saunji fyffe: well, good morning and i'm saunjifyffe and i wasn't here yesterday, i flew in yesterday afternoon but i was asked byelizabeth boris who is the director of the center on nonprofits and philanthropy at theurban institute, to speak about a project that i work on called perform well and toprovide a demonstration of the project or the website. i don't have a live demonstrationbut i was able to download a few screen shots so we can walk through the lens of a practitionerso you can get a sense of how it works. so my presentation will probably be a littledifferent from what you've been hearing while you've been at this conference.saunji fyffe: so today, i'm gonna speak about the current landscape that sort of led tothe idea of perform well, give you an overview
and some background. we'll do a demo and theni'll speak about the next steps. so, i think we can all agree that the current status quoin the nonprofit sector is being challenged. funders and nonprofits want better information.we all know that funders are not doling out funds the way that they used to. they're requiringnonprofits to report on how funds are being used and how their funds are being used tohave an impact. nonprofits that are wanting to respond to these reporting requests, manyare strapped at biz [ph?] and are now having to deal with the additional burdens of reportingto funders in many different ways. we all know that sometimes there is a lack of consistencywhich then becomes a problem for the nonprofits. i think we can all agree as well that sometimesfunders ask for information and when they
get it, they don't necessarily understandwhat they're getting or know how to use it. in addition to that, we know that resourcesthroughout the sect are pretty scarce. that said, competition is increasing. so thoseorganizations that have the capacity and the resources to accommodate this reporting, they'reat an advantage. so, our goal was to help these nonprofits build capacity when it comesto performance management. there are a lot of current initiatives out there or emerginginitiatives. i see the leap of reason book throughout the room and i think we can allagree that it hasn't been said but a lot of these initiatives are working together tohelp build or cultivate a culture of performance management and evaluation in the nonprofitsector and perform well is one of these initiative.
but i'll explain how we feel that our websitemight be a little unique. it complements these initiatives certainly because we rely on theseresources but ours is a bit more hands on and hopefully user-friendly.saunji fyffe: so perform well, it's a joint initiative, it's a partnership that is managedby-- it's a project that is managed by a partnership of the urban institute, child trends and socialsolutions. we have an eleven member advisory board that's made up of individuals from thenonprofit sector, experts in performance management as well as folk from the human services field.this has been a concept that's been in the making for about the last four years. we'vehad several funders who really believe in what we're doing, this is just a partial listbut i wanted to give you a sense of you know,
who's supporting this initiative. so whatis it? it's a website. it offers a one-stop online resource for organizations that arelooking to build their capacity and improve their ability to manage their performance.it contains a website that offers a menu of outcome measures with corresponding indicatorsas well as access, immediate access to measurement tools that programs can begin using to startcollecting their data. we do our research and we supply the content based on research-informedor evidence-based information; however, we try to translate it into what we call practitionerfriendly language. as you know, we've all read research papers and they're great butwhen you're on the ground and you're trying to get work done, trying to decipher throughall of that information can be quite time
consuming. so we try to break it down so thatwhen they access our website, it's user-friendly, it makes sense and they can immediately beginusing or at least applying some of the strategies. so i added this model because this is themodel that basically i think helped us to narrow down our identity or our purpose forperform well. if you're focusing on the yellow area in this model, this is a model that itcontains activities for organizations wishing to become more performance driven. so focusingon the yellow area, we've realized that the gap really is in the collection and the useof data, that that's a barrier for many organizations in becoming performance driven. so we wantedto respond to that gap by developing a tool that makes it easier and saves time for organizationswishing to collect data and to use data. so
