Running a Program Day to Day
Once your program exists and applications start arriving, everything happens on one screen with six tabs. This page explains what each tab is for, how to move an application from arrived to onboarded, and the one setup step that will otherwise stop you creating a batch at all.
What you will learn
- What each of the six tabs on a program is for
- How to open an intake with a batch - and what blocks it
- The eleven application statuses and what each one means
- How to ask a startup for changes or extra documents
- How to collect forms and files from a whole cohort at once
The six tabs#
Open any program from All Programs and you land on a screen with six tabs across the top. Everything about that program lives here - you rarely need to go anywhere else once a cohort is running.
| Tab | What it is for | How often you will use it |
|---|---|---|
| Program Info | The public description, objective, benefits, eligibility rules and question counts. There is a Preview button to see it as an applicant would. | Occasionally - mostly to check or correct wording. |
| Batches | Your intakes. Each batch has its own dates, slot limit and funding. Without an open batch, nobody can apply. | Once per intake. |
| Startups | The startups accepted into this program. | Weekly. |
| Registrations | Every application received, with its status. This is where most of your work happens. | Daily while a batch is open. |
| Evaluations | What your panel still has to score, and what they have finished. | During shortlisting. |
| Data Collection | Requests for forms and files from startups already in the program. | Monthly or quarterly reporting. |
Opening an intake with a batch#
A program is the scheme; a batch is one intake of it. Applications attach to a batch, not to the program, which is why nothing can arrive until you have created one and its dates have opened.
- 1
Press Create Batch and name the intake
Name it something that will still make sense in three years - 'Cohort 1, Jan–Jun 2026' rather than 'Batch A'.
- Batch Code is a short reference like SMA-2026-C01. It appears under the batch name in lists.
- Application Opens and Application Closes control when the apply button appears to startups.
- Max Slots caps how many you will take. Leave it blank for unlimited.
Creating a batch. Note the warning next to Batch Code - that one cannot be changed afterwards. Tip: Decide your batch code format before your first intake and stick to it. It is permanent, and a consistent format makes your records far easier to read later.
- 2
Fill in the funding details
Every batch must have funding attached - this is not optional. You set a total amount and currency, choose the funding type, and then say which of your funding sources the money is coming from and how much from each.
- Funding types: Grant, Equity, Debt, or Mixed.
- Currency defaults to INR; USD, EUR and GBP are also available.
- Funding Sources is a list of the sources you have already set up, with a box to say how much this batch draws from each.
No funding sources set up yet - so the list is empty and Create Batch stays greyed out.
Set up your funding sources first
You cannot create a batch until at least one funding source exists, because every batch needs funding and the funding must come from somewhere. If the Funding Sources box says 'No funding sources found' and the Create Batch button is greyed out, that is why. Go to Funding, add your source - a government grant, your own corpus, a CSR partner - and come back. This catches almost everyone the first time.
Good to know
Batches move through Draft, Upcoming, Open, Under Evaluation, Closed, Completed and Archived. Use Change Status on the batch row rather than editing dates when you simply want to stop accepting applications.
Working through applications#
The Registrations tab is where you will spend most of your time. It shows every application with its current status, and a Status Legend at the top so you never have to remember what the colours mean.
- Filter tabs across the middle jump straight to one phase - New, Reviewed, Under evaluation and so on. The Waiting on menu beside the date and batch filters narrows the list to applications waiting on the startup, on you, or on nobody.
- Search by startup name, and filter by date or by batch if you are running more than one intake.
- Tick several applications to act on them together.
- Export CSV is the quickest way to answer a funder who wants the whole list.
- Sheet, next to Export CSV, shows the same applications as a spreadsheet - see The Registrations sheet below.
The Registrations sheet#
Switch the Registrations tab from List to Sheet to see this programme's applications one per row: the startup, programme, batch, status, who the next step is waiting on, what the startup still owes, and when it was submitted and last changed.
- Keep an internal note, a follow-up date and who is handling it beside each application. Founders never see them.
- Add columns of your own for anything else your team tracks - interview done, shortlisted, a score from an outside round.
- Status is not typed into a cell. Clicking it explains why and opens the application, where the change is made and the startup is told.
- Tabs are saved views, such as Waiting on your team or Onboarded, and every programme's sheet shares them.
- Export turns the tabs you choose into an Excel workbook of this programme's applications.
- Tick applications to move them together: Next phase moves each one rung (Verified is onboarded, never moved on this way), Reject asks for one reason every founder reads, and Onboard takes an amount for each - capped as one application is, with the batch's money used row by row. The dialog first says how many move and which cannot, and why.
Good to know
An exported Registrations sheet is for reading. Changes made in the file do not come back by upload - keep notes and your own columns in the sheet itself.
The Startups sheet, and every registration at once#
A programme's Startups tab opens on a sheet of every startup with a place in the programme - active, completed and offboarded - with its money first: Approved, Paid, Remaining, Last paid and the funding sources it was paid from. Above it, the programme's funding: what was allocated to it, what has been paid, what is in progress and what is not yet paid out.
- Paid is the completed payments recorded to the startup's place, the same number as its Funding tab. Remaining shows only where an amount was approved.
- A startup in two batches of the programme is one row adding both up; open it with the '2 places' button to see each batch's own dates and money.
