You can use these questions to help kick off this discussion thread:
- Terminology: please help us to understand the language of fundraising! What is the difference between a “donor” and a “funder”? What other terms are confusing for beginners to this work?
- How do we measure the impact of human rights work? How can we set realistic expectations that work for funders, organizations and their beneficiaries? How can we ensure that impact measurement work is also funded and supported by funders and organizations?
- How do you know when your work is sustainable?
- When is it worth the effort to seek out small foundations and when is it better to approach larger funders/institutions?
- What kind of capacity (staffing) does your organization require in order to engage different audiences (foundations, individual donations, grants, etc)?
- What can we learn from fundraising strategies from other sectors such as development and humanitarian work?
- How do you know when your funding strategy is sustainable? Share your examples of strategies that work! What lessons have you learned?
Share your experiences, thoughts, ideas and questions by adding a comment below or replying to existing comments!
A thought that might stir controversy...
What is the relationship between fundraisers/development staff and the human rights work itself?
I must preface this by saying I have huge respect for the people who raise money for all our organizations. It is a tough job.
And in my observations over the years of human rights organizations and humanitarian organizations (especially the larger ones) -- it is a job that often becomes disconnected to the work itself. We often hire fundraisers for their experience in fundraising, but not necessarily their experience in human rights work. Or we hire fundraisers who know the work well, but don't know fundraising...
This raises all sorts of challenges for everyone. How do we ensure that we have both? That the people who are dedicated to fundraising have an opportunity to deeply experience and understand the work -- and the people who are doing the work have the opportunity to understand and respect fundraising?
Thoughts??
Here's an interesting question for debate: should Fundraisers for human rights only have experience and skills in marketing and PR to raise funds, or should they also be able to engage into "traditional human rights work" as their peers?
Likewise: should human rights practitioners only have experience in their relevant field of expertise (legal field, advocacy, communication, etc) or should they also be able to engage in fundraising for human rights?
Human rights NGOs provide a variety of recipes on this. Some organisations are asking their staff working on projects to fundraise for these, i.e. staff must be able to manage a project, but also to fundraise for it. Other organisations have clearly separated and autonomous sections for project management on the one hand and fundraising on the other.
Of course the two require very different skills and experience. Good human rights fundraisers do not necessarily make for good human rights project managers. The contrary is true too.
However, I would argue for an equilibrium betweent the two approaches: I think it is important for fundraisers to be able to regularly participate in activities with colleagues, if possible "in the field" to maintain the connection with ground reality. This can actually boost one's ability to fundraise.
Likewise, it is equally important for non fundraising staff to undertand the need, value, and strategy, to fundraise for human rights work
I think both Jane and Vincent are raising a very interesting point - which seems to be about a communications/understanding gap that can develop between 'programme' and 'resources'. I guess this could especially be the case in larger organisations? I don't know because my main experience has been with smaller ones - and ones that focus on institutional fundraising not fundraising from individuals...
I have experienced what you are talking about though. And I do think it is important to avoid having fundraising separated from programme reality. If it is separated, one problem that can arise is that promises are made or concepts are 'sold' that cannot actually be delivered... I think fundraising must be informed by programme... and not the other way around. Your fundraiser can tell you about opportunities, but shoudl not be re-shaping your work so much that you don't recognise it anymore...so that it meets a donor's priorities but is not true to your mission/objectives.Scary when that happens! But with proper communication and oversight... this is hopefully avoidable?
Maureen
I agree with Maureen's comment that the program/development gap may tend to be more pronounced in larger organizations. For the past decade+ I've worked at organizations with budgets under $5m and staff under 30 members. This has helped maintain an "extended family" feeling in the workplace and a healthy collaboration among departments and colleagues. I realize that this isn't true at every small organization (nor is the reverse true at every larger org) but it's been my experience and it's probably a big reason why I've stayed at organizations as long as I have. As WITNESS, I find the development staff deeply engaged in the work and program staff open and savvy on the fundraising front. I think we can always do a better job of more fully integrating the development team into daily programmatic activities - and it does take effort and sometimes money to attend a conference or make a site visit - but the payoff is usually well worth it. Now if I can just find my way to our next training in Brazil...hm...
Hello, all -
I propose that this topic not be discussed in exclusive terms. Quite simply, fundraising is everyone's job. What remains is to negotiate the roles of each position and / or personality. Previously, as a development officer for the Center for Victims of Torture (CVT), I relied heavily on project / program management staff for their professional competence and credibility, but also on their ability to convey passion to donors in a way that only they can do.