out of that model, we developed our definitionfor performance management. it's not that different from other definitions but it helpsto guide us as we go forward with this project. so we look at it as a dynamic process thatis designed to better understand program operations, monitor outcomes and ultimately help nonprofitsbecome high-performing organizations. but what's important is that we know that it involvesthe regular ongoing performance measurement reporting analysis and program modification.now we realize that this is easier said than done, we certainly do, but we're trying toat least provide a tool or mechanism for organizations that have little to no capacity so that theycan, you know, continue and use this data frequently to make improvements so that theycan achieve their desired results. so perform
well, based on the current climate, we feelorganizations are either asking or they should be asking questions such as, "are we makinga difference? how is our approach helping to change the behaviors and attitudes of ourclients? how can we or are we able to demonstrate and articulate our goals or show our progresstoward our goals? and if we're collecting data, are we collecting useful and meaningfuldata?" so perform well, it's a website that contains two parts. one part is a menu ofoutcome measures. the other part is called improved service delivery. and yes, they dotalk to each other but _______ we know that that's important. but they do serve slightlydifferent purposes. you know, in looking at outcome measures for your programs, an organization,for example, if i'm a parenting education
program and i'm just starting this process,i might want to enter the portal and search for outcomes that might be appropriate formy organization. but i can also search through the improved service delivery portal and ican search for information or content that's specific to my type of program. so let's talka little bit about.. i'm gonna walk through the process first through the identifyingoutcomes and then i'll talk about the improved service delivery.saunji fyffe: okay, so we're about to launch new content on parenting education programsnext week, so that's why i'm using that in my example. so if i'm a parenting educationprogram and again, i don't have the capacity but i know i need to start doing this typeof work, then perform well will suggest that
i enter the portal by trying to identify outcomesfor my particular program. so as a parenting education program, i know that i strive toachieve parent outcomes as well as child outcomes. but our program is designed really to buildthe relationship or strengthen the relationship between parent and child. so i would thengo to perform well and i would click on the relationship tab which would take me to apage that would show outcome measures under relationship, such as parent-child relationship,the pair relationship or relationship with others. as a parenting program, i would thenclick on the tab for the parent-child relationship. it takes me to a page in perform well thatwill provide me with a description of the outcome measure as well as suggested indicatorsthat i can use to demonstrate whether or not
my program is having an impact on strengtheningthe parent-child relationship. so let's just say for this example, i choose the parent-childrelationship quality. it then takes me to a page for that indicator, provides me withagain a description of the indicator as well as suggested survey tools and instrumentsthat i can then use and start using right away. so if i select positive relationshipwith parents which is a scale that i can administer to parents in my program, it takes me to apage that again gives me a description of the tool, i can download a pdf of the tool.if you're using any type of case management software like eto [ph?] you can download itinto your software but the beauty of this is that organizations don't have to go andthen search for this tool on their own. we've
done the research, we've collected the permissionsfor these tools to use. our goal is to provide as many free quality tools as we can. we knowthat there are some tools that organizations will have to pay for. we do include some ofthose in perform well but the goal is to get as many free quality evidence-based toolsas we can. and again, we collect all the permissions upfront before we post it in perform well.so organizations can download a pdf, we provide information such as the administration method,how many questions, how long will it take. but if i download a tool, i get that pdf,i can either print it off and use it or keep it in my files or modify it for use for myprogram. we also offer information on interpreting the data. how do you score a tool? what doesthat mean if i get a high score or a low score?
