Recently, I saw an interesting editorial from a United Way CEO about how their United Way is changing the way it addresses social issues in their community. What caught my attention in the editorial was not what the United Way is going to do to address the pressing local needs it has identified but how they are going to measure their success.

One of the most common refrains I hear from United Ways is that the times are changing. Society is changing, technology is changing, the economy is changing, and even competition for charitable giving is changing.

“Helping people is easy. Change is hard.” – Gary Goscenski, Issue-Focused Consultant, Perspectives

“An issue focus has changed everything, from how we speak about our work to how we measure our success.” – Pat Berger, President/CEO, United Way of Grand Forks, East Grand Forks & Area

“It is more work to try to do everything and not know where you are going” – Ken Toll, President/CEO, United Way of Jackson County

As I noted in my previous blog post, many United Ways communicate information like their campaign goal, number of investment panels, number of funded partner agencies, and how many volunteer hours it took to determine the allocations – but, this information does not motivate donors to give.