- Its tabs - All, Active, Completed & offboarded, Funding - are shared by every programme's Startups sheet. A startup removed from the programme is left out of them; filter In the programme to Removed to see it.
- List, next to Sheet, is the table it always was: every place with its batch and founder, 25 a page.
- Export on this sheet can give a startup in two batches a line for each - its own batch, standing and money on each line - with One line per place.
- Asking the startups for a field from this sheet puts the request on their application to this programme (on the startup itself when it has none here), so it counts as still owed on the registration and only this programme's team - and the startup's own page - see it.
- Programs > All registrations lists every application to every programme, as a list you can search and filter, or as the Registrations sheet.
- Someone assigned to a programme does what that programme's own access says - set on their page under Program Assignment, or by an admin under Program Info > People on this programme. It starts from their role and can give more or less there: with Program Management Create they create batches in that programme, with Edit they move applications on and ask for documents and changes. With View there, it shows under Programs in the menu and its startups' pages open within it, even without Program Management. Creating a programme, merging two and recording money stay with the roles that have them.
What the statuses mean#
An application moves through six phases, one at a time, and can be rejected from any of them. Knowing what each means saves confusion when a colleague asks why something is sitting still. What the startup still owes is not a phase - it is shown beside it (see Asking a startup for something).
| Status | What it means | What you do next |
|---|---|---|
| New | Just arrived. Nobody has looked at it. | Read it and move it to Reviewed. |
| Reviewed | Your team has read it and it is worth progressing. | Send it to the panel. |
| Under Evaluation | Sitting with your evaluation panel for scoring. | Chase panel members if it stalls. |
| Evaluated | Panel scoring is complete. If your plan includes panel evaluation, it needs at least one score to get here. | Check their documents and decide. |
| Verified | Documents checked and accepted. | Onboard them. |
| Onboarded | Accepted into the program. They now appear under Startups. | Nothing - they are in. |
| Rejected | Not accepted - possible from any phase. | Nothing. The record stays for your history, and a rejection made by mistake can be reopened. |
| Removed | Taken out of the program after onboarding. | Nothing. |
Tip
If applications are piling up in one status, that is usually a person, not a process. 'Under Evaluation' stuck for two weeks means a panel member has not scored - chase them rather than changing the status by hand.
Asking a startup for something#
Two things you will do constantly, both from an application's own screen. Both notify the startup. Neither changes the application's phase: what they owe shows beside it - 'Awaiting startup · 1 doc' - until they answer, and their answer then waits for your review. You can still move the application on in the meantime; nothing is blocked by an open request.
Request changes
For when an answer is thin, wrong or contradicts something else. Give it a short title and describe what you need. The application shows as awaiting the startup until they respond.
Request documents
For when you need a file they did not submit - incorporation certificate, financials, a signed undertaking. Name the document and describe the requirements. It shows as awaiting the startup until they upload, then as waiting on you until you approve the file or ask for another.
Tip
Be specific in the description box. 'Please clarify' generates another round trip; 'Your revenue figure for FY24 does not match the figure in your pitch deck - which is correct?' gets you an answer first time.
Tracking evaluation progress#
The Evaluations tab is your at-a-glance view of where scoring has got to: how many are pending, how many are done, and how many programs are assigned to you.
- 'Pending' is what your panel still owes you.
- 'Evaluated' is what has come back with scores.
- Building the scoring sheet itself happens when you create or edit the program - see Creating a Program.
- Assigning who sits on the panel is covered in Evaluation Panel.
Collecting information from a cohort#
Data Collection is for startups already in the program, not applicants. Use it when you need the same thing from everyone - a quarterly progress report, updated headcount, a compliance document.
- Create a request describing what you need and by when.
- Startups see it in their own portal and respond there.
- Filter by status to see who has replied and who has not.
- Filter by batch to chase one cohort without bothering the others.
Good to know
This is the difference worth remembering: document requests chase one applicant during selection; data collection requests chase your whole cohort after they are in.
Common questions#
You have no funding sources set up. Every batch needs funding attached, and that funding has to come from a source. Go to Funding, add at least one source, then come back and the button will work.
You cannot - batch codes are permanent once created. If it is badly wrong, create a replacement batch with the correct code and archive the old one before anyone applies to it.
Check the Batches tab. Either there is no batch, or the batch status is not Open, or today's date is outside the application window. All three produce the same symptom.
Registrations is everyone who applied, at every stage including rejected. Startups is only those you actually onboarded. An application appears in Startups once its status reaches Onboarded.
Yes. Export CSV at the top of the Registrations tab gives you the current list, respecting whatever filter you have applied.
That means a panel member has not submitted their scores. Check the Evaluations tab to see what is pending, then chase the individual. Changing the status manually would lose the scoring.
Yes. Create two batches with overlapping dates. The Registrations tab has a batch filter so you can work through them separately.
Open the copy and use Merge into another programme, next to Edit. Choose the programme to keep and you see what will move - memberships with the registrations your team or an import made for them, batches, allocations, payments and funding requests - before anything changes. A batch whose name the kept programme already uses is kept apart with '(from ...)' added. The copy stays as an empty, unlisted programme that says when it was merged and by whom. A programme that took applications from founders, or has evaluations, managers, panels or announcements, cannot be merged.