if they're benchmarks available, we includethat in the portal as well. if not, we encourage organizations to begin benchmarking with theirown individuals or participants so that they can track improvements and progress over time.we offer analysis tips to help them understand what does it mean to get a positive or a negativeresult and we encourage organizations that are not receiving or getting the results thatthey want to then look at their service delivery. maybe there are tweaks or a change in strategiesthat they need to modify in order to help them get the results that they're lookingfor. so if i'm navigating through improved service delivery, as a parenting educationprogram, i will then be taken to a page that gives me some background on parenting educationprograms but then there will be questions
that as a parenting education program thati should be asking. and this content area is written specifically for each program,so although you might see some of the same questions under different program areas, thecontent itself is written specifically for that particular type of program. so improvingservice delivery as a parenting education program is probably gonna be a little differentfrom improving service delivery for a significant [ph?] engagement program, which is why wewrite that content specific for each program area. so if i want to click on one of thesequestions, it'll take me to, for example, to what extent is your program structuredto address risk factors for child abuse or to meet the needs of program participants.i will then receive content that speaks to
things that i can be considering in termsof modifying my strategies or things that i should be looking for. but what i reallylike about perform well, is that we don't just offer the advice, we also offer tools.if we're suggesting that you evaluate each parent training program to see whether ornot they're effective, we then supply you a sample evaluation tool that you can printand begin using immediately. i know some people might be saying organizations can find thesetools on their own but realistically, how many organizations or nonprofits have thetime to do this. i've worked on this content and it takes a while to find good reputablesources that organizations can use right away. saunji fyffe: so the benefits of perform well,our goal is to enhance the capacity of organizations
to demonstrate their progress toward theirgoals and objectives, as well as to help organizations better target the use of their resources andto make more informed strategic decisions. so what's next? we launched officially a littleover a year ago in march 2012. as of last week, we've had well over 100,000 visits toperform well, over 80,000 unique visitors have used perform well and over 30,000 downloadsof our tools and surveys. we have visitors from all 50 states, including dc and puertorico, as well as over a hundred countries. i think the top state users are california,new york, texas and the district of columbia and outside of the us, the top countries arethe uk, canada and india. and actually we found out recently that there's a similarinitiative that's now being started in the
uk, so they've actually reached out to usand we're looking to possibly partner with that initiative as well. so there's a needworldwide. since we've launched, we've also implemented a quarterly newsletter and weoffer free webinars to practitioners. webinars might be on the content that is being launchedor we might offer free webinars on performance management, just helping to get the informationout there and help to build the capacity throughout the sector. we're introducing ratings forour tools and measures so that if you know, we wanna know are you findings these toolsand measures useful. if not, then we also want that information as well. it's aboutgetting data and using data. and we're looking to develop additional content on childcare,gang prevention and financial literacy in
the immediate future. so in addition to buildingout additional content areas, we're fundraising, fundraising and doing more fundraising. we'rebuilding our communications in social media capacity. we're beginning our use abilitytesting starting hopefully next month and we're hoping to also build communities ofpractice, so that we can start linking organizations across the country with like programs, sothat they can start talking about best practices, results, sharing strategies. even comparingand seeing how their programs are functioning compared to other like programs. and we'rehosting our first performance management conference in december of this year and hopefully youwill hear more about that and we're looking for partnership opportunities. we're lookingfor partnership opportunities with organizations
that may have content that's a fit for performwell. if you've done research and you have a tool that you think would be great and you'dlike to see nonprofits use that tool, we'd love to have it. we're looking for fundingto support the development of additional content areas. so that's all i have for you today.i'm sorry i didn't have a live demo but please feel free to access our website. it's a freewebsite, that's the other thing and here's my information if you'd like to be in touch.
of somebody who has used it and the kind ofchanges they made as a result of __________? saunji fyffe: that's a good question. i haveto think, i'm usually-- q: can you talk into the microphone.saunji fyffe: oh, i'm sorry, oh this microphone, correct? can you hear me? i'm sorry aboutthat. that's a good question. i usually don't work on that side.
of the land, they were good. and then we hadother organizations that did not know how to use excel. so you talk about a range ofskill. so that said, we introduced them to perform well and we helped them to.. becauseit was a project, i was able to provide more hands on ta with a lot of these organizations,so we helped them to start downloading some of these surveys. it's funny because someof these organizations who, you know, may have been less experienced, they wanted todownload lots [ph?] of measures. so we coached them and were able to say you know, "sometimesless is more. let's introduce you to the process." well, that said, about three months afterthat ta, i received a powerpoint presentation from one of the organizations that they hadput together and they wanted me to review
it because they were taking the informationthat they had collected and they put it into a powerpoint to present to their board andthis was the first time that they were actually presenting this type of data to their boardand they were excited and i was excited because i felt like this was just a new beginningfor this organization. so that's the first example that comes to mind for me. i don'tknow if that answers your question. q: no, it's a good start but as you get thispool of partners, i think you're gonna get that it's gonna be even more exciting. notjust presentation organization but actual changes and having impact.saunji fyffe: oh, i agree and i think even for the research world, it's exciting becausethen we'll have more organizations with data.
