Guest post by Phil Buchanan, president of The Center for Effective Philanthropy

This is the third in a series of six blog posts, which were originally featured on the CEP Blog.

Beating up on the label “nonprofit” has become an almost reflexive habit of those speaking and writing about the sector.

“Anyone who has thought about it for more than a nanosecond agrees that ‘nonprofit’ is about the worst possible summary we could give of ourselves and our work,” writes Harvard Business Review blogger Dan Pallotta, crediting Harvard Business School (HBS) Professor Allen Grossman for noting that the sector “suffers from the distinction of being the only sector whose name begins with a negative.” (I had Professor Grossman as a second-year MBA student at HBS and he is an outstanding professor, who I respect greatly and stay in touch with to this day. But I disagree with him when it comes to the way he views the sector and the comparisons he draws to business.)

In a much more constructive spirit than Pallotta’s, Peter Hero, former president of the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, has also argued that the term “nonprofit” is problematic because of what it conveys.

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Guest Post by Jake Porway, Drew Conway, and Craig Barowsky of Data Without Borders

Data drives almost every decision we make. Whether you are aware of it or not, data is being used to make better decisions about what movies you would like to watch, which route you should drive from home to work, and which new friends, jobs, and opportunities you should pursue.

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Guest post by Phil Buchanan is President of the Center for Effective Philanthropy

When it comes to leadership, data matters. I’d argue you can’t be effective as a leader without understanding how to tap into data to gauge the effectiveness of your work and then drive (and inspire) improvement.

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Guest Post by Chip Giller, CEO of Grist

Why did the environmentalist cross the road?

Plenty of possible punchlines spring to mind. But at Grist, we take this question seriously.

A green-media site with a monthly audience of 1 million and growing, Grist is building a broad movement for sustainability. That means reaching new users, educating and entertaining them, and inspiring them to take action—and using data to learn about our impact on the ground.

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Guest Post by The 2011 American Express NGen Fellows

For our emerging generation of nonprofit leaders, the ability to keep up with our counterparts in the private and public sectors as they use data for planning, research, communication, development, and evaluation will be crucial to our success. That’s why the 2011 American Express NGen Fellows have decided to focus our project on using data for leading the nonprofit sector.

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