Additionally, there must be clear channels of communication and high levels of mutual accountability. A poorly run program cannot be sold (or should not), and a poorly run development function cannot sell the best of programs. If these functions are integrated - i.e. program staff are also the primary fundraisers - then it becomes a matter of auditing their skills in both areas to identify where they need support and professional development.
Thanks, Jane, for starting this conversation on the role of fundraisers in human rights work, and the role of human rights practitioners in fundraising! I wanted to bring up a related question about fundraising capacity:
What resources are needed for a sustainable fundraising strategy?
Dedicating too many resources might dissuade potential funders/donors (most Americans think that nonprofits spend too much money on overhead). Not dedicating enough resources could lead to not raising enough money to support the programs. How do you know what the sweet-spot is? Are expectations for successful programs for few resources too high (and unrealistic) for human rights organizations? If so, how can we break this cycle and set realistic expectations and dedicate appropriate resources for human rights fundraising?
How do you know when your funding strategy is sustainable?
I love this question... and I'd love to know the answer!!
I think if you are an organisation reliant on donor/foundation funding, can you ever be 100% sustainable? Given changing donor priorities and time limits on funding, you will always be looking for new sources of support. So when I think of a sustainable funding strategy I think of one where unknowns and unpredictability are minimised, and there are fewer sleepless nights :)
In our case, we have worked relentlessly over the time I've been there (which will be 9 years next month!! heavens, where does the time go!?) to move away from project funding and to consolidate longer-term core funding from as many donors as possible. I'd say about 25% of our budget is very likely to remain project funding just because of the nature of the work we do, and special initiatives that arise and have perhaps shorter time horizons within the broader scope of what we do. But moving to 75% core funding and the work to keep it there is still something we have to work at constantly. Again it is about relationship-building, building confidence in the work we do, making sure we do what we say we're going to do, and can show that we have achieved results. And that the people we do it for, who we consult every step of the way, agree that we are working effectively.
So it is never only about the funding, it is about the way a whole organisation works and about building all of those pieces that make up sustainable organisations. It is a long process - and it is always evolving.
One of our latest challenges is to think about ways to 'digitally transform' our fundraising efforts... how do we present what we want to do (i.e., what we need money for) and report on it, in ways that are compelling, short and enjoyable? We joke about needing a 'tweet' version of our core proposal... but we're not there yet! So we can't relax yet :)
Maureen
I think one of the problems of discussing sustainability, is that organizations that focus on issues like human rights have difficulty thinking of the value that they create outside of the social impact that they get funded by foundations. At the engine room we have been thinking hard about how we can create value to generate earned income reveneue to support other initiatives that we are interested in taking on. In the case of IFEX, the communiques that you receive from members, I think it would be interesting to see if you could establish relationships with wire services like AP or Reuters to see if they would be interested in paying you for that content. (Just throwing that out there as an example of rethinking sustainability - I realize that there are likely nuanced complications in developing these kinds of models). For NGOs that produce excellent research, I would love to see how they can parlay that into products that they can use to create revenue streams that fall outside of traditional fundraising models. Just an idea to see if we an shift the way we think about sustainability, and try and shift away from fighting over the same buckets of funds while crossing our fingers that these funds are not cut.
I think not relying on repeat support from donors, and avoiding constant struggles with donor-driven mission drift is key to assessing whether a fundraising model is sustainable. And shifts to core funding are important - but can be incredibly challenging. I think foundations and traditional fundraising will be important for organizations, but I would love to hear if any organizations in this dialogue have experimented with other forms of supporting operations.
Hi Alix - I agree it is a good idea for every organisation to think about earned income as one piece of the puzzle, even if in the end it is not something they choose to pursue.
Moreso than IFEX itself, so many of our members generate their own revenue (and visibility) from things like annual gala fundraising dinners to focus on free expression issues, membership fees from people who believe in their cause, selling publications like you suggest, providing training and services, and more... and where it makes sense, I think it is really empowering to have these independent revenue streams. I have also seen cases where a negative side effect of focusing on earned revenue can take an organisation far off track of its mission - they are doing so much 'delivering' of work that somewhat relates to their mission, but still don't have enough resources to do what they set themselves up to do in the first place. So I think each organisation should look at this and try to find a balance that works for them - knowing they'll have to check in on it periodically... perhaps as part of their strategic planning cycle.
