Evaluation Kit for Trustees

FSG Social Impact Advisors and the James Irvine Foundation have released an "Evaluation Kit for Trustees." It includes Let's Consider Evaluation: A Self-Assessment Tool for Foundation Trustees;  Let's Discuss Evaluation: A Framework for Trustee Conversations; and Let's Make Evaluation Work: A Planning Guide for Foundation Trustees.

Let's Consider Evaluation provides a survey for assessing individual trustees' and executives' views on evaluation — its purpose, method and objectives, and cost.

Let's Discuss Evaluation suggests discussion questions for formulating an evaluation strategy, including whether to evaluate individual grants or clusters, how rigorously or frequently to evaluate, to inform what decisions, with how much transparency, and at what cost.

Let's Make Evaluation Work identifies obstacles to effective evaluation — trustees lack the time to discuss results, do not see results as actionable, find the format unhelpful, and do not see the value of evaluation. It outlines solutions from the field and suggests next steps.

Also available are What’s the Difference, a summary of trustee perspectives on evaluation, and Snapshots, brief case studies that illustrate how trustees are successfully using evaluations.

http://www.irvine.org/publications/new-publications