Fonds voor Cultuurparticipatie

• The specific expertise and experience of the AIMS team supported rapid development and implementation of the grant management solution
• All stakeholders access the AIMS grant management system online, allowing advisors and applicants to access the system securely from any location
• The AIMS team have been key advisors to the organisation since inception

Fonds voor Cultuurparticipatie (FCP) is a Dutch organisation, founded in 2009. Their main aim is to encourage the people of the Netherlands, particularly young people, to get more involved in arts and culture. The fund does this through arrangements with the provinces and municipalities, and by subsidising institutions. The fund also encourages debate, initiates research, and ensures knowledge-sharing in the fields of cultural education, the amateur arts, and popular culture.

The challenge

As a new organisation Fonds voor Cultuurparticipatie needed to streamline their grant processes to consolidate grants across several stakeholder communities, whilst also maintaining separate administration to allow easy reporting and risk reduction. To avoid the challenges of paper-based and other dated grant management processes, FCP sought an effective IT solution which enables staff to be more productive and less encumbered by manual tools.

The solution

Fonds voor Cultuurparticipatie decided to implement AIMS from its launch to manage the end-to-end process of all grant and funding activity.  This included the entire application, review, and monitoring of grant making activity. The implementation was completed in a very short timescale due to the AIMS team’s vast experience in the Dutch cultural funding environment. This also meant that FCP benefitted from AIMS Software Ltd’s expertise in workflows and learning from processes previously implemented by similar Dutch clients.

Now, all grant applicants apply electronically as external users of the system. Advisors are given permissions and access that allow them to log in to the system at home and prepare for meetings. This off-site capability for administrators, advisors, and all other stakeholders has been critical to success during Covid-19.