Setting strategy, and sticking to it, can be an arduous climb. Done successfully, it's remarkably satisfying.

The key is having the right tools and knowing how to get the most out of them. In the same vein as rope, ladders, pitons, and gloves are indispensable climbers' tools, logic models are an important tool for both planning and evaluation in the non-profit and social service sectors.

Over the years we have seen examples of strong models being implemented in the strategy and evaluation efforts of different organizations. When they work, program outcomes are enhanced. But we have also seen our share of situations where logic models were treated as some kind of add-on activity to ‘regular’ program or project management. The logic models in these cases were mainly used to construct a graphical depiction of a team’s wishful thinking. In such cases the models were not been anything more than just a piece of presentation material with no impact on strategy.

Starting here, and in four future posts, we’ll lay out some tips that can augment the success of your logic modeling. Should you choose to use some of the excellent material available on the web that can guide you in using the building blocks of logic models (such as 10 Great Resources for Creating a Theory of Change from the Philanthropy411 Blog), our hope is that these tips will enhance the process.

Tip 1. In designing your logic model, remember that it’s a process and it should involve people.

We’ve seen too many examples of attractively designed models that, in the end, pursue goals that were neither necessary nor achievable. Often was the case that the designers focused on the diagram itself, and the different techniques and formulas to draw and construct logic models, instead of looking at the process around building the logic model.

To leverage the strengths that logic models can provide, it is crucial to predicate the design on the input of stakeholders with field-expertise who you involve in uncovering the root causes to problems you seek to solve. In a pluralistic fashion, the stakeholders should help you depict the landscape for the initiative (more on this in Tip 2) in such a way that a program team can target relevant, valid causes to a problem.

Also, include measurement and evaluation in the people-process right away. Involve key people who are inextricably linked to the success of the project you are modeling. For instance, if you have a project to build the capacity of teachers, invite teachers into the logic modeling process to discuss inputs and indicators.

Because designing a logic model is a process, never treat it as a “one and done.” Don’t be trapped by false pressures to develop the best, perfect model in one fell swoop. Because good logic models are derived from good processes, take the time to draw several, to think through different scenarios with your stakeholders, and assess the potential impacts of the different versions. (More on this in the forthcoming tips.)

Next tip: Depicting the landscape to strengthen your logic model

Guidestar has just released the results of a survey entitled "The Effect of the Economy on the Nonprofit Sector: A June 2010 Survey.”

Chuck McLean and Carol Brouwer wrote the report, the purposes of which were “to explore how charitable organizations fared during the first five months of 2010 and to try to gauge the effect of the downturn in the economy on the American nonprofit sector.”

Among the findings, some issues stand out among public charities and grantmaker subsectors.

On the Charity Side

Public charities were asked if total contributions to their organization increased, decreased, or stayed about the same between January 1, 2010, and May 31, 2010, compared to the same period a year earlier. Thirty percent experienced an increase in contributions, while 28 percent remained the same. Forty percent reported a net decrease. McLean and Brouwer then asked, “What factors caused total contributions to decrease?” Forty percent said private foundation grants were smaller and 22 percent said that private foundation grants were discontinued. This in the face of 63 percent of the respondents stating that demand for their organization’s services increased!

Takeaway: charitable organizations faced smaller or discontinued grants from foundations in a climate where demand for their services is up.

On the Grantmaking Side

Now let’s look for a moment at the grantmaking side of the house. Eleven hundred of the 6,508 respondents indicated their organization awards grants, with 580 identifying themselves as private foundation/grantmakers (thus, in the mix of grantmakers we probably have a mix of charitable re-granting organizations in addition to private foundations). Among these 1,100 organizations indicating they give grants, 68 percent indicated that their giving remained the same or increased in the five-month period of January-May 2010 compared to last year. Further, 65 percent indicated that they made no major changes in their grantmaking. A much smaller proportions reporting they either cut back on programs (12 percent) or cut back on payments (8 percent).

Takeaway: Grantmaking, from the perch of the grantmaker, has remained the same. Few grantmakers have cut back on programs or payments. This is interesting in light of the above finding that charities report significant declines in grant funding.

What are the implications of this? There are several, I’m sure. For the purposes of this post I’ll constrain my thoughts to issues of impact and evaluation.

What Could Be Going On?

If I’m leading a charity, I might think the following to myself. “If my grant funding is down, yet trends suggest that grant givers have not changed their overall behavior, who is getting funded, and why?”

Since I’m a strategy and impact guy, my mind tends to turn to thoughts of monitoring and evaluation. It may be the case that funders are paying more attention to charities that understand how to evaluate their day-to-day work in ways that demonstrate true impacts.

We see from the Guidestar report that demand for services is up among charities. This implies that organizations are going to have to be very savvy at bringing their services to scale while not diluting impact. This is challenging if an organization doesn’t know its place in the charity ecosystem, doesn’t have clear outcomes delineated that should result from their services, and lacks a systematic way to track successes and failures. This could explain some of the variance in why foundations and grantmakers don’t report a general dilution in their funding. Perhaps there’s been a shift in giving to organizations they trust to create promised, sought-after impacts.

