Instrumentl's end-to-end platform makes post-award management easier — our Award Assistant tool empowers grant professionals to effortlessly review grant agreements and extract critical information in seconds.
The Award Assistant is an AI-powered tool that automatically extracts key information from grant agreements and populates it directly into Instrumentl.
Review, save, and share key details from your grant documents to turn them into clear, compliant work plans!
By automatically identifying deadlines, compliance requirements, and other key details from even the most complex documents, this AI tool streamlines post-award management while ensuring nothing falls through the cracks. Information is instantly populated in Instrumentl and can be easily shared with stakeholders.
Note: Our AI Award Assistant is available beginning on the Professional Plan and above. Verify feature availability across plans here.
Overview
The Award Assistant is your AI-powered partner that extracts key data from grant agreements and turns them into tasks, requirements, and summaries in Instrumentl.
The Assistant seamlessly integrates with Instrumentl's tracking functionality by auto-populating relevant award details and creating reporting tasks based on extracted information. Use just one tool & keep all grant information within Instrumentl:
Upload your grant documents
Generate award summaries & reporting tasks
Align your team to stay on track and compliant
Save yourself valuable time and reduce human error from manual review of lengthy award documents. With just a few clicks, you'll simplify documentation & grant communication across teams.
Video Walkthrough
See the Assistant in action in the video below, then follow along in your own account!
How it Works
Ensuring post-award compliance & coordination across teams is crucial to securing current and future funding.
After receiving a new grant agreement, simply upload it to the Award Assistant, review the automatically extracted information, make any necessary adjustments, save it directly to relevant Instrumentl fields and create a series of reporting tasks.
The Award Assistant can:
Automatically extract 20+ key pieces of information from grant agreements and funder communications
Provide side-by-side viewing of original documents with extracted information
Include citations to cross-reference data across award documents
Auto-populate extracted information into Instrumentl
Generate both detailed and concise shareable summaries
📄 Step 1: Upload your Award Documents
Congrats — Your hard work has paid off and you've just won a grant! Once you've received an award letter or similar document outlining the agreement terms, use the Award Assistant to simplify managing award review & reporting.
Start by uploading your grant agreement: When you select a file(s), Instrumentl will automatically extract key details like award amount, grant period, and reporting tasks. Then you'll review, edit, and save to Instrumentl.
Open the Award Assistant
First, make sure you've added the awarded grant to your Tracker. Update the opportunity in Instrumentl to the "Awarded - Active" Status:
Next, click into the grant and open the Overview tab. Under the "Award" information, locate the purple launchpad and click "Let's go" to begin using the Award Assistant!
Upload your Files
Upon entering the Award Assistant tool, click "Upload Files" to add one or more award documents to analyze:
The best documents to upload are a grant agreement, award letter, or contract containing the bulk of requirements and reporting schedule. For best results, include at least two files, such as the agreement and associated proposal.
Suggested files:
Award Agreement — Key terms, funding, and deadlines
Grant Proposal — Funder intent and program details
Reporting requirements — Financial and impact report deadlines
Relevant emails — Clarify terms or amendments not in docs
Supported formats:
Upload files as PDFs and/or Word documents in .docx
Able to process multiple files at once
Accepts text, images & screenshots
You'll have a side-by-side view of the original document(s) centered on the screen and the extracted information to the right:
The lefthand side of the screen outlines each document you've uploaded to the Assistant. To delete a document, click the dropdown option next to it:
Once you've added all relevant files, click the "Begin Analysis" button on the righthand side to start extracting key data!
Learn more about the various award data gleaned by the Assistant below.
🔎 Step 2: Review Award Details
Extracted Data Fields
Within the Assistant, data are divided into separate tabs: Overview, Reports, Financial, Legal, and Other.
The Assistant currently extracts over 20 key pieces of information from award letters, including:
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Overview |
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Reports |
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Financials |
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Legal |
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Other |
View your Award Info
Once you've clicked the "Begin Analysis" button, the Assistant will immediately start scanning your documents for relevant award criteria. Once completed, you'll see the Award Assistant populate any fields identified from your documents.
Click the "Next" button at the bottom right to review each tab.
