CLIENT ADVISORY

Use the knowledge at your fingertips to stay on track

The philanthropic sector is more enthusiastic than ever about measurement and evaluation.  In this era of analytics and infographics, some foundations are using dashboards to consolidate the information they need to stay focused on what matters most. The dashboard, configured to reflect their particular mission and goals, becomes a springboard for strategic discussions and organizational learning.

This collection of indicators – a dashboard or a scorecard – is updated and referred to on a consistent, recurring basis.  The visual presentation of simple graphs and brief narrative in one or two pages focuses on the essential elements of measuring results.  In this article, we are referring to grantmaking results.

Independent of foundation size or payout amount, measurement is part of an effective decision-making process. With the right information, both grantmakers and grantees stand to learn, adapt and accelerate progress towards their goals; they can assess their impact. But gathering and analyzing data can be expensive and time consuming.

Fortunately, grantmakers have a wealth of knowledge acquired through years of experience.  The work involved in turning that knowledge into a dashboard of useful indicators reinforces several best practices that apply to any foundation eager to understand the impact of its work.

Turning knowledge into useful indicators

Assess your organization’s willingness to adapt.  A dashboard alone is not the key to making good grant decisions.  Instead, it can support a learning mindset that permeates strategic conversation and relationships with nonprofits.  What will you do with the learning? Before developing indicators, understand how (and whether) your decision making process would be affected by the numbers.

Define clear outcomes for your work.  What do you want to achieve?  To choose a set of key performance indicators, a foundation board must first define the most important outcomes of its work.

Aggregate information that is readily available.  Most foundations collect a trove of information in the grantmaking process.  This inexpensive and easily gathered data should be sufficient for evaluating a program’s results. Analyzing and managing the data and creating graphs can usually be done with an Excel spreadsheet.

Use familiar and common-sense indicators of success. What will you track? Experts in most fields of interests such as healthcare, education, or workforce development have mapped out performance indicators or benchmarks.  These “off-the-shelf” indicators may not be perfect, but they are helpful because they are field tested and they allow you to align your information with comparable data of other organizations.

Link data with decision-making and management.   Foundation dashboards are designed to create a common framework for decision-making. They provoke good questions about impact and lead to deeper evaluation.  At their best, they are a seamless part of most conversations and decisions about the direction and scope of the foundation’s philanthropy.

Prentice Zinn can be reached at pzinn@gmafoundations.com or tel. 617.426.7080

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READ MORE ABOUT MEASUREMENT AND EVALUATION   There is a wealth of resources on-line about this topic; here are a few that stand-out.    We are happy to direct you to others depending upon your interests.

Association of Small Foundations’ Frequently Asked Questions about Impact and Evaluation

Grantmakers for Effective Organizations (GEO), Four Essentials for Evaluation: June 2012.  In this practical guide, GEO offers an approach to “evaluation for learning with ‘four essentials’: Lead, Plan, Organize and Share.”

Paul Hamlyn Foundation, Assessing Impact: November 2012.  Review from PHF’s impact assessment exercise, reviewing outcomes from PHF funding across UK programmes between 2007-12.  This report includes a description of their approach and the resulting Impact Maps.