so as we're doing research and we wanna seethe impact of certain types of programs, we will now have access to data as well. so it'sexciting from the research end, in my opinion as well.q:
really a menu, not a mandate. we want organizationsto be able to select from what we offer. and we also realize that we need to add to ourcontent areas so we don't post it thinking this is the complete and the end all. we dorealize that we have to add to content, we might have to change content. things do changeover time. so once we post content, it's as close to complete as we think it is and it'sready to be posted but it doesn't mean that we feel that this is the end all. if you'rerunning a parenting education program, these are the only outcome measures that you shouldbe looking at. that's not our approach. q: that makes sense, but it also prompts afollowup and i'm wondering if there's also.. is an educational opportunity for some nonprofitswhere you're [ph?] working hard delivering
programs
are measures that can tell you some thingsthat'll be useful for your organizations and the research is there that shows that theseare useful and good measures. but again, sometimes there are extenuating circumstances that requireorganizations to measure a certain way and we recognize that.q: so cecelia [ph?], with your [ph?] work [ph?] is the intent to get to where that chartsare flipped where you could say, if you're an x [ph?] kind of an organization, you shouldbe doing a certain type of.. or taking a certain approach to the.. is that your next step.cecelia: yes, this is.. oh, i'm sorry is this working? the purpose was to _______ organizerand social entrepreneurs to say, "okay, i want to assess social impact because i wantto revert this information to some stakeholder
so i can choose the class number three [ph?]because it's useful and it contains models that are aiming at this purpose." so thisis the main purpose. it could be useful for them. it could be.. they could be happy thisway because according to their needs, they can choose the more stable cluster and thenwithin this, the most stable model, so it's kind of _______ allow them to simplify theprocess of choosing models since there are so many.q: how do you.. you know, this performance management is kind of a relatively new conceptin nonprofits, so if the idea is you know what you're aiming at and through all youractions pragmatic [ph?] and otherwise, you know, that's kind of the center of the universethat those indicators, whatever they are.
so, you know, with your.. i think the temptationwith these sites is, "well, let's use the tool guide with our [ph?] program not forperformance management, so how do you kind of get people to think about before you startcollecting data, figure out what your program should be aiming at, do you know what i mean?so, it's kind of counterintuitive for a lot of nonprofits, "well, we've got a program,let's take a look and see how we're doing." saunji fyffe: i mean, we've talked about thatand it's one of those things on the website, we do have information on performance management.we do try to provide some of that tutorial information as well as through some of ourwebinars. we have webinars on performance management that we're hoping that a lot ofour users will access and participate in that
speaks to that but the best we can do is havethat information on our website and hope that they'll read it. and even with.. when we'rewriting the improved service delivery, we try to speak specifically to these are thesteps you may wanna take as a program which is why it's there, in hopes that they won'tjust jump to evaluation. no, you need to collect this data, then use this data to make improvements,changes to your strategies. what curriculum are you using, are you looking at that? wetry to be really specific in how we present our information so that they won't just jumpto the easy fix and instead will read and say, "you know, this is it, this is what we'remissing, this is what we're not doing." all we can do is try to make it as user-friendlyas we can and have that tutorial information
available, in hopes that programs won't bypass.q: how are you marketing all of your.. how are you making the nonprofit sector awareof it? saunji fyffe: well we're actually.. i thinki put on here, we're really starting to work on our communications and our social medianow and we're really trying to put some resources into marketing. i think for the last few yearsit's been content development. let's get content, let's get content, let's get something tomarket. marketing has been, i would way within the last six months, maybe a little bit longer,has now become a focus for us. now how do we get people turning to our site? so we havesome staff that's committed to marketing. we've brought in some folks that have thatbackground which i'm a former hr person, so
i strongly believe that you know, people havemarketing skills for a reason. we're really using social media and we're really workingthrough our webinars, 'cause now we're building a following with our webinars. so now we havepeople that we can actually reach out to and get information to these organizations.q: __________. have you considered working with people to allow them to use perform wellas a serious design tool, instead of just evaluating existing services? we had __________yesterday who was talking about how you really should start this whole process with rootcause analysis. what are the problems that you're trying to solve? and so you have yourstakeholder group at the table and you identify the problem, so now here you have this toolthat can take you right to that next step
