What To Do

Develop a timeline that visually organizes the evaluation of your communication activities, materials, and other tasks to be implemented.

Develop a budget that reflects your agency's or funding agency's format. Normally, these budgets are created in a column format with direct and indirect expenses outlined in separate sections.

Budgets clearly delineate costs. You can develop your budget by ensuring that it fulfills some key objectives:

• Tells the same story as your program's narrative
  
• Includes detailed descriptions or justifications if needed
  
• Projects costs to be incurred during the program's duration
  
• Anticipates miscellaneous or contingency expenses
  
• Includes all items required by the funding source
  
• Includes all items paid for by other sources
  
• Includes volunteer and in-kind services to be provided
  
• Details fringe benefits separate from salaries if required
  
• Includes all fees for consultants or contractors
  
• Delineates details of all non-personnel costs
  
• Includes indirect costs when appropriate

You should provide a budget narrative that details and justifies the expenses requested for extending your program into the future.

Be sure that the budget and budget narrative relate the same story as your objectives, program activities, methods, and program evaluation.

If the project is to be sustained over the long term, also describe a simple plan for obtaining future funding needed beyond the timeframe for which funds are available.

How To Do It

Develop a Timeline

Timeline options are many. Select the type of timeline that makes most sense for your program or your agency. Options include Gantt charts, PERT charts, and others.

Whatever option you choose, your timeline should address some important questions:

• What activities are needed? (such as: obtaining resources, hiring personnel, recruiting participants)
  
• When does each activity begin and end, or when is an activity repeated?
  
• What time frame (weeks, months) is most suitable for your communication plan?
  
• When will selected activities identified in your timeline be accomplished?
  
• When will the outcomes/deliverables resulting from your program objectives be due?

Develop a Budget

Budgets should be built from the ground up. In other words, they are based on your goals and objectives as well as your methods. This structure ensures that the goals, objectives, methods, and interventions justify your budget and vice versa.

Factors that most often make up budget items are included in the proposal summary outline below:

When you have completed this step, you should have a timeline and budget developed for your evaluation activities.