Evaluation critique was a disservice

To the Editor:

Kennard T. Wing’s strong critique of foundations’ “obsession” with outcomes may have done a disservice to those who have worked hard over the years to legitimize serious efforts to measure results of nonprofits’ program endeavors (“Don’t Sacrifice Substance for Results,” My View, October 5).

My concern is also that Mr. Wing’s views might discourage funders from requiring some evidence of program performance and provide another excuse to nonprofits that are already weary of undertaking assessment of the effectiveness of services provided.

We don’t need any more excuses for not conducting program-effectiveness measures.

We are all familiar with the various and sundry limitations and pitfalls of this endeavor. We know it is not easy to assess effectiveness. But nothing worth doing is easy.

The No. 1 enemy of performance measurement — I am using these terms interchangeably — is excessive expectations of perfection. If we were to moderate our expectations as to what we can achieve in measuring results, we would not be disappointed.

For example, there is nothing wrong with the “so-called intermediate outcomes” as some indicator of a program’s progress, success, or failure at a given point in time.

In many cases, particularly those involving the human-services field, intermediate outcomes are all we can hope to get. Changes in human behavior may take a long time to register. And when changes do take place, it is difficult, if not impossible, to make the causal link between effort and result because of the impact so many other factors have on the client’s behavioral change.

In fact, I would tend to do away with the notion of “intermediate outcomes” and accept it as program outcome or result, granting that we will perhaps never know the ultimate effect of the program on the client.

Also, I would much rather use the term “assessment” than “measurement,” because the term measurement implies a degree of precision rarely available for the vast majority of programs of nonprofits.

Humans have engaged in measuring all sorts of things since the dawn of civilization. In commerce, life is unimaginable in the absence of performance measurement. In government endeavors there is an ever-increasing demand for the demonstration of results. Why should the nonprofit sector not be accountable for what it claims to accomplish?

In the final analysis, accountability is not only relevant to funders but extends to clients, boards, creditors, employees, and, indeed, to the society at large because the public in its wisdom has bestowed upon these organizations special privileges and benefits. We should never lose sight of that.

Russy D. Sumariwalla
Director
990 in 2000 Project
CompassPoint Nonprofit Services
San Francisco