Measuring Success How Robin Hood Estimates the Impact of Grants
Robin Hood fights poverty in New York City. The goal is to make grant decisions to maximize poverty-fighting impact, much like a financial manager chooses investments to maximize profit. The metrics project described in this manuscript has been designed to create just such a scorecard, showing ratios that guide investment decisions as financial rates and giving grants to programs that yield high benefit-cost ratios. Grant-making decisions rely on the detailed expertise of program officers as well as numerical calculations. Metrics are always under revision, a virtually never-ending project.
How to Transform a Text-Heavy Report into a Visual-Lite Report
Depict Data Studio breaks down how to transform a text-heavy report into a visual-lite report in five easy steps that you can tackle in just two hours: Including a 20-Minute Cover, a Text Hierarchy, a Color-Code by Section, Intentional Page Breaks and More Visuals.
Performance Measurement and Management
Performance Measurement and Management helps governments and nonprofit organizations track and improve their effectiveness and efficiency. Performance measurement is the process of regularly tracking progress on a series of program indicators. Performance management is the practice of using that data to inform decisions and make improvements. The Urban Institute has been a leader in performance measurement and management for four decades. Early on, we pioneered performance management techniques that government agencies still use to evaluate and improve public services, from garbage collection to human services to economic development. Our research also helps public agencies and private nonprofit organizations identify what questions to ask, what data to collect, and how to use that data to manage and improve their work.
Effective Data Storytelling
This is an AMAZING book, well researched, easy to read, about why you should combine data and narratives, and some strategies for doing just that. WARNING: The book is written for data scientists and the author, the wonderful Brent Dykes, spends the first half of the book helping them understand why they should use data inside a story and with personal narratives - rather than just presenting a bunch of numbers! As a nonprofit leader, you might want to start at Chapter 4 (all the chapters are described in the link). I incorporate a lot of Brent's work ImpactStory™ Group Coaching.
Nonprofit Program Evaluation Made Simple
This is a lovely book that simplifies all the academic program evaluation language so it can be readily used by nonprofits. This is a nice, easy book to read. A nice, easy primer in program evaluation, written for nonprofits. However, the book does assume that you know you need to do program evaluation - which most small- and medium-sized nonprofits do not really need to do. And, while she presents a section on reports, it's a little lean. This book is really great to read if you *want* to understand all the terms in program evaluation so you can do fancier impact measurement or talk with outside evaluators who are conducting a program evaluation with you.