Bridging research and practice to measure what matters

Session Submission Type: Roundtable Discussion

Abstract

When the academic field of program evaluation took root in the 1960s, there was little understanding of nonprofit organizations, and the nonprofit sector more broadly. But nonprofits and NGOs are now central in addressing all kinds of social problems in nations around the globe. Yet we have yet to see a robust conversation between scholars of nonprofits and program evaluation theorists and practitioners. Building such a bridge is critical for several reasons. A robust body of research on nonprofits can now better inform how evaluators work in these settings. In addition, a robust conversation can make nonprofit/NGO leaders more aware of the range of possible approaches they could take to evaluate their work, given the range of diverse methodological approaches developed within the program evaluation field. Finally, given concerns over how evaluation has often been used to center dominant perspectives to the detriment of marginalized communities, including more grassroots practitioner perspectives offers the possibility of disrupting existing power inequities.

This innovative, 90-minute roundtable will bring together a group of practitioners with scholars for a conversation on “measuring what matters.” It builds on a 2023 article on this topic and a recent event, hosted by the Global Fund for Community Foundations, in which nearly 200 practitioners and scholars joined an online conversation on the challenges, intersections and opportunities of measuring social impact. Through this conversation, we learned that there is a strong appetite and demand for a critical and collaborative conversation on impact measurement that bridges research with practice. We thus propose to advance this dialogue through a Research to Practice roundtable, featuring break out discussions, at the ISTR conference. After providing context for the session, 2-3 community philanthropy practitioners would briefly share how they are using innovative approaches to evaluation and some of the challenges they have faced along the way before dividing into breakout groups for collaborative discussions. In the breakout groups, scholars would be invited to reflect and contribute in two ways. First, the three co-authors of a recent article on this topic, simultaneously acting as breakout group facilitators, would attempt to identify links between the innovative evaluation approaches and their proposed research agenda. Second, participants in the roundtable would be invited to share theories and resources that might help to strengthen these innovations and propose new areas of research for future knowledge building efforts. During the last 15 to 20 minutes of the session, each co-author would summarize how their breakout group discussions helped bridge research and practice to measure what matters.

References

Benjamin, L. M., Ebrahim, A., & Gugerty, M. K. (2023). Nonprofit Organizations and the Evaluation of Social Impact: A Research Program to Advance Theory and Practice. Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, 52(1_suppl), 313S-352S. https://doi.org/10.1177/08997640221123590

Sub Unit

• Measuring Third Sector output and impact

Moderator

• Dana R R.H. Doan

Presenters

• Lehn Benjamin, Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy

• Alnoor Ebrahim, Tufts University - The Fletcher School

• Mary Kay Gugerty, University of Washington

• Jenny Hodgson, Global Fund for Community Foundations

• Yati Andriyani, Indonesia for Humanity / Indonesia Untuk Kemanusiaan

• Sita Supomo, Indonesia for Humanity / Indonesia Untuk Kemanusiaan