Maureen
GREAT points Maureen! I raised earned-income to stretch the scope of conversation outside of private foundations - your conclusion that "So I think each organisation should look at this and try to find a balance that works for them - knowing they'll have to check in on it periodically... perhaps as part of their strategic planning cycle." is spot on, so we can leave it at that. But if anyone else has any experiences with earned-income strategies, I'd love to hear them!
In response to Maureen’s post on making funding for Human Rights programs sustainable, I have a question:
Are the programs in response to needs of the beneficiaries as identified by the international agency (supply push) or by the beneficiaries themselves (demand pull)?
Sustainability of development interventions cannot be ‘artificially’ created. They are either present before the program is designed, or are not. In which case, we need to go back to consulting with the beneficiaries and determine exactly what their needs are in the programmatic area we choose to work in, and how we approach those needs. Often times, our approach is to define a problem in a manner that would appeal to our donor constituents, design the intervention according to their parameters and attempt to implement this imported ‘solution’ into the field with little (or no) regard to the specifics of the human rights issues we seek to address. This is not a sustainable approach and it becomes quite evident early as we seek new donors or report to existing donors. New donors typically ask tough questions and, as existing ones peruse our achievements and realize the loopholes, they lose interest. Funding for ‘supply push’ initiatives are therefore quite hard to sustain.
When our response is a ‘demand pull’, the beneficiaries take charge of project implementation. They know that their immediate needs are just a means to a greater end and they know the short cut to that end. They literally take the project and run with it. The results on the ground speak clearly to a well-thought out strategy and approach and donors respond enthusiastically to the success achieved. Sustainability is thus assured – both in funding and in programming. The next challenge becomes making donors into partners who will abide with the program for the long haul.
Thank you for this comment. Sometimes, one gets the feeling that NGOs are in the business of "helping out" because there is so much money involved in doing so. This results in what Alix mentioned as "donor-driven mission drift".
What do you do as NGO if "the world" does not seem to be interested in the problems you are trying to solve? Do you quit and let the problems be problems (and people suffering from them)? And what if the problems are not urgent (like disasters)?
Sorry for asking more questions than giving answers, I am here to learn ;-)
Thanks again, Hubert
Hi Jose
I completely agree with your assertion that a 'demand pull' approach is a durable one. I've seen so many instances of where internationals have what they think is a good idea for something and assume things rather than consult and develop projects in partnership with the beneficiaries. That said, I also see in so many project proposals from all manner of organisations so many untested assumptions, that I am not surprised when donors say no. A lot of upfront work needs to go into identifying why and for whom you are doing something, and demonstrating that the beneficiaries/stakeholders understand it and agree it is needed and support your getting the money to implement it.
Maureen
Hi Maureen,
Please see my response below, to your posting. I actually posted yesterday but technical difficulties delayed its appearance on this forum.
One sustainable fundraising strategy is to focus on the programs that are being funded - much like selling an item. When the focus is on the program, donors will shift their attention to the investment they are making and, if (in their oponion) it is a good investment, you'll get their money.
If you focus solely on getting donor support for promises to do good, do not be surprise if they differ their giving until something tangible is on offer. Whether through social media or elsehow, fundraising is always the same and, with current economic challenges putting strains on individuals, program have to be truly convincing and well packaged for donors to open their wallets.
Should you care to talk more about this, please drop me a line: josetenga@shaw.ca.
Great points by everyone! I want to make note of a funding trend that I see among foundations and governments that traditionally have funded NGOs based in developed countries for work in human rights, public health and gender equality (the program areas where I have most experience) that takes place in the developing world. That trend is to fund local groups directly. To me this is a welcome development (even though my income comes from developed country NGOs doing international work!). In practice, though, few local NGOs have experience or much knowledge about fundraising and some funders that have committed in principle to let those most affected by a problem to craft their own solutions have done little to equip these new grantees to sustain themselves financially. To cite two examples, almost every USAID proposal must be prepared in English even when the eleigibility for the grant or contract is limited to NGOs in countries where few beneficiaries speak English, let alone are able to prepare a complex proposal. The UN has a similar shortsightedness, though it expands the language in which proposals can be written to list to 4 or 5.
My question is how are others addressing this shift? Are your organizations changing the way they fundraise.and deliver programs? One model that is slowly emerging is for Internetional NGOs to become subcontractors for specialized services or technical assistance to developing country NGOs. I am doing some of that now and it is very gratifying. But the folks at "headquarters" are getting a little nervous about ther role over the longterm as funders turn their attention away from US and European based organizations that traditionally have captured nearly all the funding that is out there. What does everyone think?
