FAQ
Straight answers.
What executive directors, boards, and procurement reviewers ask us, answered the way we answer in the room. If your question isn't here, ask it through the form.
Working together
Are you grant writers?
Yes, we write grants, and we carry everything around them as one thread: strategy and readiness, finding and pursuing opportunities, applications through submission, award negotiation and setup, delivery, compliance and reporting, and renewal. And when the real blocker is not the grant, the same team clears that too: data, websites, automation, communications.
We already have a development director. Do we still fit?
Yes, and this is a common setup. We embed alongside your people as added senior capacity and take the work that sits between roles: the pieces that need program, finance, and communications at the same time, and the deadlines nobody owns. Your team stays your team.
Who actually does the work?
The Grey Mirror team: nine people across delivery, finance, technology, systems integration, partnerships, and counsel. You retain the team, and Grey Mirror routes the disciplines your work needs. We don't pretend everyone is on your account full time. Meet the people.
What happens after we send an inquiry?
Jake reads it personally and replies within 24 hours. If the fit looks right, the next step is one working conversation about what is stuck and what carrying it would take. If we are not the right team, we say so plainly instead of stringing you along. The whole path, step by step.
Do you work with fiscal sponsors and regrantors?
Yes, directly. Sponsors carry the funding lifecycle multiplied across a portfolio, plus obligations flowing both directions. There is a dedicated page for that work: eligibility review, subawards, disbursements, project-level restricted accounting, monitoring, and consolidated reporting.
Fees and commitment
How do fees work?
A flat monthly retainer, scoped to the work you hand us. Never a percentage of funds raised. We publish the structure rather than a number because the same team serves organizations from small staffs to one moving over nine figures a year in donations; scope is where pricing gets honest, and the conversation is where scope gets set.
Are we locked into a long contract?
No. Engagements have a three-month minimum, then run month to month. After the minimum you can cancel anytime, with prorated refunds. A retainer should be renewed because the work is worth it, not because the contract says so.
Do you guarantee funding?
No, and we would keep your organization away from anyone who does. Funding decisions belong to funders. Our job is the part you can actually control: making sure your strongest case reaches them, on time, with nothing dropped, and that the award is delivered and reported well enough to earn the next one.
Diligence
Who is behind Philanthropy by Grey Mirror?
Grey Mirror LLC, a company of engineers and operators. Philanthropy by Grey Mirror is its service for nonprofits, not a separate corporation, so accountability sits with Grey Mirror LLC. The story and the team.
Are you a nonprofit?
No. Grey Mirror LLC is a private company that works for nonprofits. You retain us, we answer to your leadership, and the fee is a flat retainer, never a percentage of funds raised.
What experience do you have with nonprofits?
Grey Mirror has worked with and advised more than 100 nonprofits, from small teams to one organization moving over nine figures a year in donations. We work discreetly and do not name clients without express permission. Bonnie Sachatello-Sawyer of Hopa Mountain gave hers.
How do you handle confidentiality and access?
Access is scoped deliberately at the start of an engagement: what the team can see, where work product lives, and how access ends. Donor records, financials, program data, and personnel matters are treated as what they are: yours. And we do not name clients or use their work publicly without express permission. More on responsible access.
Are you a law firm or accounting firm?
No. Where legal, accounting, or audit judgment is required, that judgment stays with the appropriate licensed professionals. We execute and coordinate around them rather than substitute for them.
What role does AI play in the work?
Engineering, technology, and AI are supporting reasons one team can cross program, finance, data, and communications without handoffs. They are how the work moves fast; they are never the point. Outcomes lead, and the same accountable people stand behind everything we deliver.
Still have a question?
Ask it through the same form, or just tell us what isn't getting done. Either way you get a straight answer.
The form takes about five minutes.