It’s also possible that funding is shifting within intact programs from charities that are working on the ground to those that are further from the “shop floor” – such as charity service providers, think-tanks, and other capacity building organizations.

What else could be at play here?

The increased appropriations in the Swedish Environment bill, from 15 to 20 billion SEK, caused the Minister for the Environment Andreas Carlgren to exclaim “Never before has this much been done for the environment”. It is probably true in economic terms, but what does it really mean to “do something for environment”?

To pour money onto a problem does not mean you are solving it. To really solve a problem require insight, bravery and systematic work. Sometimes also funding is required. In political rhetoric money is seen as a miraculous cure that automatically solves all problems. Unfortunately it doesn’t work that way. Many solutions, perhaps even the most impactful ones, don’t have to cost a single penny! It is humanity’s ability to think that can create miracles.

To advance the national environmental goals and the EU environment policy put high demands on our capacity to practically realize political rhetoric into operations. For example, there is a call within the appropriation for more research. Certainly some of the challenges in solving environmental issues could be addressed by seeking new knowledge. But more research doesn’t solve all the problems either. In reality nothing happens if research results are not made available and applied.

I argue that the greatest potential for change (and some of the most economical) stems from a collective and strategic use of existing knowledge and convert that into bases for decisions, working tools, guidelines, routines and practical action. It has been known for long that great gain lies in reducing the so-called implementation deficit.

To carry out comprehensive changes in a way that demonstrates improvement on environmental issues is quite a challenge. It is hard due to the complexity created by many factors and actors that, in different ways, affect the course of event and outcomes. Moreover, there is no definite key to what is right, and because of that we need to continuously learn to increase our skill to apply what we learn to reach our goals.

To have real impact, it is necessary to identify the barriers that politicians, administrative officials, society organizations, commercial and industrial life and private citizens have and that are preventing successful change. We know that these parties lack knowledge that is available within research, but this knowledge need to be transformed into instruments that are functional in workrooms, meeting spaces and in the field to a much higher degree.

Knowing these barriers, decision makers, officials, interest groups, businesses and privates can establish strategies and implement activities that they believe will address these barriers accurately. For each specific issue there are a number of possible strategies. The question is, which mechanisms should the strategy depend on for impact? Should it be competence development, economic incentives or attempts to influence attitudes? The real issue is always — What activities are most likely to accomplish the targeted change? In order to arrive at functional strategies, accurate knowledge and precision tools are needed in the hands of those who take environment policy to action.

All parties involved in the realization of strategies and measures should implement them and collaboratively draw conclusions on how to refine and improve the strategy for the next step. In this way we learn over time what works and what does not work. It’s like working with innovation. You start with an idea, you make a hypothesis, test, learn and revise.

In sum, we can enhance the success of Sweden’s environmental programs by placing existing knowledge in the hands of those that can and should apply it. In our effort of doing this, we should systematically work as innovators to manage our inputs and activities as testbeds and modify our strategies accordingly as new knowledge and understanding gets reclaimed. In other words, practical realization of complex environmental objectives is not primarily a question of money. What is needed above all is the insight that solving environmental issues is an innovation process. By working as innovators we are able to continuously produce activities needed to have impact in workrooms, meeting spaces, in fieldwork and everywhere where we have influential factors on the environment. It is not until then we can pour money into the bucket where real impact is guaranteed. Then we have done something for the environment.

The other week I sat down to read through a newly released Swedish regional development strategy. It described how, with a couple of inputs here and a few activities there, enhanced regional growth and competitiveness will occur in Sweden. It contained a SWOT analysis and plans for a mid-term and final summative evaluation. Weighing in at 83 pages, appendices and all, it was ambitious, elaborate and contained everything needed to describe the strategy in total.

One of the appendices included a series of logic models depicting how the ultimate goals would be achieved. For sure, logic models are becoming ever more common in plans like these. Nonetheless, Even one can’t help but be somewhat impressed that logic modeling has become a widely adopted graphical concept in a relatively short time.

“You’ve Got Your Shit Together!”

That’s what I overheard a program evaluator say at an annual meeting of the American Evaluation Association, as he set his gaze on an impressive logic model my colleague had on display in a poster session. And that’s probably what he would say if he saw the logic models in the regional strategy I’ve been reading. My colleague’s diagram at the AEA conference, and the diagrams in the regional strategic plan undeniably leave an impression of control, mental activity and ambition.

Would that gentleman have been right? Do you have your “shit together” when you can depict something visually? Not necessarily. There is a big difference between visual productions and visual thinking, or what I would call design thinking.

What We Tend to See

Within society development[1] and philanthropy, when we see logic models and other graphical depictions of program theory, what we’re seeing are examples of what I’d call visual productions. As a field, I believe we are still waiting for a breakthrough to visual thinking. Visual productions are created as add-ons to the regular operations and processes of an organization, and usually done after most planning is complete (planning which, by the way, generally occurs through a traditional linear process).