To elaborate on the question I raised during our conference call yesterday, I'm wondering if anyone has experience fundraising (from foundations or individuals) for network-based programs? As we see the trend toward more collaborative and cross-sector approaches to HR work, largely aided by digital communications and social media, many organizations including WITNESS are adapting campaigns to work in a more decentralized way across issues, regions, organizations and sectors. For instance, we are currently working on a gender-based violence campaign spanning five African countries with multiple grassroots partners, each working on their own local advocacy campaigns as well as collectively on a broader campaign with shared goals. Currently, WITNESS is raising funds on our own to support these networks, but as the model evolves and campaigns grow, I wonder if our fundraising strategy will need to also shift, perhaps to include more collaborative approaches. The flip side is, once funding is secured, M&E (already a challenge for HR advocacy) also becomes more complex when dealing with multiple organizations in different regions. This is all new to most of us, so not sure if anyone will have experiences to share, but would love to hear if you do!
Sara, Maureen and others - so glad you raised these questions about fundraising for networks! New Tactics is also a network of practitioners and organizations so it is incredibly helpful to learn from your experiences and ideas.
Jessica Dheere of Social Media Exchange Beiruit (SMEX) has been thinking a lot about what goes into a funding proposal that supports networks. Jessica calls this kind of networked-based work "net-centric": a net-centric proposal acknowledges and leverages the power of networks to achieve common goals. She recently wrote a post on a few ideas for characteristics of a net-centric proposal - I wanted to share those ideas with you here. Having a community of net-centric projects that can contribute their ideas to something like this could lead to a set of shared-values, which I think could be really powerful in fundraising and achieving common goals!
Characteristics of a net-centric proposal include:
What do you think? What else can we add to this list of characteristics?
Furthermore, have human rights organizations developed other characteristics / criteria to be included in human rights project proposals?
Hi Kristin - Thanks for bringing in Jessica's well-developed thinking on net-centric proposals. Lots to consider there!
One point that could possibly be added is that a net-centric way of working is also flexible - allowing participating groups/entities to opt in to those things that fit with their work/capacities/ability to contribute, but not to have to over commit or take on too much - as long as everyone knows what they can rely on each other for... and it is clear who is doing what
Hmmm - maybe that wasn't such a clear point to add after all! :)
Maureen
Hi Maureen and Kristin -
Thanks so much for this great input! The information on net-centric proposals is particularly interesting. We've done a lot of thinking around these concepts at WITNESS but less from a fundraising pov so I'll be sure to circulate Jessica's blog post to the team.
Maureen, we've had a very similar experience to the ones you mentioned, whereby different partners had to take ownership of discreet aspects of a program, budget, deliverables, and reporting - and quite frankly, it was an enormous amount of back-end coordination despite some good programmatic results. That was a pretty straight up "pass through" grant, which we generally try not to get too involved with for all the reasons you stated - plus the fact that WITNESS is a capacity and skills-building organization, so we try to provide human resources and tools/technology to our partners rather than enter into sub-granting. The situation we're facing now is a bit different in that WITNESS has spearheaded these networked campaigns with existing networks of human rights organizations. Since our shared campaign is entirely focused on introducing a video advocacy component into their existing campaign work, we are solely responsible for raising the funds and making sure we deliver on what we promise (though of course with clear upfront expectations of roles and responsibilites that we develop in consultation with the partners). It can get complicated when each campaign partners with multiple grassroots groups, each affiliated with the larger umbrella network. What we have found is that WITNESS is playing a strong collaborative role with these partners in knitting together the individual campaigns and leveraging them into a broader regional or global strategy. This is where, down the road, I suspect our fundraising approach may need to shift to perhaps include joint fundraising (though I can hear some colleagues' voices strongly disagreeing with this idea!) but it's really too early in the process to know. For now, we've had some encouraging success at raising funds for this work and some great results from our partners to report back on. Very curious to go through our first external evaluation with one of these funders later in the year - will have to find a way to keep you all posted!
Hi Sara
The example you're talking about here with the WITNESS video advocacy campaigning sounds very familiar, though I think our experience is on a smaller scale. At IFEX we recently led a first-ever network-wide International Day to End Impunity (IDEI) on November 23 as a call to action to demand justice for those who have been killed for exercising their right to freedom of expression and to shed light on the issue of impunity. It was the first time we tried to do a visible online campaign with similar messaging being delivered across the IFEX members - and as such, we took the lead in fundraising and allocating resources to make sure anyone who wanted to could take part in some way. We developed logos, info - a whole impunity tool kit that members could draw on in their own online and offline events. We also had funds for specific country case studies on the issues, which were granted to some members to prepare digital stories about the issue. Everything's collected here at one central site: http://www.daytoendimpunity.org/
in addition, several IFEX members who had their own funding for impunity work also linked into the project and helped to push it along and make it visible. So all of this came together in a net-centric campaign that was developed with IFEX leading, and members playing whatever role they could contribute.
