Second, Iād like to apologise to any other applicants to EAIF who have faced similar unreasonably long delays. Whilst we get back to the most applicatants on a reasonable timeframe (see other comments), there are a few cases I am well aware of where we deadlines have been missed for too long. Iām aware of a couple of instances where this has caused significant stressāagain, I would like to express my deepest regret for this.
As broader context, I think itās worth emphasising that EAIF is highly under-resourced at the moment. Itās fairly common for orgs to say theyāre ācapacity constrainedāābut I think this is more true for EAIF in the last ~3 months than any other period:
In summer 2023, EAIF had five part-time fund managers. With OPās distancing from EAIF, we dropped down the three. In late 2023, we then dropped to just myself (part-time), and Caleb as acting EAIF chair.
Given these changes, I would be suprised if EAIF has run on more than ~0.25 FTE over the past three months.
As such, it has been a challenge for EAIF to fulfil all of itās key responsibilitesāas well as developoing a coherent strategy and fundraising given constraints.
We are now recruiting /ā onboarding new fund managers, so this pressure should be alleviated soon.
Iām happy to go into details as to the details about changes we proposed and why, although I donāt think they are especially relevant to this situation
This comment feels to me like temporarily embarrassed deadline-meeter, and I donāt think thatās realistic. The backlog is very understandable given your task and your staffing, I assume youāre doing what you can on the staffing front but even if thatās resolved itās just a big task and 3 weeks is a very ambitious timeline even with full staffing. Given that, itās not surprising that youāre falling short of your public commitment, and I want to look at what changes could be made to make a better experience for applicants without a change in capacity.
All of my ideas are going to be shots in the dark given how little information I have, but maybe theyāll spark something:
Set a longer timeline for grant decisions. No one is going to complain if they hear back early.
Give decision-times with percentiles. E.g. 50% are decided in 3 weeks, 75% at 12 weeks.ā¦ Then when someone gets a slow response they can think āI guess I was in the 10%ā rather than āEAIF missed the deadlineā
Update applicantās expectations if a grant looks likely to run long, either on the website or upon first review of the application. It sounds like some projects fall into buckets that cause predictable delays, but applicantās donāt know if they fall into that.
Give applicants timelines for when you will follow up, and when they should bug you if you failed to do that. It is really demoralizing to sit there plotting how long you should wait on a grant maker and what the consequences of a mistake will be.
@Tom Barnes thank you for this insight. Your team and Caleb must work under a lot of pressure and this post, even when important, must not be nice for you to read.
It was clear to me from our EAIF applications and interactions that your team is overworked, understaffed and or burned out. I think itās so important that you are honest about that, and you work on a process that keeps your quality high. It seems from this post that EAIF is not meeting timelines, not communication clearly, and it was clear from the feedback on our application that it was not carefully reviewed (I can share the feedback and the errors and inconsistencies in that).
Can you limit applications somehow and focus on making better decisions on fewer applications with clear communication? Iād rather wait for your team to carefully consider our application, so I donāt have to waste time drafting it every 6 months and it not being carefully reviewed.