Not-entirely-random stuff for funders and doers obsessed with impact at scale. Every 3 months. More or less.
6 questions to ask your foundation program officer
You should be asking us this stuff. More pearls of wisdom from Ruth Levine.
Non Profit News (4 mins)
Investor updates: Dos and Don'ts
Everyone should get out front with regular funder updates. Here's an excellent list of dos and don'ts written by “someone who has likely processed more startup updates than any other investment principal on the planet.”
Right Side Capital Management (7 mins)
Making a better poverty map
“The careful combination of ground truth surveys with an abundance of big data increases—not decreases—the value of surveys.” says Marshall Burke from Atlas AI.
World Bank (5 mins)
World Poverty Clock
A tool that shows people living in extreme poverty, as a share of world total.
Nigeria has 15.9%
Congo: 10.1%
India: 6.4%
Ethiopia: 4.2%
Tanzania: 4%
Also, you can see what happens to India's share when you fast forward to 2030 (spoiler, it drops to 0.6%).
Worldpoverty.io
Depressed? Here's a bench. Talk to me.
One of our fellows, Dixon Chibanda, leads Friendship Bench. They started by training grandmothers in poor communities in Zimbabwe as therapists, teaching them to deliver simple but sophisticated care. It's a compelling idea backed up by rigorous results. It's now spread to New York.
New York Times (8 mins)
To make products with social impact, ask these 4 questions
When we're trying to predict whether a product/technology/thing will have impact, we ask:
- Is it needed?
- Does it work?
- Will it get to those who need it most?
- Will they use it right?
One organization that gets to answer "yes" on all four questions is Inyenyeri, a Rwandan company that leases ultra-low emission, forced-draft cookstoves to households at a nominal cost.
Redshift by Autodesk (6 mins)
Impact Matters - a new rating system to measure impact of gifts
Impact Matters mission is to guide donors to high impact nonprofits by producing ratings of cost-effectiveness at scale. Their first batch of >1000 ratings was recently released.
New York Times (5 mins)
Why governments should pay community health workers
Raj Panjabi, founder of Last Mile Health, nails it succinctly and eloquently in this cover story. You gotta pay, train, supply, and support community health workers. Everywhere. Now.
Time (2 mins)
A remote Congolese island offers a test case for improving the country's health
Jacques Sebisaho, who leads Amani Global Works, practices what Raj preaches on the island of Idjwi in the DRC. “We believe we cannot build a health care system on volunteers. It doesn’t work. But our referral numbers have increased and the number of facility deliveries have been heightened,”
Devex (5 mins)
Productivity Hacks
- How to get the most out of your calendar with some creative ways to be intentional about scheduling meetings. Medium
- How to write an effective email to people who receive a tons of emails (in 12 easy steps) Twitter
And finally...
H/T: Duncan Green's Better Blogging Guide
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