We'll be continuing the effort every year - and will be learning along the way, like we did this time. And it will be interesting to see how the resource issues play out as hopefully more organisations engage more deeply in the issue and the campaign.
One place we got some help thinking about digital-savvy online campaigning was from a consultancy group in Vancouver called 'Communicopia': they have some helpful analysis and advice they make available on their site about net-centric campaigns here: http://communicopia.com/insights/what-is-a-netcentric-campaign - and they've also led some environmental campaigns that they learned a lot from. So worth reading up for anyone who is heading in this direction.
Maureen
Hi Maureen - thanks for sharing this example, it does sound like a similar approach. Great to hear that you're able to keep it going - I'd be curious to know if your fundraising strategy evolves over time.
I will definitely check out Communicopia - I'm not familiar with them. Thanks for sharing!
Sara
Does anyone have any experience drafting criteria for who you accept money from and why? How do you communicate who supports your work to your consituencies and partners?
Would love to hear your thoughts!
Forgive me for referencing The Google as a response, but have you tried searching "gift acceptance policies" as a start? Many organizations make them publicly available.
Thanks Alix for raising an issue which I think is fundamental for the human rights sector. Where do we as fundraisers, and more generally, where do our organisations put a limit in terms of what donations we can accept, and which we can't. Or rather, from which sort of funders we may be able to accept donations or not?
The human rights sector has developped considerable efforts over the last 3 decades to mainstream human rights approaches and "do no harm" policies into the development and other sectors. However, very little has been done into assessing the extent to which these policies, designed and promoted by the human rights sector for fellow sectors, have been applied by the human rights sector itself.
Let me give an example of this: I recently participated in a conference in which a panelist was the Head of an important European organisation working to provide medical relief to persons living with disabilities in the developping world. This panelist made a presentation on her organisation's fundraising strategy, and how they had been able to raise a major gift from an important nuclear power producion and uranium extraction company based in France. This company has been embroiled in several controversies in Europe, and it has been accused of supporting a government crack down on Tuareg populations in Niger.
When I mentioned this to the panelist, her answer was she did not care where the money came from, and considered that the gift would enable her organisation to undertake new initiatives for people living with disabilities.
I found her answer quite disturbing and started thinking of the extent to which we may contribute in adding fuel to a fire which we seek to extinguish by legitimising and providing PR support (accepting grants) to some actors of the fire.
In conclusion, I would say that ensuring that the money that we receive to undertake our human rights is "100% clean" is just not feasible and unrealistic. However, I would certainly agree that tools such as "gift acceptance policies" and wider institutional reflections about the "definite yes" and the "definite no" for funders ought to developed by human rights groups.
We had a really lively conversation with our advisory board about this topic that opened my eyes to the need of solid criteria. I used to think in monolithic terms of "government funding or no government funding" or "earned income or no earned income" but the more I think about these issues the more nuanced they become for me. I think Vincent is absolutely right when he says that there is no money that is completely free of entanglements, and at the end of the day I think an argument can be made for accepting or rejecting any offer for grant support. To decrease the likelihood of reinventing the wheel in every grant making decision and to ensure transparency for constitutencies, I think a holistic, publically available (and not just embedded in a 990 pdf available through a download link) is appropriate. I really like what Global Integrity does on its website. Does anyone else have examples of organizations that do a good job of transparently reporting where they get their funding, and/or transparent policies on why they take the funding they do?
This is a really excellent area to raise in this discussion. I totally agree with you and Vincent that "purity" is unattainable, as that is very relative.
However, we can in our efforts to advance human rights adhere to transparency, which can be both an underlying value of how we do our work, but also a good strategic decision. Strategic in terms of the financial resources and support coming to an organization, but also in terms of the vision, leadership, and actions.
Thanks for sharing that example from Global Integrity - they are certainly modeling their vision.
Hi Alix -
WITNESS has developed very clear criteria for socially responsible investing, including some obvious screens for a HR org (no money from companies doing business with repressive regimes or involved in extractive industries, etc.) and some less obvious ones. We also as a rule do not accept any governmental funding. Of course if you trace most money you'll find problems (ie, where do foundations invest their money? Or what about accepting funds from the UN which gets dues from governments?) but you have to draw the line somewhere. I'm not sure if this document is something I can share publicly but I can find out if you'd like to know more.