Click into any field to edit text, dates, and monetary amounts (if necessary). Pull down the bottom right corner of a textbox to view more information:
Type directly within any textbox to add other details:
If a field was already filled out in Instrumentl to begin with, the Assistant may include a suggested update based on the newly-received contents of your files. E.g., an updated Notification date will also display the date "previously" entered.
To adjust auto-generated Reporting Tasks and Funder Contacts, click the Actions dropdown menu to the right of either. Select "Edit" to update details, or hit "Delete" to remove the item altogether.
Verify with Citations
Use citations to easily locate and cross-reference extracted information across documents.
To the right of each field, you'll see the number of source citations circled in purple. Click the citation bubble to view more details:
Note: As with all AI-generated takeaways, we always recommend reviewing results for accuracy.
Confirm & Save Details
Once you've reviewed all tabs, you'll have the options to save your Award details, go back and make changes, or exit the Assistant altogether if you'd rather not save anything yet.
Click "Confirm & Update Award" to summarize and store your information.
✉️ Shareable Summaries
Once you complete the review process & confirm award details, The Award Assistant can then auto-populate your document's extracted information into Instrumentl and generate shareable summaries of key results.
You'll get a concise Award Highlights summary for quick reference alongside the more detailed Award Summary.
Download either summary as a Word Document, edit and customize it, and then share it out to your colleagues:
Now you & your teammates can start on critical next steps without skipping a beat!
✅ Reporting Task Series
Based on your document's extracted information, the Assistant can auto-generate a series of compliance and Reporting Tasks with email reminders.
Within the Assistant, review & edit Reporting Tasks under the Reports tab:
How Task series work: If a repeating Reporting Task is identified in your document, a series of Tasks will be created upon saving the award summary. For example, a Quarterly progress report will have four Tasks created, one every three months, until the Grant Period End Date.
Along with regular Task specifications, You can also modify the Frequency of these recurring Reporting Tasks:
You can also edit any Reporting Tasks after they've been generated.
💾 Access Saved Award Info
View extracted information after completing the Assistant: You can always click into the grant and re-enter the Assistant at any time, as well as download the shareable summaries.
Additionally, key info extracted such as Award Amount, Award Period Start and End Dates, Notification Date, Reporting Tasks, and Funder Contacts will show in their respective locations across the platform.
If you've already used the Award Assistant, open the respective grant and click the "Award Assistant" button to either revisit & update information within Instrumentl, or restart the flow altogether!
After saving, download summaries directly from Instrumentl, and you'll automatically receive an email with fresh copies each time you run the Assistant and save updates.
❓ FAQs
Do I have to save this information to Instrumentl?
Do I have to save this information to Instrumentl?
Nope! Users can exit the flow at any time without saving, which is especially useful when reviewing a draft agreement rather than the final executed contract.
You can also remove information such as Reporting Tasks initially, and then revisit the Award Assistant to save them at a later time.
What's the best way to share award information with others?
What's the best way to share award information with others?
Anyone with access on your Instrumentl account can easily review the info after a document has been processed.
Download either or both detailed and concise shareable summaries from the award view. Whenever you complete the review flow, you'll also receive an email with both shareable summaries attached. Easily forward the email to colleagues!
Are there any limitations to document size?
Are there any limitations to document size?
Currently we support documents with a max size of 5MB and 100 pages. Occasionally, documents under these limits will not successfully process if they contain complex tables.
What should I do if my document is too large? How should I organize my files?
What should I do if my document is too large? How should I organize my files?
The Award Assistant can ingest multiple documents at once. Easily combine or separate PDFs, remove, rearrange, or append pages with PDF editing software such as Adobe Acrobat.
If your document is significant in length (>100 pages), simply remove any pages in the letter that are more generalized, boilerplate, or not relevant, and then reupload.
E.g., we do not recommend, attempting to upload any of Uniform Guidance. In most cases, the bulk of requirements span less than 50 pages. For best results, reduce the document to those specific pages.
Contact Us 
If you have any questions about using the Award Assistant, message our friendly Customer Support team via the chat bubble when logged in, or email us at hello@instrumentl.com.