A new study by Harder+Company and Engage R+D shows that two years after completing PropelNext, nonprofits in its first cohort (National 2015 Cohort) sustained, deepened and, in many cases, advanced their performance-management capacities. They have also grown, increasing the number of youth they serve by a median of 53 percent and their budgets by a median of 36 percent.
Policy Studies Associates, Inc. Co-Founder Elizabeth Reisner notes in the foreword how PropelNext differs from traditional capacity-building approaches by focusing first on mission and culture, demonstrating that “well-designed interventions to increase organization-wide capacity and effectiveness can, if delivered with sufficient intensity and skill, help promising nonprofits reach high levels of focus, scale, and success.”
As one grantee CEO observed, “You can’t go back to what you were before.”
The executive summary and the full report below highlight key findings about the challenges and nuances of building a learning organization.