Does the second part of your question refer to how orgs communicate their investment strategy, or in how they publicize their funders in general?
Sara
Thanks for sharing the criteria that WITNESS has developed for accepting funds, Sara! Is this information available publicly, perhaps on your website?
It would be great to hear from others on how their organization decides from whom they will receive funding from and why!
Hi Kristin -
WITNESS does not post our criteria for funding on our website (though we probably post nearly everything else there!) It was generated by a sub-committee of our Board of Directors, so I need to find out if it's something I can distribute here. Will come back with an answer tomorrow.
Sara
Hi again -
I looked into our socially responsible investment strategy and found out that it is in fact an internal document. However, I've been given the green light to summarize some of what it contains. I think there's definitely an argument for us to make this document publicly available in the interest of transparency and sharing of best practices - both major values behind our work. But, that won't happen by today so here's some brief information that I hope will be useful.
WITNESS uses 5 categories for screening potential investments (and by investments we're referring largely to the stock market investments though by extension we use these same filters when deciding whether to accept donations, especially from corporate donors).
1 - Qualitative Screening - WITNESS is concerned about companies that have egregious records of employee relations, environmnental stewardship, and product safety and liability.
2 - Positive Screening - WITNESS is interested in investing in companies that have positive employee relations, are environmentally progressive, have a high-performance workplace, and a positive record of corporate governance.
3 - Avoidance Screening - WITNESS avoids companies that benefit from dicatorial governments and/or encourage child or forced labor, derive revenue from nuclear weapons or nuclear power, derive more than 5% of revenue from tobacco, and engage in non-essential animal testing. WITNESS also avoids investments in media conglomerates that restrict media.
4 - Shareholder Engagement - WITNESS is interested in supporting shareholder resolutions that relate to human rights.
5 - Proxy Voting - WITNESS seeks to vote its shares, when possible, in accordance with its social investment objectives.
Another issue that relates to the siloing of program development and program implementation has to do with impact assessment. I tore my hair out when I first started writing proposals trying to understand the differences between Outputs, Outcomes, and Impact. When I began to understand these concepts, I started tearing my hair out about the difference between what donors wanted and what was actually productive for programs. How do we balance the structuring of monitoring and evaluation programs and impact assessments in a way that moves a project forward iteratively and effectively? Anyone have epxerience working to develop base line data and program expectations with program managers? Or have any of you found a helfpul way to include program managers in the reporting process that has been productive and not frustrating (or seemingly pointless) for program managers? Would love to hear experiences with this!
Maureen - that does sound "heavenly"! I love it. And I also love that you have reflected on the process and shared it here! I have so many questions about how you actually did this...but I'll start with a few specific questions:
Regarding your annual programme summary,
Is there any chance that you could share the doc with us? Or a template? I would love to be able to put these into context with an example.
Also, technically speaking - how does your team keep track of the status of the indicators? Do you use special software that collect this data as the program moves forward? Or does the team document this information quarterly? How do they share information on the indicators with the fundraising staff? Would love to learn more about the documentation process...it's so easy to say "oh yea I'll be sure to write that down" but the trick is 1) taking the time to document, and 2) documenting it in a way that can be useful (and not lost). Thanks, Maureen!
Hi Kristin - I'm sharing our humble 2011 Programme Summary as an example of how we organise our work annually, so that we can track progress and report on impact. We have 5 programme areas (in 2012 that's been reduced to 4, 2 have been merged) and each programme area has a team of people assigned to it that draft the annual workplan, outputs, and indicators... and in some cases outcomes are revised or updated if they don't feel like they are still quite valid. Each team presents their work to the full staff for feedback, questions, clarification, ideas, more input, etc...(and then on to our international board for approval).
Each team takes responsibility for the reporting in their area. So at the beginning of the year, they know what they have to track and they figure out the best ways to do that. We have two main reporting deadlines with our donors - midterm (so July-ish) and year-end (so January-ish). Eeach team figures out how they want to tackle drafting the programme report, and getting it to me. Once I have it I compare it to the programme summary and we do a back and forth on things that might not be clear, or information I think we need to make the report more compelling... and then I do the final assembly which gets reviewed by the manager and ED. In most cases we are able to do the same core report for many donors.
