Grant Disbursement: Awards Decided on the Evidence and Paid Once

Applications, compliance files and conflicts kept in three places

A grant round has clear rules. An application is eligible when its compliance documents are current, its budget supports the request and no reviewer on it has a conflict. Approved awards are calculated from the award table by program and request size, the match note records what the applicant pledged in matching funds, and each grantee gets a program officer with room in their portfolio.

Applications live in Salesforce, compliance documents and budgets sit in Box, conflict declarations arrive in the review panel's Outlook mailbox, the award table and policy are in Google Drive, and grantees write to the grants inbox in Gmail. Small confusions add up across those places: a waived document read as an approval, a match note copied from the wrong email, a disbursement summary that reaches finance twice.

Who works in the room

Each grant round gets its own Kylon room. Fin is the default agent and the only one connected to the panel's Outlook mailbox, which it reads as the grants director it is working for, checked on every call. Questions about amounts, officers or close-out files go to Myco, and Nova drafts everything addressed to a grantee. When Fin finishes a batch of dispositions, it mentions Myco with the approved application ids, and Myco leads the thread from there.

From application to close-out file

The award table and policy are linked from the room guidelines. Each change is proposed in the thread and written to Salesforce or Box only after the grants director approves.

When a conflict clears or the award table changes

A panel member writes that a declared conflict was a mistake: a different organization with a similar name. Fin re-runs that one application with the conflict cleared and hands it to Myco if the disposition changes. The match note still comes from the applicant's own pledged matching funds in its budget, because clearing a conflict says nothing about money.

A new version of the award table is a wider change. Myco re-prices every approved award the new table touches, lists each with its old and new amount, and posts one updated summary for finance with the changes marked. One summary per change means finance never pays from a superseded figure, and the run history keeps each step for the audit file.

What the checks catch

• A match note that cites a cleared conflict or other correspondence instead of the applicant's pledged matching funds
• A waived document treated as an approval, when the application still has to meet every other rule
• A second disbursement summary posted for the same change, which finance could act on twice
• A program left without a close-out file, or a file that does not follow the agreed format

What stays with people

• Approving every disposition and disbursement before Salesforce changes
• Granting a document waiver and deciding the award that follows
• Sending every letter to a grantee, which Nova drafts in Gmail
• Signing the close-out file for each program

Integrations in this workflow

Kylon is not grants management software and it does not replace the desk's Salesforce setup. It connects the records, files and mailboxes already in use, and the decisions between them happen in one room.

• Box
• Gmail
• Google Drive
• Outlook
• Salesforce
• Slack

• Salesforce holds applications, dispositions, award amounts and officer assignments
• Box stores compliance documents and budgets, and receives the close-out file for each program
• Outlook is the review panel's mailbox, where conflict declarations arrive
• Google Drive keeps the grant policy and each version of the award table
• Gmail is the grants inbox, where letters go out as drafts a person sends
• Slack is where finance and program officers confirm payment batches and assignments

Where to start

One program in one round is enough to begin. Connect the Salesforce object that holds applications and the Box folder of compliance documents, and let one rule lead the room guidelines: each hold reason is cleared on its own, and only the grants director turns an application into an award.

“A waiver closes one question. It does not answer the others.”

Set it up with your agent

Open a new Room, add your agent and paste this prompt. It connects the tools, builds the App with you and asks for your rules one step at a time, and nothing goes out until a person approves it.