Conference on ‘Valuing impact’

Event  Conference on ‘Valuing impact: building an association of non-profit analysts’
When  19 May
Where  London, UK
Organizers  New Philanthropy Capital and the Bertelsmann Foundation

‘My name is Martin Brookes and I'm a non-profit analyst. Not many people can say that and not many would understand it.’ So said Martin Brookes, Chief Executive of New Philanthropy Capital (NPC). The aim of NPC and the Bertelsmann Foundation, joint organizers of a conference on ‘Valuing impact’ held in London on 19 May, was to change this situation. Around 200 delegates from 19 countries came together for the day to talk about how this might be done.

What was refreshing about this conference is that it had a very specific purpose: to discuss whether it is a good idea to form an association of non-profit analysts (ANA).

What difference would this make? The ultimate goal, not surprisingly, is ‘a better world’, but how to get there? The vision is of a world where resources go to the ideas that work and away from those that don’t. Matthew Bishop of The Economist, the keynote speaker, sees ‘openness to this sort of thinking’ as ‘a silver lining to this [financial] crisis’. His dream is that ‘everyone wanting to give money, not just the super-rich, will be able to go to a website and read an analysis of the top ten organizations working in their area of interest’. Being a non-profit and not measuring outcomes, and not knowing if they are helping or hurting, is ‘like driving without brakes’, said one participant. Organizations behaving like this ‘should be put out of business’.

All this is common enough in the business world, as Matthew Bishop reminded us, where there is lots of data about what goes wrong. But ‘writing about philanthropy is like writing about mud. We need information, analysis, robust debate about what works and what doesn't.’

The standard riposte to this is that business has a single clear metric that can be measured easily: profit – and we are never going to get to that point in the non-profit world. But, as Bishop and others pointed out, the business sector increasingly looks beyond the pure financial bottom line, talking about social capital and human capital and other things that cannot be directly monetized.

Another question about non-profit analysis is how the focus on improving non-profit performance fits with the aim of helping investors/funders, who will be the primary clients. The type of analysis will shape activity and practice at ground level. Who decides what is measured and how, asked Alex Jacobs of Keystone, stressing the need to avoid the risk of creating systems that suit only the donors and declaring himself ‘still anxious about the impact this could have on smaller organizations or on those trying to achieve very long-term changes in attitudes’.

A fascinating piece of information in this regard is that the group of right-wing US foundations that famously set out to move US thinking to the right did define a common and very specific measure of success: changing perceptions of the New York Times so that it was considered left rather than right or centre. And in this they succeeded.

In the conference’s closing plenary, participants voted via touchpads about the idea of an association of non-profit analysts. In addition to improving practice among non-profits, an association would help make non-profit analysis into a recognized, understood and respected profession with a proper career path, providing an answer to the question ‘what do charity analysts do when they grow up?’ It would shape practice and push it to a new level.

Around 80 per cent said that they would consider becoming a member, and as many as 87 per cent felt that the significant challenges to doing so were not impossible to overcome. Delegates were fairly evenly split on what is most needed for the development of a profession, with leadership and more opportunities to share frameworks and best practices seen as the most important. We await the next steps!

For more information
www.nonprofitanalysts.org

Update
NPC and the Bertelsmann Stiftung met in July to review feedback about an Association of Non-profit Analysts and to explore possible next steps. The conclusion was that there is a clear appetite for an association and that it would have tremendous potential to raise the profile of the discipline of non-profit analysis and shape it as a profession. In the coming months, NPC and Bertelsmann will be holding discussions with a range of organizations and individuals about supporting this initiative, the intention being to build a broad coalition to take it forward. They will also be looking at what establishing an association might entail, including its governance structures and funding requirements.