Your organization or school has spent a significant amount of time, money and resources on collecting, tracking and analyzing important data about your programs and services. In working with our clients, we often find that many are not doing a good job of sharing this information beyond the traditional annual report. Here are some simple, yet effective ways to use your program evaluation data:
- Annual Report – At a minimum, you should annually produce a report that summarizes your organization’s impact in the community. However, we strongly encourage you to rethink your traditional annual report. Check out these olds posts (here and here) for some inspiration!
- Email – The signature line in your staff’s email is a great communication tool. Think of all of the collective emails that your staff send out daily, weekly and yearly and the potential reach of those emails. Use the signature line to highlight key successes, which can be updated monthly. For example, if you operate a tutoring program this quick line could be added to all staff signature: “85% of participating students in ABC program increased their reading level by 3 months during our five week summer program.”
- Social Media – Similar to creating “data sound bites” in your email signature, similar data posts can be created for your organization’s social media pages on Facebook and Twitter. Just make sure to limit your jargon and make the post user-friendly.
- Collateral Materials – Too often, organization’s marketing materials focus on the services and programs (what you do) and not the result of those services and programs (aka, your outcomes!). Refresh your marketing materials to include both of these critical items – the programs offered and the impact that these programs have in the community!
- Grants and Fundraising – One of the best ways to increase an organization’s revenue and funding is to share the results with your funders via grant proposals, grant reports and fundraising events. The evaluation data can be useful to both highlight the great work you are doing (aka – give us more money to expand our impact) as well as justify the need for more money (aka – we need better staffing, curriculum, etc. to accomplish our goals).
Transform Consulting Group is passionate about helping organizations get clear on their mission and goals as well as have the right tools and systems in place to monitor the accomplishment of your goals. Do you need help evaluating your programs or communicating your impact? Contact us today for a free consultation!
