How Sparkrock Helps Transform Community Development

Community development has a pretty straightforward objective. You want to help a community reach its full potential, thereby improving quality of life for its residents. 

Sounds easy, right? Not exactly. 

There are many stakeholders involved in the process, everyone from local businesses to government agencies to individual community members. You need to facilitate collaboration between these people and groups while also keeping them engaged. And that only scratches the surface of what's involved. 

You'll also need to manage multiple projects, identify opportunities for improvement, measure progress and performance, and navigate through a mire of legal and regulatory complexity — all while ensuring you have enough money in the bank to see your initiative through to the end. 

To say that trying to tackle all of those responsibilities manually is a little challenging would be putting it lightly. To make matters worse, this administrative work is a huge drain on resources. The more time you spend juggling people, schedules, projects, and finances, the less time you'll have to see your initiative through. 

Let's discuss how our enterprise resource planning (ERP) software, Sparkrock 365, can help. 

Enable Streamlined Grant Management

Grant management is among the most significant roadblocks facing any nonprofit initiative. Documentation aside, you'll likely end up having to navigate a veritable labyrinth of regulations. Complicating matters further is the fact that in some cases, grant criteria changes year-over-year.

But let's say you manage to get through the application process and qualify for the necessary grants. Even once you've gotten through the mountain of paperwork that entails, you're not done. You also need to track where and how you spend each grant, down to the last cent.

Sparkrock streamlines the grant management process in a few ways: 

• Streamlined Data Entry:  Sparkrock does away with cumbersome manual paperwork in favor of automated digital forms and controls, streamlining data entry while also improving accuracy.
• Pre-Built Templates: With Sparkrock, you've got access to a comprehensive library of pre-built templates for everything from finance and payroll to human resources reports — and the ability to quickly and easily build your own. 
• Budget Management: Sparkrock provides an intuitive interface with which you can establish a single source of truth for all accounting and budgeting decisions, making it easier to ensure that your grants are properly spent. 
• Automated Reporting: Sparkrock makes it easy to generate financial and operational reports tailored to your organization's unique needs with just a few clicks. 

Consolidate Administration

Your organization likely needs to keep track of many moving parts. You not only need to track your budget and manage your employees, but also volunteer scheduling, project details, and documentation. The end result is a complex, intricate ecosystem prone to data and communication silos. 

Each silo represents not only a massive inefficiency, but also the potential for incomplete or inaccurate data. These problems grow with your initiative, especially if you have multiple departments or divisions.  Eventually, you might be left with an organization that operates less like a well oiled machine and more like one held together by desperation and duct tape. 

Sparkrock can help in a few ways: 

• Built-in HRP: Sparkrock combines human resources and payroll functionality, streamlining your hiring process and making it easier to manage and track your people, whether paid employees or volunteers. 
• Intuitive Scheduling: With Sparkrock, scheduling becomes both more transparent and more efficient thanks to customizable templates, auto-fill settings, and comprehensive self-service capabilities. 
• A Single Source of Truth: Between its comprehensive functionality and seamless integration with other platforms, Sparkrock can help your organization eliminate duplicate files and documents, ensuring everyone has access to the most accurate, up-to-date information. 
• Robust Management: Sparkrock is designed to manage not only people and budgets, but also assets, vendors, partners, and projects while also streamlining workflows through intelligent automation. 
• Complete Visibility: In addition to providing real-time visibility into all areas of your initiative, Sparkrock empowers your decision-making through powerful, AI-driven analytics capabilities. 

Compliance and Risk

Grants aren't the only regulatory quagmire you'll likely have to navigate. Each of your projects will have its own set of ordinances, rules, and regulations. That means you could easily end up dealing with multiple sets of reporting and data governance requirements. 

Cybersecurity is another bugbear you'll have to contend with, as well. Your organization will need to strike a delicate balancing act between convenience and access control, keeping systems and data safe without impeding workflows. That might sound next to impossible — but not to worry. 

Sparkrock's got you covered: 

• Powered by Microsoft: Sparkrock 365 uses the same security and infrastructure as products like Microsoft Azure, providing access to the Microsoft ecosystem while ensuring all data is stored in a compliant cloud environment. 
• Advanced Data Controls: With Sparkrock, you can ensure your data is readily available to anyone who needs it while also locking it down so it's only accessible to people with the proper authorization. 
• Comprehensive Logging and Reporting: Sparkrock's automation, grant management, and auditing functionality helps keep your organization compliant with even the strictest regulations.

Want to learn more about how Sparkrock can help your community development initiative achieve its goals? Book a demo today and we'll show you.