Learning and Evaluation
Engaging in learning and evaluation allows grantmakers to deepen their understanding of their impact, opportunities for growth and how they can better support their nonprofit and community partners. Cultivating a culture of learning requires grantmakers to embrace vulnerability, acknowledge mistakes, and remain open to feedback.
Figure 19 shows that dedicating resources for learning and evaluation has become more prevalent in grantmaking organizations over time, with 96 percent of grantmakers indicating they evaluated their “initiatives, programs or strategies” “occasionally,” “sometimes” or “often” in the period between 2022 and 2024. This is a significant rise compared with the 2017 study where only 77 percent of grantmakers evaluated their work.
In addition to the significant increase in conducting evaluations, grantmakers are expanding their use of evaluation data by increasing their use of the data for planning programs, reporting to grantees and sharing findings with other grantmakers, as demonstrated in Figure 20. It is encouraging to see expanded use of evaluation data across activities; there is still room for continued growth in sharing evaluation data to influence public policy or government funding.
Beyond transparently sharing the results of their own evaluation and learning processes with nonprofit partners, grantmakers can provide flexible funding and resources that enable organizations to design and conduct evaluations of their own work. Eighty percent of grantmakers “always,” “most of the time” or “sometimes” require grantees to conduct evaluations. However, despite this requirement, 38 percent of grantmakers that require evaluations do not provide additional funding to support these activities, leaving nonprofits without the support needed to complete evaluations and deepen their learning about their organization’s impact.
We’ve been working in a cycle — asking people what they want, testing ideas, reflecting on results, adjusting and trying again.”
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bi3 Fund
bi3 Fund — Meeting Partners Where They Are
The Cincinnati-based bi3 Fund grounds its work in trust-based and equity-centered philanthropy.
By simplifying grant agreements, removing performance metrics, and co-creating learning questions and outcomes with grantees, bi3 shifts the focus from compliance to learning. The fund also recognizes the value of grantee partners’ time, compensating community reviewers and focus group participants, and offering honorariums for board presentations. “Equity, to us, means meeting people where they are, reflective of the project’s size and the organization’s capacity,” said Zohar Perla, Director of Evaluation & Learning. “Once in partnership, we trust their knowledge of the community and our role is to help them reach their goals.”