Alex Blake

Inside Grantmaking

Business EN ↓ 3 episodes

Many charity leaders and fundraisers submit funding applications and then wonder what happens to them. Who receives it? How do they react to it? How is it assessed? What due diligence is there? Who makes the final decision? Host Alex Blake — a fundraising consultant with over 20 years of experience helping charities secure major grants — speaks to foundation staff, trustees and advisors who share insight into how grantmakers operate and why. They also share their thinking on the bigger questions shaping the sector — how grantmaking practice is evolving, what funders are grappling with, and whe...

Author

Alex Blake

Episodes

Grantmaking for Systemic Change, with Sufina Ahmad of John Ellerman Foundation 08.07.2026 39:02

Sufina Ahmad, Director of the John Ellerman Foundation, joins Alex Blake to talk through how the Foundation funds change, from its total assets approach through to what actually makes an application stand out. Sufina walks through the Foundation's two-stage application process in detail, including why first-stage success rates are lower but second-stage approvals run close to 90%. She talks candid...

Grantmaking for poverty and trauma in Scotland, with Jim McCormick, CEO of The Robertson Trust 24.06.2026 28:53

Jim McCormick, Chief Executive of the Robertson Trust, joins Alex Blake to talk through how Scotland's largest independent grantmaker actually makes decisions. Jim walks through what happens to an application from the moment it lands, who assesses it and how, and the four decision frames the Trust applies as awards get bigger. He talks candidly about the shift toward unrestricted funding, now at a...

Trailer 29.04.2026 1:00

This is the trailer for Inside Grantmaking — a podcast about how philanthropy really works. Each episode, host Alex Blake speaks with foundation staff, trustees, or advisors who share how they think about their work, how funding decisions get made, and the bigger questions shaping where grantmaking is heading. The conversations are honest, practical, and respectful — because better understanding b...