This is the 5th in a series of posts were we explore one of 5 Evaluative Practices, that if adopted put you on the path to being evaluative. The last post highlighted how important it is to Leverage and Link Your Efforts so you are designing efforts that maximize resources and have the greatest likelihood of success. Take-aways from that post are the following:

• Recognize that your organization is part of an environmental landscape and understanding where you fit within that and your unique contribution can be helpful in narrowing in on the outcomes you hope to accomplish.
• Outcomes don’t happen by magic at the programmatic or organizational level. They occur because one has thought through a pathway of activities/strategies, relationships, interactions and changes that are most likely to lead to the desired end.

The next critical practice is to “differentiating what you want to know, can know and need to know.” Once you get to this point, you have adopted the idea that information is important and it’s not all what you can see and feel but also what you can demonstrate. This is all about knowing how to ask the right questions at the right time .

As you continue on this journey, distinguish between the information needed to determine if your efforts are 1) progressing as intended, and 2) having the impact desired.

Getting clear on what information (guided by the most relevant questions) is most salient to your work and intention and being comfortable with what you can know (based on available data, time frame, resources, appropriateness, etc.) is an evolutionary process. Like sport you wish to master, it takes time and
training for the muscles to respond and behave in the way you wish. Part of that journey is knowing what equipment best suit your style and preference and yields the desired results as well as determining a training schedule you can stick to (more on that in our final post).

Some tips to pave the way include:

• Understand where your organization or efforts sits in terms of its overall development
• Know the difference between process and outcome questions and at what stage in your development it makes the most sense to ask what
• Look to your colleagues who engage in similar work or efforts and ask if they might share their thinking, internal working documents including logic models, evaluation frameworks and measurement tools.

This is the 4th in a series of posts were we explore one of 5 Evaluative Practices that if adopted put you on the path to being evaluative. The last post highlighted how important it is to Differentiate What You Know from the Difference You Make and how that can open up a set of possibilities. Core to that post are the following:

• Getting clear about why you do what you do and the “to what end” is a new muscle in the non-profit sector which needs exercise.
• Once an organization gets clear, it can be a transformative event that opens up possibilities, focuses efforts and strengthens evaluation efforts

The next critical practice is to “leverage and link your efforts.” Important in both small and large organizations. For large organizations, because it is easy for the pieces and programs to get away from the core purpose and intended impact of your org. For small organizations because there is very little cushion and thus everything you do must matter. This includes not just thinking about efforts internal to your organization but also how you relate to others whose work supports and compliments your own.

In our own practice, we love this part of the process which often is iterative with Practice 2 (Differentiate What you Do with The Difference You Make). If we are doing program /initiative level work, it starts as simply with a group of staff people each armed with a set of color coded large post-its (one color each for outcomes and activities) and a blank wall. Participants are given the opportunity to brainstorm outcomes and activities which lead to them. We then move the pieces around the wall, the dialogue begins and the opportunity for clarity and alignment happen through exploration of the following questions: What leads to what? What is missing? Is that the right outcome? What can we really accomplish? What else do we need to do to reach the outcome? Can we do it? Should someone else? How do we connect?

For more complex endeavors, conceptual models such as network analysis and system mapping can be helpful. And logic models and theories of change are additional tools to assist you in making connections and getting clarity on how the pieces work in service of each other and where your organization fits in the larger environmental context.

None of our work happens in a vacuum, and for us to have true impact as well as understand the degree of impact we CAN have, it’s important to contextualize, be explicit about intention, and develop and implement programs/projects/efforts which have the greatest likihood of success. All of which move you along the path to being evaluative.

What tools have been most helpful to you? What have been the results of leveraging and linking your efforts in your organization?

For the past 18 months or so, jdcPartnerships has worked with CompassPoint NonProfit Services Staff and Board in developing, refining and applying their emerging Theory of Change (I can hear some of you groaning) to their work.  A recent application of this framework was to NonProfit Day 2010. For purposes of reference, our model of a Theory of Change includes the following components: Issue(s) Addressed, Target Audience, Core Strategies, Values/Guiding Principles, Assumptions, Anticipated Change (Long Term) AND Research/Evidence.

Given discussions last year about “blowing up the conference model” by Teri Behrens, and Sean Stannard-Stockton ”more-ideas-for-blowing-up-the-conference-model”  among others AND that spring conference season is now upon us, we thought it might be interesting to share a glimpse behind the scenes of designing a conference.  Nelson Layag, Project Director graciously agreed to share his experience using a Theory of Change framework to the immensely popular and well attended NonProfit Day held annually in San Francisco. See NonProfit Day Session Materials and Selected Resources for information if you were unlucky enough not to have attended.

Q. So How Did We Do It?

A. When we  began planning Nonprofit Day the full staff and Board were in the midst of developing our theory of change. CompassPoint’s theory of change focused us on what exactly we were working towards (in other words, to what end) and what ways we were most likely to make progress towards those outcomes.  Thanks to Jara’s suggestion, we used a simple format for creating an overall framework for the conference which helped us use the theory of change as a foundation for the planning and execution of Nonprofit Day.  This framework was our guiding document and helped shape theme, overall outcomes, speakers,  and structure.

Q. What Was Different?

A. A big difference was  balancing the tension between the specific outcomes we wanted to achieve AND those we could achievein a one day convening.  We had great discussion on questions like “is it realistic to achieve this outcome?” and “what can/should we try to achieve in our one day convenings?”.  We also worked with our speakers on developing specific learning outcomes for each session and evaluated to those specific outcomes.  We asked attendees to hand in their evaluations after each session so our return was much higher than in the past.   We gained some good insights such as what a panel discussion could or could not achieve.  We also saw things like participants thinking the presenter was great, but rating lower when asked if learning outcomes had been met.  (Read NonProfit Day 2010 Eavluation Findings, Lessons Learned and Implications for more detail.)

Another difference was how we intentionally lived particular parts of the values stated in our theory of change.  For example, the value of humor was expressed in the large scale “mad libs” game and the speakers we chose were aligned with our values on social equity and multiculturalism.

Q. What Next?

A.Nonprofit Day 2011 of course (it’s on September 19 – so save the date),  but infused with the learnings gained not just from last year’s Nonprofit Day but from all our major convenings held in the past year.  Here’s three things that you’ll see from us this year:

1. Better developed learning outcomes and evaluations (along with being more explicit about those outcomes to our participants)
2. Get more specific what “networking” outcomes we want to achieve in this large scale event and then design to those outcomes
3. Continue to use our Theory of Change as the guiding foundation