Archive for the ‘Effectiveness’ Category
Posted by Gayle Gifford on July 27, 2010 in Communicating, Effectiveness
The IRS has released a state-by-state list of nonprofits that are at risk of automatically losing their tax exempt status for failure to file required reports for three consecutive years. They are giving small groups an extension to October 15, but after that, you are out of luck.
According to the IRS site:
“This one-time relief benefits Form 990-N (e-Postcard) and Form 990-EZ filers only. Organizations required to file Form 990 or Form 990-PF are not eligible and are automatically revoked if they fail to file for three consecutive years.” Any organization that loses its tax-exempt status will have to reapply.
In quickly looking through the over 1,100 nonprofits on the RI list, I noticed at least one of my former clients whom I had told years ago when I worked with them briefly that they needed to file a 990 (I’ve let them know they are on the list) and surprisingly many veterans organizations.
This is pretty serious stuff. You can find the list on the IRS web site by clicking here. If you haven’t been sending any annual 990s to the IRS, especially if you are a very small nonprofit that was previously exempt from filing, you would be well-served to scroll through your state’s list.
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on June 11, 2010 in Effectiveness
I was just flipping through my dog-eared edition of “Good to Great and the Social Sectors,” the 2005 monograph by Jim Collins, when I came across this advice:
“It doesn’t matter whether you can quantify your results. What matters is that you rigorously assemble evidence — qualitative or quantitative — to track your progress. If the evidence is primarily qualitative, think like a trial lawyer assembling the combined body of evidence. If the evidence is primarily quantitative, then think of yourself as a laboratory scientist assembling and assessing the data.”
Collins goes on to say that being hard isn’t an excuse for not attempting to measure performance. “All indicators are flawed,” he reminds us.
But, prescient of the charity raters, Collins reminds us that it is important to be curious to learn for its own sake, in pursuit of the greatness to which we aspire. (For me, greatness means really taking on social challenges – making the world the best it can be – whatever your cause.)
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on April 27, 2010 in Effectiveness
Thank you to self-described philanthropy wonk Lucy Bernholz of Philanthropy Blog 2173 for alerting us to the resource “A Guide to Actionable Measurement” put out by Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. I’m preparing materials for two workshops on why measuring societal impact is important and this couldn’t have been dropped in my lap at a better time.
Just yesterday, I was discussing the framework for one of those sessions with a board member who will be at this retreat and has been thinking carefully about this topic. The retreat I’m preparing is designed to help program staff and board members learn to love evaluation — okay, maybe not love yet, but appreciate the importance of.
We both agreed that the conversation about measurement needs to shift away from evaluation, which conveys judging, to learning, which is about a desire to get better at what you do for the sake of the people or community you serve.
So let me say I was cheering when I read the three principles that The Gates Foundation says guide its approach to measurement:
- “Measurement should inform specific decisions and/or actions.
- “We do not measure everything, but we do strive to measure what matters most.
- “The data we gather help us learn and adapt our initiatives and strategies.”
Hallelujah.
Their formula for actionable measurement is just brilliant in my book:
“Planned collection, analysis and synthesis of data + time devoted to development of reflection and insight + willingness and ability to change = Informed Decisions & Actions”
With the growing drumbeat to rate and rank nonprofit outcomes, it is refreshing to hear such an important funder talk about reflection, insight, adaptation, learning. I’m also impressed that this foundation that has more money than any of my clients could ever dream of makes a point that they are judicious about what they measure as they can’t (and shouldn’t) try to measure everything. Read More >>
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on March 16, 2010 in Effectiveness
A message to President Obama:
Here are my
FOUR GOALS FOR PUBLIC EDUCATION
All kids …
1. Prepared for a career or job that can provide a decent quality of life for their family
2. Informed and ready to participate in our civic life and democrary
3. Enabled to live a fulfilled life
4. Information Literate, that is, able to use and evaluate information to understand and solve problems.
The explanation:
Last week, the Obama administration announced its plan to overhaul No Child Left Behind. According to the Whitehouse press release, “the plan will set the ambitious goal of ensuring that all students graduate from high school prepared for college and a career.”
For those of us in the nonprofit world who are completely absorbed in the push to measure societal outcomes, I was happy to see the President start with a “societal outcome” as the framework for public education.
In designing programs to achieve societal outcomes, every system starts with certain assumptions or theory of change on how to get there.
The NCLB theory of change might look like this:
Proficiency in reading + writing + math = preparation for college and career.
After eight years of the NCLB experiment, we have sufficient evidence of its results. Schools with parents who have high educational attainment score well. Schools in low-income areas (as income has a high correlation with parental education attainment) score poorly. Scoring isn’t standardized across the US. Grownups cheat.
In the urban district where my kids went to school, four school administrations and countless educational reforms have resulted in very limited progress.
