Guest Post by David Kroodsma

Anyone poking around online newspapers has noticed a proliferation of info-graphics and maps. If these graphics are done well, they can tell a story much more quickly than a series of paragraphs. Introducing data journalism – the newest form of online communication, and also a great way to get eyeballs on your website. For much of 2011, I worked as a data journalist for Climate Central, where I attempted to tell stories about climate change and energy through both articles and data-driven graphics.

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Guest post by Jacqueline Quintanilla Aker, Senior Vice President, Health & Multicultural Marketing at Edelman

Every public engagement campaign should be grounded in research data. Impact is built on the foundation of learning and understanding your audience, and on achieving real, measurable change. Data allows us to develop strategies that can change behaviors, influence opinions, motivate a community to action, and shift social norms. Data enables an organization to deliver the right message, at the right time, in the right place, and from the right messenger – a trusted source with the power to persuade action. This is done by listening to your audience and identifying the best way to reach them, whether it’s through an article in a newspaper, an event in their local community, or an online social community.

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Guest Post By Sarah Hunter, a Behavioral Scientist at the RAND Corporation, a nonprofit research organization.

One of my interests is building evaluation capacity within nonprofit community service organizations to increase impact. The model RAND uses for this work is called Getting To Outcomes (GTO), a free program management tool with demonstrated success in improving program performance.

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Guest Post by Bernadette Sangalang, Ph.D.

Many nonprofit organizations recognize the value of evaluation and using data for decision-making, but they often struggle with insufficient time, resources, and expertise to develop and implement an organizational practice of evaluation. Having worn different hats in my work with nonprofit organizations – as evaluation consultant, funder, and nonprofit evaluation director – I have encountered positive and negative reactions to evaluation. In my experience, when nonprofits hear the word evaluation, they may run away, their eyes may glaze over, or they may claim they don’t need it. To some, evaluation is a scary word. To others, it’s a foreign language. But in reality it’s neither.

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Data that Empowers the Community

Guest post by Tom Pollak, Director of National Center for Charitable Statistics at the Urban Institute

I expect the role of the nonprofit sector to increase in coming decades if we are to successfully "bridge the gulf between our scientific progress and our moral progress," as Martin Luther King put it. In an increasingly global world, where technology will leave more of us under- or unemployed, and where climate change, an aging population, fiscal challenges, and other forces will leave us increasingly vulnerable, we need a trustworthy and effective nonprofit sector that can help build the resilient, caring, and thriving communities in which all citizens can flourish.

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