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Recent Posts
- What evidence to use at each stage of a programme
- Prince Andrew’s patronage of charities didn’t help
- Was Prince Andrew any good as a charity patron? We’re finding out
- What evidence exists about women & remand in the UK, and what does it say?
- Shifting the power in philanthropy: Types of initiative
- Most grant-makers don’t seem to know if they are effective
- More UK foundations are reporting the diversity of their staff and trustees
- Measuring children’s safety in organisations: Evaluating the strengths and limitations of currently-used measures
- Why the Fdn Practice Rating doesn’t assess the same foundations each year, and why that’s fine
- How diverse are UK foundations’ staff and boards?
- Surprising churn in the top UK foundations
- Why the system for charities applying to foundations is so expensive, and what can be done about it
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Category Archives: Impact & evaluation
Assessing impact needs a reliable comparison group
This letter discusses an article in Stanford Social Innovation Review and was first published there. “Dressed to Thrive” [in Stanford Social Innovation Review, Winter, 2013] describes the work of Fitted For Work (FFW) in helping women into work. By way … Continue reading
It’s hard to make evidence-driven decisions if loads of data are missing, or garbage
First, missing data. Philanthropic donors, operational charities and others often have to deal with this. Hence unearthing the missing data is a theme in Giving Evidence’s work: Massive emergency aid is now flowing to the Philippines following Typhoon Haiyan. Operational … Continue reading
Posted in Impact & evaluation
Tagged data, evaluation, impact, monitoring, publication, publication bias
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Do matched giving schemes work?
This article was first published by Philanthropy Impact magazine. Many fundraisers tell us that donors give more if a match is available, that is, somebody else will also give if, and only if, they give. Fundraisers’ confidence is based largely … Continue reading
Most Charities Shouldn’t Evaluate Their Work: Part Two: Who should measure what?
This two-part series first appeared in Stanford Social Innovation Review. So what should happen if no one has properly evaluated an idea yet? If it’s important, an independent and suitably skilled researcher should evaluate it in enough detail and in … Continue reading
Posted in Effective giving, Impact & evaluation
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Most Charities Shouldn’t Evaluate Their Work: Part One Why not?
This two-part series first appeared in Stanford Social Innovation Review. Most “evaluations” of charities’ work are done by the charities themselves and are a waste of time. Perhaps this is a surprising view for an advocate who thinks that charitable … Continue reading
Posted in Effective giving, Impact & evaluation
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Good charities spend more on administration than less good charities spend
Ground-breaking analysis by Giving Evidence disproves the popular idea that charities should spend less on administration. This is the first analysis which shows (doesn’t just argue) that high-performing charities spend more on administration costs than weaker ones do. {Report here. The … Continue reading
Posted in Admin costs, Fundraising, Great charities, Impact & evaluation
34 Comments
What the First Social Impact Bond Won’t Tell Us
This article first published in the Stanford Social Innovation Review. Social impact bonds (SIBs) are a high-profile innovation in funding public services. The pilot SIB in Peterborough, UK, which aims to reduce recidivism, has been widely watched and—despite not yet … Continue reading
Posted in Impact & evaluation
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Free for you: Insight on what works
The government’s new What Works Centres should be awesome. And they should be a fantastic and free resource for charities and donors and others, which we can use to dramatically improve effectiveness. What are you on about? Wouldn’t it be … Continue reading
Posted in Effective giving, Impact & evaluation
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What is decent evidence?
‘Evidence is not the plural of anecdote’, wags often say. Sure, but what is it? Evidence comes in many forms, some distinctly better than others. Below is a hierarchy produced by NESTA. Is it any good? Level 1 is essentially having … Continue reading
Posted in Effective giving, Impact & evaluation
Tagged cochrane, evidence, hierarchy, systematic
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Don’t ask “what’s the impact of this charity?”
Longer article on this topic here—>
Posted in Effective giving, Impact & evaluation, Uncategorized
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