So, maybe the NCLB theory of change isn’t enough for low-performing schools?
Maybe the path to ensuring successful college and career success is about more than proficiency in a limited number of test subjects?
And maybe the success of our society depends on more than just college and career success? Read More >>
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on March 1, 2010 in Effectiveness, Strategic Thinking
I’m organizing a workshop for later this month for the Grantmakers Council of RI called “How Grantmakers can Help Nonprofits Survive and Emerge Stronger in 2010.”
The workshop will focus on how this climate presents unique opportunities for this sector to become more intentional about strengthening the nonprofit and philanthropic infrastructure.
As a few of the grantmakers have been overly focused on mergers as the solution in these tough economic times, the discussion will highlight other opportunities shy of merger for collaboration and consolidation of management services.
Last Thursday I was chatting with a consultant colleague whom I’ve recruited to be on the panel. She was recounting her own work facilitating mergers and how these experiences have left her convinced that mergers are often not worth the time and expense that goes into them. She was pointing out that mergers usually require costly consultation and legal services and amazing amounts of time and energy from the staff and Read More >>
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on February 9, 2010 in Effectiveness, Nonprofit Highlights
It was exciting to get word of the lawsuit launched this month by former client Women’s Voices for the Earth (WVE) and a number of other environmental groups. EarthJustice launched the suit on their behalf against well known cleaning product manufacturers who have been flouting New York State’s strong labeling laws.
“The bottom line is that hazardous ingredients that have not been tested for long-term health impacts, like asthma or even birth defects, are being used in some cleaning products,” said Erin Switalski, executive director of Women’s Voices for the Earth. “Consumers have a right to know if they are spraying their kids’ high chairs with toxic chemicals. Without full ingredient disclosure from these companies, there’s simply no way to be sure.” (From SustainableBusiness.COM)
Unfortunately, you won’t find WVE listed at a big rating sight like CharityNavigator because they don’t meet its income levels (less than $500,000 in public donations, $1 million total budget). Yet. (that’s where you can help.)
Thankfully, a number of smaller private foundations understand the essential role that an organization like WVE plays in knitting together women’s health and environmental concerns.
Despite its small size, WVE has played an important role in getting manufacturers like OPI and Clorox to clean up their products.
I’ve seen this passionate band up close and can testify to its worthiness and its leanness. It could use a lot less of the lean. And more of your green.
Please don’t assume that just because an organization isn’t showing up on a rating site that it automatically should be excluded from your consideration. Dig deeper. You’ll find some real treasures out there.
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on January 22, 2010 in Effectiveness
It’s been a very interesting week.
My post on Tuesday, “My worst nightmare is now true, sloppy ratings ratings of nonprofit effectiveness in Hatii,” and a storm of Tweets generated quite a bit of attention.
As Tuesday’s post explains, after my first critique, Guidestar changed their hastily constructed home page listing Top Ten Relief Organizations Working in Haiti, which I strongly debated the evidence for, to a somewhat more accurate Most Reviewed Relief Organizations in Haiti.
After a long conversation this afternoon with Debra Snider, Guidestar’s VP of Communications and Administration, and Shari Ilsen, Director of Marketing and Outreach at GreatNonprofits, Guidestar made the laudable decision to drop the listing altogether.
Now when you land on Guidestar’s homepage and scroll down, you’ll see Disaster Action Center and encouragement to post a review if you have firsthand experience with an organization working in Haiti. A link takes you to the site of GreatNonprofits.
Why is this so much better? Read More >>
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on January 20, 2010 in Effectiveness
Evening update. I just discovered the press release sent out by Guidestar and GreatNonprofits touting their reviews. How do you spell “No Shame?” Seems it may be time to follow the money to see who benefits.
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UPDATE from this afternoon: As a result of Tweeting, Guidestar has now changed the title of the list discussed in this blog to more accurately reflect what it is: “Most Reviewed Relief Organizations in Haiti.” If a handful of reviews qualify as “most.”
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Original Post:
I was doing a bit of research today that required me to look up a few organizations in GuideStar.
Imagine my surprise to find on Guidestar’s home page the following list:
“Top Ten Relief Organizations Working In Haiti”
Wow! That’s quite a claim. What was their criteria for picking these 10 out of all the other NGOs they listed as doing work in Haiti?
Guidestar goes on to say under that amazing headline: “Donors, clients, and volunteers have identified these nonprofits as the most effective working in Haiti.” Hmm.
So I clicked the button “learn more or write reviews.”
When I clicked through, this took me to “Disaster Action Center” which seems to be a collaborative effort of Guidestar and GreatNonprofits.