When you look at the performance indicators, you'll see some are quantitative and can be generated from the Content Management System we use to circulate our members' free expression violations daily by e-mail, twitter, on our website - and in multiple languages, so it is easy to count things... but counting totals of violations published only gets us part of the way, then the team analyses those results in relation to the programmatic work we do, and shares the most interesting information. 'More' is not necessarilly better has been our mantra for a while... this information being USED as part of a broader effort to change the free expression situation is really what we are looking for (and which is driving our new effort to find more effective ways to use the violations information in how we report it, going forward). There are also qualitative indicators, and as I mentioned in a previous post, we don't wear ourselves out measuring and writing down every single result, we use the performance indicators as a GUIDE to what to look for in our work that will tel us if we are getting closer to our outcomes.
So I don't know if seeing our summary and hearing our process in these snippets makes it become any more real for you! But keep asking questions... and I'd love to see examples of how other organisations are doing this type of work, if they are willing to share!
And to Vincent's points about attribution - that's so true. It is very hard to find a way to say exactly what piece of 'change' your organisation played a part in. So in our outcomes we learned to try to stick to things we know we have a strong part in affecting, so that we can be able to claim our role in achieving it or not. And in addition to our bi-annual survey of members asking what value they find in the network support/facilitation/leadership we offier, we also are continually collecting anecdotes and quotes from people that tell us they benefit from our work, and that our work played a role in a change in their communities. Everyone knows to be on the lookout for these types of testimonials and we have tried to develop a reflex in staff to know when to ask 'what specific difference did IFEX make in that outcome' so that we can keep track of that and report it when appropriate. Staff are always circulating feedback they get from our 'target audiences' so that we have a record of it.
And since we also have a role in providing some funding support to some of our members, we use that opportunity to try to get them using some of the same methods and inquiring about their own work in the same way.
Maureen
For the past few years, WITNESS has been using a template called a Performance Evaluation Dashboard which features a series of metrics to measure our progress against the goals we set at the beginning of the year. The Dashboard comes out every six months and uses an innovative system of measuring human rights advocacy impact by assigning numerical values to inputs, outputs and outcomes. It's not a perfect system, but it has really helped us to establish our goals more clearly and measure our impact in a consistent way across programs. Our funders in particular have been very happy with the Dashboard - and in fact we first developed it because one of our funders complained that we were sending him too much information! He wanted a very top line, at-a-glance look at our work without all the detail that we were accustomed to providing. We're now in the process of revamping our Dashboard to make better use of visuals and even less text, but our current version is a good place to start for ideas:
http://www.witness.org/about-us/annual-reports
For new ideas on how to visually convey these types of things, we were intrigued by this recent article in the Chronicle of Philanthropy:
http://philanthropy.com/article/How-Nonprofits-Make-Data-Fun/130225/?sid=pt&utm_source=pt&utm_medium=en
Maureen, it sounds like your "heavenly doc" is intended more for internal goal-setting and tracking between Development and Program? If so, I would really love to see that since we're trying to create a system to better track proposal deliverables right now. If it's for external purposes then I'd love to see it as well!
Thanks for sharing how WITNESS collects and stores information on its progress towards goals! This is great info!
Here is Maureen's "humble" 2011 Programme Summary.
Thanks for being so open to share all of this great information, everyone!
Thanks so much for sharing your heavenly doc, Maureen. Unfortunately I wasn't able to access it through the link.
Kristin is it possible to try linking it again or emailing it to me directly at sara@witness.org?
Thank you both!
Hi Sara - Thanks for sharing the link to WITNESS's reporting dashboard (neat idea!), and to the Philanthropy article on using infographics to make reporting fun... that is definitely the direction we need to head in at IFEX.
And I think it speaks to the diversity of audiences we have for our storytelling... some will always need the longer more detailed narrative reports and log-frame type documents, and others ONLY want the pictures and the visually interesting results... so far we have stuck to trying to cover all bases in one 'report' by doing the long (trying to be shorter) reports with some visuals embedded in them, because this seems to meet all the requirements... and because it fits within our resource constraints.
But the visuals are so much more impactful, and can be used as a marketing and communication tool - so I think organisations now have to be looking to find ways to have that capacity in-house. Are others feeling this push? And how are you responding to it?
Maureen
Hi Maureen - we feel the same tension between presenting quick snapshots with lots of visuals/graphics vs. more text-driven documents. In general we have found that individual donors (especially those from the tech or business worlds) tend to prefer the former while foundation donors tend to prefer (or at least expect) the latter. That said, we try to keep an eye on our proposals to make sure they're story-driven and accompanied by illustrative graphics and images to bring the work to life. At WITNESS we also have the added dimension of video since that's what we do. So when is it appropriate to do a video report and when is a more formal written document in order.
