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Request for Proposals: Membership-Cultivation Consulting Team
Remote
USD 50k-50k / year
Posted on Oct 22, 2026
Grantmakers in the Arts is the only national association of both public and private arts and culture funders in the US, including independent and family foundations, public agencies, community foundations, corporate philanthropies, nonprofit regrantors, and national service organizations – across the US and into Canada.
GIA provides valuable professional development for arts grantmakers through conferences, workshops, podcasts and webinars; publications including the GIA Reader; research and policy work across the field of philanthropy; and online communication tools.
As we articulate in our vision for the future, GIA would like to see grantmakers consider arts and culture as elements of broad social issues and as a frame for considerations and approaches to social issues.
Toward this end, GIA has shared insights on the role that culture plays in other realms of social impact, such as:
- Arts & Culture, Collective Efficacy and Civic Engagement
- Artists Leading and Learning in Community Development — The Reader
- Solidarity Not Charity: Arts & Culture Grantmaking in the Solidarity Economy
- Opportunities at the Intersection: Advancing Racial Equity Via Arts and Culture in the Public Sector
- Increasing Art, Health and Wealth in Trauma Affected Communities
- The Role of Arts and Culture in Health – Grantmakers In Health GIA also shares the voices of grantmakers who support arts and culture as part of larger social change, such as:
- Empowering Cultural Self-Determination in Trans and Queer BIPOC Communities
- June Member Call: Arts & Cultural Organizing – Neighborhood Funders Group
- Arts in Society: A Case Study in Collaborative Cross-Sector Grantmaking
Request for Proposals
GIA seeks a consulting team to help in identifying grantmakers who don’t self-identify as arts grantmakers but who may support arts and culture as part of their larger funding strategies. GIA seeks to provide the larger grantmaking field evidence – through these new grantmaker members – that support for issues like health, community development, and the environment – can include support for arts and culture. We want to make it clear that these are not mutually exclusive but are instead mutually reinforcing. GIA also seeks help in cultivating and recruiting these grantmakers as members of GIA.
GIA seeks help with a combination of research, strategy, communication and member-cultivation and recruitment. This project would be ideal for a consulting team.
Scope of work
- Our goal for this project is to expand GIA’s membership to include grantmakers who support arts and culture as part of their larger grantmaking strategies.
Questions we seek to answer:
- Who are the non-arts grantmakers that value the arts?
- Are they clustered in specific fields like health or the environment or community development?
- Are there other patterns and commonalities among these grantmakers?
- Are these grantmakers aware of one another?
- What networks do these grantmakers have in common?
- Are these grantmakers aware of GIA?
- If so, what is their perception of GIA? Do they see its value?
- How best to conduct outreach to these grantmakers?
- How best to cultivate them as members of GIA?
Projected Process and Timing:
- Grounding and structured inquiry: 2 months
- Review GIA’s existing outputs on cross-sector work
- Meet with key stakeholders
- Research: 2 months
- Begin landscape mapping
- Identify potential grantmaker members
- Strategize: 2 months
- Approaches to these grantmakers
- How to cultivate these grantmakers as members
- Support: 3 months
- Work with GIA on outreach, cultivation and recruitment
Outputs may include:
- Landscape presentation and narrative for GIA CEO and Team
- A summary of insights, tensions and opportunities
- Action plan for the next 6-12 months: List of grantmakers to reach out to; Recommend
approaches - Support GIA through the first 3 months of this process:<.li>
- Implementation over the first three months includes:
- weekly/ bi weekly meetings with GIA devo team
- monthly meeting with CEO/Board on successful leaders
- touchpoints every 30 days to assess any shifts needed
Budget
GIA anticipates ~$50,000 for a ~9-month engagement, inclusive of all consultant fees, research costs, and expenses
Candidate Competencies/Qualifications
- Demonstrated ability to conduct independent stakeholder engagement, synthesize qualitative data from multiple sources, and bring existing knowledge of comparable organizations and ecosystems to bear – translating findings into clear, actionable strategic recommendations
- Knowledge of funding landscape
- Strategic planning
Proposal Requirements
Interested consultants should submit:
- Bios of the team members
- Approach and methodology: How you would approach this project and your proposed timeline
- Relevant experience: Examples of similar engagements with results achieved
- References: Contact information for 2-3 relevant clients
- Finalist will be asked to submit a full work sample of comparable projects.
Projected Timeline:
Proposals due: November 2, 2026
Consultant selection: Mid-to-late November 2026
Project start date: February 2026
Project end date: November 2027
Submission
Submit the above materials to Grantmakers in the Arts’ CEO Eddie Torres at eddie@giarts.org, cc’ing gia@giarts.org