In the early 2000s, NeighborWorks America wanted to help its network organizations measure and understand the community-level results of their work. That's when staff members became aware of Success Measures, an evaluation initiative created by the former Development Leadership Network and McAuley Institute, two organizations active in the 1990s and early 2000s.
“We were interested in Success Measures’ new outcome measurement tools and innovative evaluation approaches designed for housing and community development efforts,” said Brooke Finn, senior vice president, Evaluation, Leadership & Peer Learning. “We thought the tools, expertise and participatory methods would fit into NeighborWorks’ vision to support our network organizations and understand community impact more deeply, and they did.”
Finn was part of the team that brought Success Measures into NeighborWorks to operate as a social enterprise in 2004. Under NeighborWorks, Success Measures has operated as an evaluation and learning strategy consulting group over the last twenty years. In addition to its work for NeighborWorks network organizations and programs, Success Measures has worked with over 1,100 nonprofit organizations and funders.
“Our work has always been grounded in a participant-first lens,” said Maggie Grieve, vice president of Success Measures, who has been with social enterprise since it was acquired. “We work with all affected parties in each evaluation stage. This gives us insightful and practical information that we can share back with organizations and participants. All of our work has been guided by this principle, because it contributes to more equitable outcomes.”
Community Impact Measurement project
After the acquisition, Success Measures began providing focused individualized evaluation support to NeighborWorks network organizations to help them learn and understand the outcomes and impacts they were making in their community. In 2013, this work evolved into the Community Impact Measurement (CIM) project, one of the largest multi-site efforts to assess the quality of life in community development practice.
Every three years, participating organizations conduct a resident survey and observations to understand the quality of life and physical conditions in the community. CIM provides a common evaluation framework, measurement tools, and a deep set of training and technical assistance support. Using a common set of evaluation tools allows NeighborWorks to see how its investments in local strategies make a difference across the country.
Many organizations have participated in CIM since its inception, including NewVue Communities, a community-based nonprofit dedicated to revitalizing the North of Main neighborhood in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. The organization has participated in four rounds of data collection and analysis, which means it can assess change in the community over 10 years.
The results were positive: resident satisfaction increased, stemming from improved physical conditions and deepened community connections. Overall, data shows that 10 years later, more residents would recommend living in the community: almost double the number of respondents would “definitely recommend” the community as a good place to live from 2013 to 2023, from 29% to 54%.
“By working together with the residents, we’ve learned a lot over the past 10 years,” said Marc Dohan, executive director of NewVue. “We can now see how NewVue’s programs and investments have helped bring new life to the neighborhood. Residents are proud to make this place their home and have played a big part in creating a stronger community. The buildings are more attractive, and people feel more connected. The job isn’t finished yet, but it feels good to know we’re on the right track.”
Organizations use the information from the CIM survey component to engage residents, better understand local issues and identify new strategies to address the community concerns that surface. Community partners and funders also benefit by understanding community strengths, needs and accomplishments – as well as areas where they plan continued focus.
“By engaging residents in the CIM data collection process, organizations better understand their communities and strengthen direct ties with residents,” said Nancy
Kopf, senior director of Success Measures Evaluation Services. “That can result in increased participation in programs, and occasionally leads to residents increasing their leadership role, including on the organization’s board.”
CIM has also helped residents raise issues reflecting their lived experiences in the community, paving the way for community collaboration. For example, communities have raised safety concerns that led to functional change: once network organizations recognized the issues, they worked with local governments to identify solutions like increasing street lighting or working strategically with local law enforcement.
The CIM project set the foundation and paved the way for forging new working relationships and opportunities for community residents and network organizations. And, it helped NeighborWorks and the network understand and communicate meaningful community impact.
Supporting evaluation and learning at NeighborWorks
Success Measures’ role has evolved over the past 20 years to meet the dynamic needs of NeighborWorks and the community development field. Today, the social enterprise continues to play a valuable role at NeighborWorks with a history of attracting funding, managing special initiatives that include evaluation and supporting evaluation needs for several National Initiatives’ program areas. Success Measures also collaborates as a thought partner on organizational priorities.
Advancing Special Initiatives: Success Measures supported NeighborWorks as it entered emerging areas such as financial coaching and health equity. By attracting significant outside funding, creating specialized data collection tools and guiding evaluation efforts, the social enterprise helped catalyze two key projects in the 2010s:
- The Financial Capability Demonstration Project was a $5 million, 3-year national initiative supported by Citi. As project manager, Success Measures helped secure funds for the multi-division effort that included Training and National Initiatives. This demonstration project advanced training and capacity building in financial coaching, provided grant funding to NeighborWorks network organizations and other Citi-supported organizations to launch or deepen financial coaching programs and engaged 30 organizations in evaluating the financial capability outcomes of their program participants using Success Measures tools and approaches.
- The Health Outcomes Demonstration Project was designed to help organizations measure the health outcomes of their affordable housing and community development work. Twenty organizations, including 10 network organizations, received grant funding, technical assistance and peer learning opportunities to evaluate health outcomes and apply the learning to advance health equity in their communities. The project was created and conducted by Success Measures in partnership with Enterprise Community Partners, and funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Kresge Foundation and Hearst Foundation.
Evaluation and Learning Services for National Initiatives: Success Measures has also provided a range of evaluation and learning services for multiple departments and their associated programs within National Initiatives. Success Measures’ productive partnership with National Initiatives’ programs has included everything from developing a resident leader survey for the Community Leadership Institute (CLI) to assess how resident leaders build leadership skills over time, to actively participating in the cross-divisional working groups for the multi-year Shared Equity Housing and Creative Community Development initiatives.
As part of those initiatives, Success Measures developed and tested new measurement tools for arts and culture programs and evaluated a range of resident and related outcomes from shared equity housing. Among many other projects, Success Measures also partnered with the Healthy Homes and Communities program to design and facilitate strategic learning processes for multiple cohorts of NeighborWorks network organizations, and worked with the Corporate Strategy and Impact Division and Community Initiatives to help network organizations use data more effectively when talking about community change and informing future strategies.
These projects are only a sample of Success Measures' many divisional partnerships and initiatives. However, they represent foundational projects for NeighborWorks as learning opportunities, current projects and advances in community development.
The Future
Understanding the outcomes of people, programs and places requires a deep understanding of — and the ability to measure — change in complex environments and systems. This principle has guided Success Measures in helping NeighborWorks and other organizations measure and learn the impact of their efforts and investments, in addition to make meaningful contributions to the broader community development field.
However, the twenty-year anniversary offers a unique opportunity to reflect on internal change: a deepened relationship with NeighborWorks, an expanded understanding of how evaluation can support communities and the evolution of Success Measures itself.
The social enterprise has evolved over the past two decades by adding strategic learning services for philanthropy and finding new ways to ground and expand its participatory and equitable practices.
Jessica Mulcahy, senior director, Success Measures Philanthropic Evaluation Strategies, oversees strategic learning work, which has increased in the philanthropic sector as more funders wish to work in new ways with their grantees and communities. “Many funders are looking for ways to be grantee-led,” she explained. “They are looking for ways to better listen to and trust their grantees’ expertise to provide funding for grantees’ ongoing strategies. We’ve been able to support those efforts by helping funders and grantees work together to shift their relationships to ones that makes space for advancing new directions.”
Success Measures looks forward to continuing to explore new ways to help organizations understand their community impact and leverage their learning for another 20 years from its home at NeighborWorks.
Read more about Success Measures’ work through a sample client list and project descriptions.