By the way, I forgot to mention that our Performance Evaluation Dashboard is protected under Creative Commons - so anyone who wishes to use or adapt it is more than welcome!
One issue that came up as part of the debates organised by the ICHRP on assessing the impact oh human rights work is whether it is fundamentally distinctive to assessment of other work. The debates were lively and brought about a plurality of viewpoints.
At the APT, we have often received requested from donors on showing impact which clearly evidenced a gap in the understanding of what can reasonably be expected from an organisation like ours. We often got a feeling that donors were asking for results which they could get from related sectors in which quick and quantifiable outputs are easier to deliver (such as relief or humanitarian aid) . A general tendency we see from the donors is an ever-increasing focus on quick and measurable results whereas human rights work often brings about deep societal change which may take years (although potentially very rewarding in the long run), and be particularly challenging to measure with traditional methods (log frames, quantifiable indicators, etc). The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights has developped a range of useful indicators on HR work. This constitues a welcome development to develop of a culture of impact assessment for human rights work. So far, we also see a major challenge in translating and adapting the evaluation approaches and paradigms to the human rights sector. The OHCHR initiative contributes in bridging this gap, but more initiatives are required to create sustainable ownership of impact evaluation within the human rights movement
Thank you, Vincent, for sharing all of the great resources with us! I am eager to take a closer look at them.
I wanted to connect Amanda Shaw's comment in another thread to this conversation on measuring impact. In addition to all of its other great resources, AWID has developed the Building Feminist Movements and Organizations Wiki on monitoring and evaluation. The wiki is designed to help share ways of measuring the impact of complex and long-term rights work. I think this will be a great resource for human rights practitioners and fundraisers to identify some effective strategies for monitoring and evaluating their work. It's also a great way to SHARE new resources with others, as it is a wiki! :)
As a fundraising consultant who has worked with dozens of human rights groups over the years, I see one impediment to sustainable fundraising time and again. There's a saying: "Fundraising is communications with a bottom line." Many of the groups I have consulted with, even when their work is important and effective, do a poor job communicating the value and import of their work. Part of this is the challenge of showing impact, as many of the other dialogue participants have highlighted. But at least three other things come into play. First, in proposals and other written materials, I often see an inability or resistance to communicating the intentions of the work being proposed. It is often unclear what the group is trying to change or why. Lots of proposals bog down in methodological activities and details -- not that those are unimportant. But if the rationale, need and intentions are missing, it's hard to know what the proposal is even about.
Second,a perenniel weakness of human rights fundraising writing is the absence of human beings in the discussion. It's understandable that much of human rights work is structural and about changing systems. But at the end of the day, it's about making lives fairer for human beings, and that element is often missing from the story.
Third, there is often a lack of awareness of audience, or put another way, a failure to distinguish among various funding audiences. The story you need to tell about your work, if you're speaking to a foundation program officer, is often quite different from what you would tell to a wealthy individual philanthropist, or a government official, or a corporate sponsor (recognizing that corporate support for human rights is rare.) Each of these funding audiences has a different slant on what's important to emphasize, or what they need to know first.
Anne,
Thank you so much for bringing up this really great perspective on missed opportunities in effective story telling! For International Development Exchange (IDEX), while relationship building with our grantee partners has been a key successful part of our grantmaking approach, we have had to learn how to effectively engage with donors and funders in the best way in which the message gets to them. As Shalini Nataraj noted in another thread, making human rights work accessible is about offering various entry points from donors and potential donors in differing parts of their journies so that they can become committed advocates. This work takes resources, time and talent. And with the whole low overhead pressure, our smaller human rights organizations are forced to sacrifice this effort of engaging with a diversity of donors in a segmented and innovative manner! So for small organizations, likes ours, ensuring that staff, board, volunteers, grantee partners, allies, peer organizations all have the tools to be able to demonstrate and show (rather than tell) a great example of the impact of the work, a superb and complete story to the relevant audience is an sustainability measure!
Hi all - since this forum is intended to live on, I wanted to share a blog post that WITNESS has published with reactions to the Atlantic Philanthropies' report on trends in human rights and international justice funding (a little late but still very much relevant to all of our work!) We'd love to hear your perspectives if you want to respond here or mail me offline at sara@witness.org.
http://blog.witness.org/2012/03/thoughts-and-reactions-on-the-atlantic-p...
All the best,
Sara