Philanthropy : Overview

Mission Measurement helps foundation clients to measure and aggregate grantmaking outcomes and design strategies to effectively purchase the impact they want.

Measuring grantee impact isn’t anything new. Where Mission Measurement adds value is by helping foundations  measure what really matters—the “high value” outcomes that are needed to achieve broader social impact.

We offer a profoundly different kind of solution – rather than just help foundations collect and report perfunctory throughput data from grantees, we leverage research to help you capture and communicate the outcomes that really matter. You may be measuring the reach of 20 different preventative health models, but what you really want to prove is that your portfolio is improving health outcomes for uninsured people.

At Mission Measurement, we see measurement not as a compliance exercise, or an academic exercise, but a value-creation exercise. Instead of funding many different programs and hoping they add up, our strategies allow foundations to purchase the outcomes they need—to construct a sort of social impact supply chain.

Mission Measurement offers two service lines to our foundation clients:

Measurement and Evaluation

Our team specializes in measuring the seemingly intangible—the high-value social impact outcomes that have eluded the social sector for so long. How do we measure whether a student is college-ready? Or which indicators suggest financial stability? Or what policy change success looks like? Our measurement tools are designed to answer those kinds of questions, providing you with reliable data to make strategic grantmaking decisions and communicate with grantees and the general public.

Our measurement work is rigorous, but practical. We start by helping to define the set of specific changes you want your portfolio to influence—then build out an Impact Framework to capture the interim outcomes that will create those changes. The result is a grantmaking strategy for dramatically deepening social impact in ways that are valuable and measurable.

Value Creation

Your portfolio should be more than a collection of grants—it should be a formula for creating specific, lasting social impact.  A smart grantmaking portfolio should look like a sort of social impact supply chain. When Apple wants to build a new computer, they don’t start by asking their suppliers for parts—they design the computer they want and then find the suppliers who can build the necessary parts.

Buying social impact works in much the same way. Foundations start from the social change they want to influence, identify the interim outcomes needed to achieve that change and then find the grantees who can deliver those outcomes. Our team works with foundation clients to create the best formula for impact, based on a set of complementary, measurable outcomes. That formula—or Impact Framework—becomes the basis of an evolved strategy, in which the foundation can effectively purchase the outcomes it needs from grantees in order to create the impact it envisions.