You may not have heard of GreatNonprofits yet. I hadn’t until they were named in a holiday giving press release put out by a consortium of third party intermediaries that have been setting themselves up as the “go to” rating places if you want the skinny on nonprofit effectiveness. (You can see my rants on this in prior blog posts like “Join a lively debate on rating nonprofit societal outcomes” or others under the effectiveness tab.)
GreatNonprofits invites donors, clients and volunteers to do little reviews of the nonprofits they support or have benefited from. Anyone can go online and write a review and choose the number of stars they’d like to give to that nonprofit. Kind of like the ratings on Amazon.
So I clicked through to read the reviews of some of the organizations that were listed by Guidestar in the Top 10 and some that weren’t in the Top 10 but also seemed to have 5 Stars, the top rating.
I admit it. I didn’t click on every nonprofit. But the ones that I did, that were listed in the Top 10, had ONLY 1 or 2 Reviews. That’s it.
But some of the NGOs that didn’t make the Top 10 list also had the same number of stars and same number of reviews. For example, World Vision International had five stars and two donor reviews (as of 3:55 pm EST today) and they were in the Top Ten list. PLAN USA had five stars and two donor reviews and they were not listed as being in the top 10 list.
And some of the donor reviews had nothing to do with Haiti. Assuming they really are donors, right? I mean, who’s to say that the reviews aren’t the work of a PR firm hired to write the reviews. Or fund development staff?
When I suggested on Twitter (you can find the conversation by searching @gaylegifford) that it was absolutely shameful for Guidestar and GreatNonprofits to be naming a top ten list based on 1 or 2 donor reviews, GreatNonprofits replied:
@gaylegifford its a new site-we need more reviews 2 build the resource. U can help by spreading the word 2 post at http://bit.ly/gnpdisaster
It’s pretty obvious to all that they need more reviews to even begin to have a credible claim. That is, if you buy the whole idea that rating NGO effectiveness is the same as reviewing a book or toaster, which I don’t. It’s not that I don’t think that feedback from donors et al isn’t helpful. Caveat emptor on that.
But to then take those skimpy reviews and definitively name a top ten list of effectiveness based on the handful of reviews and the handful of organizations reviewed, I’m still shaking my head.
By the way, shouldn’t there be some distinction made between what donors say and what clients or volunteers have to say?
But what irresponsible hubris to make a claim about NGO effectiveness in a disaster of this magnitude based on what I might describe as a complete lack of credible information.
I’m not saying that some of the organizations on the list don’t deserve their rating . But I am saying that GreatNonprofits and Guidestar have absolutely no credibility if this is the criteria they are using to be telling donors or the media that their uninformed list is in the Top 10 in Relief.
None.
P.S. By the way, just because an NGO has done good work in Haiti in the past (e.g. a school) doesn’t mean it has the competency to do the type of relief work that is needed in a disaster of this magnitude. Or the capacity to handle huge amounts of short term aid.
What would be helpful is for those organizations that have been working on the ground for some time in Haiti to communicate with each other and with the world community how donations can best be used … for relief or for long term rebuilding.
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Posted by Jon Howard on January 15, 2010 in Effectiveness, World News
It’s hard to be hard-headed about giving to Haiti when people are hungry, thirsty and injured. But before you reflexively hit the DONATE NOW FOR HAITI button on the first email (or text message) you see, take a moment to consider your own values. Even in emergencies, perhaps most of all in emergencies, it’s important to try to give in ways that can help to avert similar disasters in the future.
Timothy A. Wise reminds us that “aid is power” in his 2005 blog posting Humanitarian Crises: What is a Progressive to Do? A lot of American aid power goes, intentionally or unintentionally, to helping entrench American businesses and exports at the expense of local products and producers. Food aid often winds up driving local produce and producers out of business. Reconstruction contracts with international construction firms undercut local professionals, builders and workers. Wise advises sticking with agencies which were present before the crisis and will stick around later and those with clear strategies to build local capacity.
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on January 5, 2010 in Effectiveness
1. Passionately pursue that big vision of societal (or personal) change.
- Inspire other visionaries.
- Join dreams together.
- Be realistic, but don’t let obstacles become your excuse.
- Celebrate each step forward.
2. Ensure that you are trustworthy and worthy of support.
- Do what you have promised to do.
- Work on what matters.
- Measure, analyze, learn, adjust.
- Model your values and ethics.
3. Think and act strategically
- Understand the systems in which you operate
- Remember, everything is in motion.
- Seek knowledge, all kinds – you never know what you’ll need to know
- Find the leverage
- Seize opportunity
4. Love your donors
- Communicate, engage, thank.
- Don’t take anyone for granted.
- Love the small ones as much as the big ones.
5. Enable people who make things happen.
- Match the right talent to the right job.
- Agree on individual outcomes that matter.
- If you are seriously stuck, take another look at who’s doing the doing.
- Train, coach, mentor, reward.
- Remove the barriers you’ve put in their way.
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