of __________ what are the evidence-basedservices for that and what are the evidence-based measures for those services and what are theinstruments that we can use for that as a design tool for novices and even for experiencedpeople but you know, a lot of nonprofits start off with people who have _______ condition[ph?] versus people with a great deal of experience. i think this could be very powerful for helpingthem get the ground running instead of trial and error, trial and error, trial and error?saunji fyffe: we do have some of that information in our improved service delivery. for example,we speak to conducting a needs assessment in your area to see where are the gaps andwhat are the needs and organizations you might consider contacting to get a sense of whatthe needs are in your organization. for example,
i think i wrote the content for mentoring.so if you're looking at starting a mentoring program, "well why don't you talk to the schools,talk to social services and see what type of mentoring program might be needed in yourarea." those are some of the tips that we offer. in addition to that, we speak to thedifferent strategies that might be used for a particular type of program or a servicedelivery. i think, like with tutoring, you have online tutoring, peer to peer tutoring,there are different types of tutoring. so we speak to those different types of tutoring,but then we also include what the research says is a useful approach or what has beenshown to be a useful approach. that if you're looking to start a program, you have thatinformation, you don't have to look for it
on your own, it's there in perform well. sowe hope that that's helpful for programs that are starting up and then once they move onfrom there, what types of curriculum has been shown to be effective for particular typesof tutoring or mentoring or what have you. so we do try to include that information aswell without promoting any brands but just promoting a method or a strategy that hasbeen shown in the research to be successful.
might be competing against different groupsto compare closely related but different groups, like we had in this presentation, we had agroup that was promoting an abstinence only [ph?] program to prevent teen pregnancy andthen we've got an organization that provides facilitation of car loans. and to me, you'relooking at pretty [ph?] similar but different programs. i mean, to be [ph?] contractingwith the performance of _______. mostly done by nonprofit but very different from whatsome of these more
saunji fyffe: that's a good question.
compare programs or activities using thesemodels, __________ that's the question right? q: yes.cecelia: well i think.. i don't know exactly because yeah, that's a good question. i thinkthat it should be possible in some way because that's the reason why.. that's one of thereasons why an organization has to measure their impact because from _______ for examplehave to do a decision about which kind of project to invest in, so it has to be useful.these models have to be useful for comparison. i don't know exactly how because i think thatit depends on which models you use from my point of view because i did an overview ofmodels. i didn't go specifically into that. but i think that it depends on the model becausewhen you apply the same models to two projects,
then you have to _______ and you can understandhow to compare them but it depends on the feature of the model so i cannot answer, reallyanswer to this question. q: cecelia, let me ask one more. i did hearyour beginning that in the united states we have like notre dame is a private college,university. we have public and we have for profit. in the health field we have the samething. in your presentation, those models and clusters could be from any groups of serviceproviders that are entrepreneurial. does italy have a strong classification to determinewhat is outside the tax system such as our nonprofits, how do you classify the organizationof your services? cecelia: oh, that's a good question, thankyou.
q: or give us an example of what would bethe kind of entrepreneurial organization you would have in italy that you were describing?cecelia: okay, so which kind of organization can use these models, exactly how to distinguishthem, that's the question right? q: yep.cecelia: well _______ we have for profit organization and not for profit one and those are differentbut when we talk about social enterprises and that's the kind of organization i focused[ph?] on, it's quite hard to distinguish between them because according to the italian law[ph?], social enterprises are not a specific kind of enterprises, you know. it's.. mostof all, it's.. there are some requirements and all organization that meet these requirementscan be considered as social enterprises. so
no matter about what kind of legal format[ph?] they have, they could be nonprofit organization but also for profit one. if they meet theserequirements, they can be considered as social enterprises, so there is a kind of overlappingbetween for profit companies and not for profit
one and that's.. this makes things even morecomplicated but of course all of the model [ph?] i focused [ph?] on, they could be appliedto every kind of organization that wanted to assess their _______. also for profit one,so they are kind of transverse _______ from this point of view.q: thank you both.
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