Whether you work in a philanthropy or foundation, a nonprofit, or a government agency, you are being increasingly asked to produce evidence of the results of your work, of the efforts of your programs or your organization…and of the fiscal and other resources entrusted to you. How to identify your target results, manage toward their achievement, report your accomplishments in a way important audiences can understand, and learn from your experiences, are the subjects we will cover in these pages, and are the purpose of this website.
Maybe the first question we should answer is Why a “Toolbox,” and what does that mean? Our approach is that there are many tools available to nonprofits, philanthropies, and government to help them improve performance and achieve meaningful, sustainable results. Unfortunately, two things often hamper the adoption and use of these tools. The first is simply a lack of knowledge. The second is the often competing claims made on behalf of this model or that framework regarding its applicability to your work and the comprehensiveness of its power.
Our approach, the “Toolbox” approach, is that while all of these models do some things well, and several do many things well, no one model or framework does it all, no one model suffices for all the needs of your program or organization when it comes to applying and benefiting from the power of outcomes to transform the way you work.
If the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem is a nail.
-Abraham Maslow
Our approach is that just as you might fill a toolbox with implements coming from different manufacturers, and use what you need in a given situation no matter whether its label matched the other tools you were using, so too in our work on behalf of those we serve, we ought to use the tool that best meets our needs, irrespective of its author or origin.
To accomplish this, we have done the work for you, surveying the best of the tools available, whether they come from the world of nonprofits, from government, or from the realm of multinational corporations, and bringing them together in one place, to be your best source for guidance and information on outcomes.
Our book, The Nonprofit Outcomes Toolbox, the companion piece to this website, is designed to help the those new to outcomes, those wanting to improve their existing skills, or those wanting to move to the more advanced stages of results-based analysis, program design and management. These pages will reflect much of what is in that volume.
And so we welcome you to join us. Your journey to outcomes will bean exciting one, and we are pleased to make it with you.
