Data Driven Decision-Making

Why Focus on Improving Data Collection & Evaluation?

Effectively and efficiently collecting, analyzing, and visualizing transformative data is vital. Funders, donors, and community members are increasingly looking for "impact" -defined by the quality of data collection as well as the sophistication of analysis and reporting. The creation of impact is the bedrock for obtaining funding, especially in an increasingly competitive funding environment. 

Additionally, high-impact data drives decision-making by: 

• Providing insights on when, how, and where to use resources to maximize positive influence
• Informing real-time strategic and operational adjustments
• Determining whether current activities directly result in intended and desired outcomes

Our experts at Innovative Funding Partners (IFP) offer a range of data & evaluation services designed to support organizations at all stages as they move to increasingly sophisticated efforts to inform decision-making. These include: 

Data-Driven Decision-Making Readiness Assessment 
Every organization can improve impact by evaluating its data-driven decision-making, informing strategic, operational, and sustainability decisions. The first step in creating and improving an organization's strategy for data collection and evaluation is to identify the strengths of the current approach and opportunities for improvement. IFP's individualized report provides: 

• A concise and thorough assessment of current state of data collection and evaluation with the goal of quality improvement.
• Insights to align evaluation strategy with evidence-based best practices, improving ability to collect and analyze data for full impact.

Data Collection Technical Assistance 
Recommended for organizations that do not have a comprehensive and strategic data collection system already in place-whether in the beginning stages of thinking about data collection or have collected data for years but have not thoroughly considered best practices around data collection. IFP's targeted technical assistance supports these organizations by: 

• Thoroughly reviewing current data collection tools and providing feedback on the inclusion/exclusion of individual tools, demographic data collection, qualitative questions (e.g., interviews, focus groups), and data collection and storage procedures.
• Increasing understanding of best practices to ensure data collection is culturally sensitive, ethically sound, and aligned with community preferences.
• Considering how tools/systems can be tailored for more effective and efficient evaluation.

Evaluation, Visualization, & Reporting Services 
Recommended for organizations interested in elevating their data evaluation and reporting and refining their ability to make data-driven decisions. Based on data an organization is already collecting, IFP can provide detailed data analysis and visualization to meet a variety of needs (reports, post-award compliance, donor engagement, etc.). IFP offers several levels of complexity of evaluation, visualization, and reporting, based on how deep an organization would like to dig into its data.