Blog Archive

Posted February 5, 2018 by Al Mueller 0 comments

Guidestar announced in January 2018, “Around 50 percent of the nation’s nonprofits are operating with less than one month’s cash reserves.” That headline makes it sound like a half million charities could close if people stopped giving for a month. Oliver Wyman and SeaChange Capital Partners analyzed Guidestar’s archived 990s from 2010-2014 to make this claim. Suzanne Coffman, Guidestar’s editorial director, summarized the data from this study of nonprofit financials in a simple article (admittedly designed to market a Nonprofit Quarterly webiner): “Half of U.S. Nonprofits on Financial Precipice, New Report Finds.” That’s scary news. The good news is that Guidestar’s information is both old and incorrect.

Tags: Guidestar, Nonprofit Finance, Nonprofit Performance

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Posted January 15, 2018 by Al Mueller 2 comments

Common question asked by nonprofit Boards: “How much should a nonprofit CEO get paid?” Common questions asked by donors: “Is that charity CEO over-compensated?” We at Excellence in Giving have to answer this question all the time for major donors our firm advises. And we have the data to do it.

Since we collected 75,000 fields of detailed organizational data over the last 2 years, we can now release an excerpt of our nonprofit CEO Compensation findings in 2018. Our study includes data from 372 nonprofits whose CEO compensation was analyzed according to staff size, annual expenses, CEO tenure, and geographic location. Here are the results…

Tags: Charity Evaluation, Nonprofit Analytics, Nonprofit CEO Compensation

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Posted September 3, 2015 by Al Mueller 0 comments

Are you wasting your time attending leadership development conferences?

130 years ago, German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus devised several experiments to measure how fast we forget. He concluded the majority of information we hear is forgotten within one hour, and 75% disappears in a week. To be sure, his simplified conclusion doesn’t take into account varied teaching methods, experiential learning strategies, or learning styles. Not all educational strategies are created equal. But it raises the question: Do leadership conferences leave a lasting impact after a couple days of talks?

Tags: Charity Evaluation, Impact, Nonprofit Evaluation, Outcomes Measurement

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Posted July 9, 2014 by Al Mueller 9 comments

“The kingdom path links success to obedience rather than outcomes.” That is the mantra from ECFA’s new book The Choice: The Christ-Centered Pursuit of Kingdom Outcomes. Hoag, Rodin & Willmer have been publishing articles in multiple outlets (like OUTCOMES magazine) to push this message to faith-based nonprofits. Since Excellence in Giving clients fund many faith-based nonprofits, we care about the accuracy and consequences of this message. Unfortunately, the baby is being thrown out the door with the bath water.

Tags: Effective Philanthropy, Impact, Nonprofit Performance, Performance Standard

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Posted January 21, 2014 by Chasity Cooper (Introduced by Paul Penley) 0 comments

#GivingTuesday analysis represents our first-ever guest blog. Chasity Cooper, from the MPA@UNC program at UNC School of Government, explores how 2013 #GivingTuesday results compare to 2012. I, Paul Penley, have yet to find any analysis of how increased donations on #GivingTuesday may produce decreased giving at year-end (and therefore no net gain in giving), but Chasity highlights valuable year-over-year trend lines. Check out below how the new “Giving Day” has rapidly grown in just one year. Thanks for this contribution Chasity…

Tags: Annual Reports, Generosity, Online Giving Contests

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Posted October 2, 2013 by Al Mueller 0 comments

Reinventing Philanthropy gets under your skin like a dentist’s advice to floss. You know in your head you should do it but don’t always feel like taking the time. Eric Friedman simply wants giving to be effective. What does that mean? He wants people to engage in thinking critically about the world’s greatest needs and our best solutions. He is frustrated. “Giving is too often about making the donor feel better and too infrequently about making those in need better” (12). So Friedman wants to reinvent philanthropy and make the new normal—utilitarian, issue-agnostic donors who support charities offering “the greatest help to the greatest number of people” (182). How does Friedman motivate donors to practice high-impact philanthropy?

Tags: Charitable Giving, Effective Philanthropy, Problem-Solving Philanthropy, Strategic Giving

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Posted July 22, 2013 by Al Mueller 0 comments

Where can donors get answers to their questions about charity efficiency and effectiveness? Nonprofit Analytics. Nonprofit Analytics now publishes up-to-date answers to the most common questions donors ask.

No other online platform tackles all these important questions. Only Nonprofit Analytics presents up-to-date nonprofit performance in one simple page. Nonprofit Analytics still offers 160 data points about leadership, finances, strategy and impact via downloadable 2-page nonprofit Analytical Overviews for paid subscribers. However, donors who want the highlights without all the numbers and trend lines can now get what they want for free. Nonprofit Analytics’s 2013 release of nonprofit effectiveness and efficiency data finally makes it possible to give wisely without investing much time.

Tags: Charitable Giving, Charity Evaluation, Charity Evaluations, Charity navigator, Guidestar, Non profit organizations, Strategic Giving

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Posted May 17, 2013 by Al Mueller 13 comments

International adoptions have dropped 60% since 2004. UN policies, government regulations and high costs are to blame. Millions of orphans suffer through life without a healthy family context. All these facts that Both Ends Burning, STUCK, and now Foster Friess are sharing are true. But you won’t find my name on the STUCK petition at change.org or my footprints in DC during the May 17 “step forward for orphans march.” I’ve learned too much to believe international adoption is a scalable solution for a world full of orphans.

Tags: Effective Philanthropy, International adoption, Problem-Solving Philanthropy, Strategic Giving

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Posted January 10, 2013 by Al Mueller 0 comments

Do you still enjoy your giving? In a world of professional philanthropy conferences, philanthropy journals and “giving gone wrong” headlines, giving can become one more skill to master or task to manage. My daily research into the performance and impact of grantees has the real potential to strip away the joy of generosity. It can become all head and no heart. Site visits can feel like audits. Grant impact reports can relieve the worry of wasting gifts rather than excite you about the difference the gift has made.

To be honest, you may wonder if it really matters.

Tags: Effective Philanthropy, Generosity, Joy of Giving, Strategic Giving

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Posted October 31, 2012 by Al Mueller 0 comments

Impact measurement has been dubbed the Holy Grail of all social enterprise. If non-profit and for-profit social enterprises could capture the lasting difference made from all the meetings, projects, programs, fundraisers, volunteers, budgets and staff, we would have arrived. We would know if all the donations, charity walks, social media campaigns, grant proposals and collaborative partnerships are worth it. Not surprisingly, no one has found a short cut to universal impact measurement. There is no simple formula that determines whether a charity is ‘high impact,’ I believe there are a few specific steps to take when assessing any non-profit’s impact.

Tags: Charity Evaluation, Charity Evaluations, Impact

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