SIF National Assessment: Making a Difference for Organizations and Communities

By Damian Thorman, Director, Social Innovation Fund

In the spirit of the Social Innovation Fund’s overall goal of finding what works and making it work for more people, CNCS recently released results from the ongoing SIF National Assessment, an independent study conducted by ICF international based on the first five years of SIF Classic funding. The National Assessment has found that the SIF is not only supporting transformative changes through grantees’ projects, it also is having a powerful impact on how our grantees are structuring their organizations and carrying out their work.

Findings from a 2015 survey indicate that, compared to other nonprofit grantmaking organizations, SIF grantees are demonstrating significantly greater improvement in organizational capacity in the areas of adoption of evidence-based grantmaking strategies, ability and willingness to build the evidence base for the service models they support, ability to support and scale their service models, and use of collaborative approaches to address local community needs. As one grantee put it:

“SIF’s emphasis on rigorous evaluation is giving us an opportunity to demonstrate to our organization as a whole how evaluation can impact results – it’s allowing us to show what it means to fund for impact.”

Building SIF Subgrantee Capacity for Scale, Evidence, and Impact

The SIF identifies promising programs with preliminary evidence of effectiveness and provides grantees with tools, resources, skills, and knowledge to strengthen the programs further. Grantees, in turn, provide extensive capacity-building services to their subgrantees, enhancing the ways subgrantees conduct successful programs.

For example, the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation (EMCF) engaged The Bridgespan Group to develop organizational ‘road maps’ to guide subgrantees as they made plans for using the SIF grant and growing their programs. EMCF found the key time for developing a road map was after subgrantee selection but before EMCF had specified the investment amount. The road map included scenario plans for staffing, market analysis, and sustainability. The act of developing the plans helped subgrantees look at their intended accomplishments and identify whether more in-depth business planning was required.

Learn more about how the SIF is building subgrantee capacity.

Using Data to Improve SIF Programs

SIF grantees and subgrantees are effectively using data collected through SIF evaluation efforts to improve their programs:

The Bridge Project, a subgrantee of Mile High United Way, has used its results to improve professional development of educators in their literacy intervention program. This means that all of the young people in the program benefit from the same kind of teaching, and the curriculum is being delivered in a valid and reliable way.

For Corporation for Supportive Housing subgrantee, AIDS Connecticut, the evaluation surfaced systemic barriers for their clients. This included transportation to appointments, behavioral healthcare, absence of primary care, and limited housing case management. AIDS Connecticut met with community partners to address these issues and continues to work toward improved health status for its participants.

REDF subgrantee, Chrysalis, provides a pathway to self-sufficiency for homeless individuals. Their SIF evaluation showed that post-employment support was contributing to significantly better outcomes at the one-year mark. With this information, they moved from having all of their case managers calling participants at certain checkpoints to hiring a retention coordinator, whose primary focus is to track down the participants, gather their information, and steer them back into the program, if needed.

Learn more about how SIF grantees are using data to improve their programs and services.

Evidence of Organizational Change Among SIF Grantees

One of the criteria in selecting SIF grantees is the organization’s ability to provide technical assistance and support for subgrantees. SIF program staff provide targeted technical assistance for grantees and expect that they will in turn provide needed supports for their subgrantees. The National Assessment showed that SIF grantees are providing these supports to subgrantees, and it is making a difference. For example, New Profit developed a performance dashboard (see chart below) to track subgrantee performance on a variety of financial, administrative, and programmatic indicators. Red or yellow flags highlight potential needs for targeted technical assistance. As a result of the technical assistance, subgrantees implemented changes that are improving the overall health of the organizations.