Many times a project plan is developed even before an optimal design can be created. As such, the beneficial forces of visual and design thinking are not capitalized upon, increasing the risk that weaknesses, problems or inconsistencies from the traditional linear and textual thinking will enter into to project plans. In using visual productions in such a way (as to merely repurpose and illustrate a linearly-derived plan) one merely creates a window dressing that makes the plan more appear explicit and look convincing. This visual makes it look like you have your “shit together.”

I would like to see a new position developed within nonprofit agencies and philanthropy: That of impact designer.

Impact Designers Would Be Visual Thinkers

An impact designer in the nonprofit or philanthropic sector would utilize all the skills and talents of their own disciplinary background and employ the best practices in visual and design thinking to develop better, more robust, more impactful programs. They would grasp onto early works, like Rudolf Arnheim’s “Visual Thinking” (from 1969), which talks about how “the visual medium is so enormously superior because it offers structural equivalents to all characteristics of objects, events, relations.” Arnheim argues that polydimensional space is perfect for theoretical reasoning. I’ve heard someone say that visual production is the tip of the iceberg while the rest is visual thinking. What a great way to put it.

I believe that three things are needed to achieve a breakthrough in the nonprofit and philanthropic sectors before visual and design thinking can become prevalent.

1. Role shift

2. Reframing of economic realities

3. Better tools

If I were to write a “help wanted” ad for an impact designer, this is what it would say:

IDEO founder, David Kelly, said in an interview (http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/132/a-designer-takes-on-his-biggest-challenge-ever.html) that by applying the competence of design thinking, his group is able to come up with solutions that nobody has come up with before.

My hope is that we can do the same in our sector.

In November we teamed up with Kairos Learning to deliver two online hour-long courses, Building Accountability Into Your Team and Activating Your Program's Strategy and Evaluation.

Below you'll find the recording of the second virtual class,  Activating Your Program's Strategy and Evaluation, which presents an approachable perspective on setting strategy for achieving goals in education, nonprofit and community programs. 

Watch the video to learn:

• A simple yet effective technique for setting strategy and goals for your work
• How to effectively answer the question "Is my project reaching its goals?"
• How to confidently demonstrate to funding sources that your programs are effective

Let us hear your comments on this webinar -- what do you think of this topic? What else should we be covering?

[By the way, the chat window in the recording is not very readable. But this won't prevent you from enjoying the slides and the synchronized audio. If a higher resolution video becomes available, we'll post it.]

The theme of the TCI annual global conference Oct 2009 in Jyväskylä, Finland is “Learning Clusters”. We are joining business leaders, cluster coaches, funders and researchers who will investigate ways to enhance competitiveness on a global market.  We will partner with VINNOVA, Sweden, to present insights on what’s really essential in a cluster leadership. Our workshop with VINNOVA “How to significantly shorten time-to-impact and create tangible change”, is designed to demonstrate a hands-on approach for leaders on how to establish and maintain a Learning Cluster.

VINNOVA used OpenEye’s visualization technique to uncover how a program can be designed to have the best possible impact. In the process VINNOVA discovered that any program that has a social dimension, which indeed all programs or clusters have, needs to be continuously reinvented. Why?  Because, the area in which we are working will change continuously. It will change both as a result of what we do and as a result of changes in the world around us. So, in order to stay on course we must be prepared to review our inputs and actions over and over. From our experience the message is clear – The basis of a successful design for impact is a good learning strategy.

At the TCI conference, we will talk about how strategic planning and evaluation work significantly better when they go hand in hand. Consequently, we argue that it is necessary to evaluate from DAY 1 in order to learn, revise and reinvent the strategy focusing on the factors that will influence your progress starting tomorrow.

Evaluation is becoming an increasingly important theme in cluster development. More people are becoming aware of the importance of getting early confirmation of progress rather than waiting to see if the ultimate economic goals of cluster policies, such as wage growth and number of new employees, are met. As a cluster goes through several stages in its lifecycle, from embryonic to declining, the evaluation strategy not only has to look at different factors in the different stages but also adapt to what’s unique about a cluster. There are no generic models or standard solutions that can guarantee success. The perfect cluster model is unique for each cluster.

VINNOVA realized the need to pinpoint exactly what the needs and problems are in their programming and continuously keep focus on the evolving nature of them. Being successful in a context where there is a social dimension requires continuous innovation based on what really happens. Success is deliberate change and impact is the result of a careful design. Focus on activities very often will make you see what you want to see. If you focus on what you would like to accomplish you will soon see that activities are simply “tests” that will give you insight on what works and what doesn’t work on your road to success. This is the paradigm shift that we hope to bring to the attention of the conference delegates. It’s about leaving the traditional role as an administrator of a cluster or a program behind you in order to become an impact designer.

If you won't be able to come to the conference, follow us on Twitter: www.twitter.com/OpenEyeGroup