About Project Impact
ABOUT PROJECT IMPACT
Project Impact is our signature evaluation project designed to build the capacity of social sector leaders to design and implement meaningful, useful, and credible evaluations of their impact. It brings together teams of leaders from a variety of organizations to learn with and from each other over the course of 6-8 months. More than 400 organizations have participated in Project Impact since it began in 2014.
PURPOSE: TO DEVELOP THE CAPACITY TO PROVE AND IMPROVE IMPACT
Project Impact is designed not only to produce credible findings about impact but to build durable habits of evaluation within organizations. To accomplish this, participants will:
Join in a cooperative learning community of teams of 3-5 leaders from other organizations.
Engage in accessible, graduate-level training in a series of retreats and/or virtual workshops.
Receive individual coaching to support your development and meet your community’s unique needs.
Design and execute customized evaluation strategies to listen and learn from the people you serve.
Produce both quantitative and qualitative findings to demonstrate and improve impact.
Develop an ongoing strategy for evaluation and continuous improvement for your organization.
PRODUCTS
After completing Project Impact, each participating team will have:
An evaluation of a key area of their impact or a signature program's impact,
Tested evaluation instruments and protocols,
Findings to communicate to stakeholders and constituents,
Strategies for ongoing implementation,
Internal capacity to design and implement evaluation in the future, and
Evaluation partnerships with other local nonprofits.
To see examples of Project Impact reports, follow this link.
APPROACH
We believe that capacity is developed over time and through iteration. It requires both instruction and practice – more than 40 hours of training and coaching in some of the leading techniques of research accompanied by ongoing applications and practice. The best evaluation strategies are iterative, so we will design and test strategies, and then return to design further. We recognize the power of partnership, the enrichment of cross-pollination of ideas among like-minded organizations, the durable impact of a learning community, and the potential inspiration for a sector when exemplars are developed and elevated. These are the ingredients that make Project Impact effect lasting change.
WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING
"My entire thought process has changed."
"Project Impact allowed us to change the way we gather and analyze data today, but more importantly it gave us the tools to embark on a new glide path for richer insight in the years to come."
"I now have better tools and a better understanding of how to conduct an effective evaluation, and what's most important for a meaningful evaluation."
"Evaluation has become a friend, and hopefully an even more dear friend over time."
"I'm inspired to challenge myself to lead more for deeper, qualitative impact."
"I now see evaluation as something organic and ongoing to be incorporated into everything I do, and to enjoy and grow with."
"Evaluation will be more meaningful for me, less rote, more personal, more of a conversation."
"I saw evaluation before as an evil piece of paperwork. I look at evaluation now as a process to learn more about how to lead more effectively and motivate my staff more meaningfully."
"I now use evaluations as something that should live on well after the formal process has been completed."