Accountability and Impact: How Does Your Nonprofit Measure Up?

As donor dollars become more competitive and funding opportunities fewer and farther between, nonprofit organizations face increased pressure to demonstrate accountability and impact to their shareholders.

But how should an organization go about demonstrating accountability? And how do you measure impact when your modus operandus involves a more complex theory of change?

In a recent article from the Harvard Business School's Working Knowledge series, Dr. Alnoor Ebrahim discusses the two conversations that every nonprofit organization should be aware of when mapping out strategies for demonstrating success.

In the end, argues Ebrahim, what matters most is developing a set of metrics that reflect and support your mission, goals and objectives, rather than trying to conform to some universal, one-size-fits-all-NPOs standard for measuring social impact.

So, how does your organization measure up?