Evaluation with Power: A New Approach to Organizational Effectiveness, Empowerment, and Excellence

Evaluation with Power becomes more important in the social sector every day. Donors no longer reward good intentions, they reward results. This book can help social sector leaders manage for the mission and measure results.
?Frances Hesselbein, president and CEO, Peter F. Drucker Foundation

Evaluation with Power transforms evaluation into a powerful tool nonprofits can use to help their organizations progress and change in ways that lead to greater achievement of mission. Building on THE INDEPENDENT SECTOR'S ongoing research on evaluation, it is a practical, comprehensive handbook for turning program, process, and organizational evaluation into a positive learning experience that connects performance to mission. The book focuses on the needs of the nonprofit and reveals the sort of evaluation that is most appropriate to and helpful for nonprofits.

Leading experts from a wide range of show how to use evaluation in key organizational areas, including program design, human resource management, information systems, volunteers, and more.

Table of Contents:
MAKING EVALUATION A USEFUL MANAGEMENT TOOL (by Sandra Trice Gray).

Ongoing Evaluation: A New Approach.

Empowering Staff for Evaluation.

The Board's Role in Evaluation.

How Volunteers Can Contribute to Evaluation.

Using Client Feedback to Improve Programs and Services.

USING ONGOING EVALUATION TO IMPROVE PROGRAMS AND SERVICES.

Organizational Behavior and Policy (A. Merget & E. Weaver).

Program Effectiveness and Outcomes (J. Seeley).

Human Resource Management (D. Young & H. Doerman).

Information Management (R. Millett & M. Lelle).

Resource Development (P. McE. Buchanan & T. Hurwitz).

Ethics and Accountability (J. Belk & M. Daignault).

Adapting the Evaluation Process to the Organizational Culture (R. Adamson & E. Weaver).

Using Outside Evaluatorsv (P. Patrizi & J. Sanders).

About the Author :
SANDRA TRICE GRAY is vice president of INDEPENDENT SECTOR where she heads the Effective Sector Leadership and International Initiatives Program. Previously she served as an assistant commissioner with the U.S. Department of Education.

Review :
"ASAE has long been interested in finding ways to help associations continuously assess themselves to ensure that they are operating with maximum efficiency and effectiveness. We applaud the publication of this important new book, and the cogent plan it presents to associations for ongoing self-evaluation. Associations mean to do good work. This book will help them do it." (R William Taylor, CAE, president, American Society of Association Executives)

"In an era of concern that 'nothing works,' it is essential for nonprofts to report on effective programs. Big Brothers Big Sisters of America has known anecdotally for many years that having a Big Brother or Big Sister has an enormous impact on the life of a child. Evaluation with Power will help us continue to report on the effectiveness of our programs. Evaluation with Power provides a management tool that will help us promote organizational learning and empowerment, basic ingredients for building public confidence and program excellence, key to long-term nonprofit survival. (Thomas M. McKenna, national director, Big Brothers Big Sisters of America)

"Evaluation with Power becomes more important in the social sector every day. Donors no longer reward good intentions, they reward results. This book can help social sector leaders manage for the mission and measure results." (Frances Hesselbein, president and CEO, Peter F. Drucker Foundation)

"Terrific, easy-to-use primer on evaluation! Given the public's questioning of the performance and public accountability of organizations, this book provides the needed support and guidance to make evaluation part of our everyday work." (Geraldine N. Mannion, program officer, special projects, Carnegie Corporation of New York)

"This book combines the practical with the philosophic?process with outcomes. It answers a need many of us have who want more than simple answers?we want to continually improve on what we do. This book gives us a host of ways to do just that." (L. Bryant, executive director, National School Boards Association)

"This book offers an antidote to the infectious mentality that ?nothing works.' What works are organizations that are effective, excellent, and empowering. Ongoing evaluation is a tool for creating, sustaining, and enhancing such organizations. This book suggests that the future effectiveness of organizations depAnds on meaningful, useful, and practical evaluation. It is a major contribution to both the fields of organizational development and evaluation." (Micheal Quinn Patton, former president, American Evaluation Association)

This book clearly has the potential of becoming a classic in the literature of not-for-profits, generally. It takes evaluation from the punitive world of "now I got you" to a environment where individuals, programs, and institutions can grow to meet the challenges of a changing world." (Lee Van Bremen, executive vice president, College of American Pathologists)