Have Dreams of Growing Your Business? Read On.

By Ines Q Compton

Last week, Girlgrants wrote a post about women-owned businesses and how they are performing as a group to add to the US economy. Seeing how many were involved in the health care industry, Lisa L. decided to contact Girlgrants  to ask

what would be available for her business. She owns a business in Indiana involved in the health care industry, providing treatment and education to her community especially for children with special needs. She told how she sees so much more she could do to address these children, but could not remotely figure out how she would go about funding it.

After asking whether she had any clear ideas what she would do if she were given some funding, it became apparent that she already had a good plan. The budget had already been clearly outlined. The locations to provide the service had already been selected. She had even gotten permission from the schools and libraries to use their facilities a few afternoons per month. She simply lacked the funds. Did the government have any funding for something like her business?

Going straight to Grants.Gov online, within 30 minutes, we had found 81 options for her to look into. One in particular suited her interest and as she looked at her profile and saw that she qualifies as an applicant.

She looked at the project description and got excited. It actually expands on her original idea, thus involving her in a big new part of the healthcare landscape: data compiling. This aspect of the health care industry is going to grow exponentially in the years to come and Lisa L. got very excited at the prospect of being a part of it at this stage in the game.

By the end of the afternoon, Lisa had downloaded the application form from www.grants.gov and had begun getting the actions planned to get her application in on time . The steps she had to take were just as was posted yesterday – good guideline on what the steps are to getting the grants found and the apps in

.
The project she zoned in on would offer her a grant of $275,000 to be dedicated to:
” 1) make comprehensive, public and private state-level health information more available to children, their families, and their health care providers,
2) to ensure that children have access to primary care services and receive coordinated, comprehensive care, and
3) to enable health care providers to develop behavioral/social/health profiles that will identify children who are at risk for developing disabling conditions.”

All these fitted her desires exactly, and she had most of the details already figured out. She then saw the deadline is 2 days.

Believe it or not, since our interaction, she has notified me that most of her paperwork is ready. All she lacks are some documents which she can easily gather by Wednesday. She is going to get in it on time and complete.

Lisa will find out if she is funded as late as this summer, possibly sooner. The project would begin Aug 1, 2009. The contract is for 2 years. She is extremely excited and grateful to have been directed to look into government grants.

So, what have we learned? There are funds out there. It does not require years to come by these funds. Having a plan ready to go helps expedite the completion of an application. The funds are going to be disbursed to someone. And Lisa decided to ask the question: why not her?

Go Lisa L. You know your chances are good. You are a woman – owned business seeking to widen its scope. The US funding for this kind of venture is all about your kind of request. If you have a business and have dreams of growing it, think about it, plan it out, look for the grants that are available and apply. Go get it.

Actual Grant Details:
” Description: Project 1: Developing a Comprehensive Child Health Profile
CFDA Number(s): 93.110 — Maternal and Child Health Federal Consolidated Programs
Funding Opportunity Number: HRSA-09-180 ”