3 Oct, 2025

Ask Nicole: Program Updates Take Time—and That’s Okay

By Nicole Clark, LMSW|2025-10-03T13:09:08-04:00October 3rd, 2025|Categories: Program, Service, & Campaign Design|Tags: Ask Nicole, Data Driven, Evaluative Thinking, Nonprofits, program design|0 Comments

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I’ve talked about the moment when you realize your program’s design is outdated. Maybe the content hasn’t evolved in years. Maybe it no longer reflects your participants’ realities. Or maybe the logic model hasn’t been updated despite changing the program’s activities.

Since then, I’ve heard from many of you:

We know our program isn’t where it should be… but we’re already stretched so thin.
We want to make updates, but we don’t even know where to begin.
We feel stuck—even though we’re clear something needs to change.

If this resonates with you and your staff, you’re not alone.

Program updates take time—and that’s okay.

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20 Aug, 2025

Try This: The Data-Driven Decision Tree Walk-Through

By Nicole Clark, LMSW|2025-08-20T10:11:47-04:00August 20th, 2025|Categories: Program, Service, & Campaign Design|Tags: Capacity Building, Data Driven, Data Sense-Making, Evaluative Thinking, Try This|0 Comments

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Staff want to engage with data-driven decision making, but they don’t always have the time or space to do so.

When organizational leaders make decision-making processes transparent and collaborative, it supports staff, even if they can’t act on every idea right away.

This week, we’ll take a more hands-on approach. I’ll walk you through an activity you can use with your team to turn raw data into clear, actionable insights: The Data-Driven Decision Tree.

The Data-Driven Decision Tree is one of two activities taken from “Prioritize This: Data-Driven Decision Making“, a free resource provided to my newsletter subscribers. This activity helps break down program and service evaluation data into actionable steps based on feasibility and impact.

Objective:

Help your team turn data into clear, actionable next steps by exploring feasibility, mission alignment, and participant impact.

This activity is ideal for:

Staff who design and implement programs
Leadership responsible for strategic decisions
Any staff who collect, analyze, or share participant feedback

What you’ll need:

A copy of the Data-Driven Decision Tree. (Sign up for my newsletter to access the full exercise (including the decision tree visual) from Prioritize This: Data-Driven Decision Making.)
Program or evaluation data you want to analyze
A notetaker or facilitator to guide discussion
Time allotted: 30–45 minutes, depending on group size and number of data points

The steps:

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13 Aug, 2025

How Nonprofit Leaders Can Balance Staff Capacity with Data-Driven Decision Making

By Nicole Clark, LMSW|2025-08-13T14:26:37-04:00August 13th, 2025|Categories: Program, Service, & Campaign Design|Tags: Capacity Building, Data Driven, Evaluative Thinking, Monitoring & Evaluation|0 Comments

Here’s how to balance both without sacrificing impact.

In my last post, we explored the tension between wanting to engage with data-driven decision making and not having the space or capacity to do so.

Many staff want to think strategically, but without dedicated time and structural support, evaluation efforts become something that’s outsourced rather than embedded in organizational culture.

Nonprofit leaders play a critical role in shifting this dynamic by creating conditions where evaluative thinking is not just a one-off activity, but part of everyday decision-making.

This shift doesn’t happen by accident. It requires intention, space, and a shared understanding of how leaders and staff make decisions. Leaders need to guide teams in weighing both the feasibility of a potential change and its potential impact on participants or outcomes. These two factors can help shape priorities in a way that feels realistic for the organization, while also respecting the insight and energy of staff.

In this post, we’ll look at how to navigate two realities: first, the emotional weight of setting aside important but currently unfeasible changes, and second, the value of making the decision-making process transparent and collaborative. Along the way, I’ll also pose two key reflection questions for leaders to use with their teams—questions that can help staff focus their energy where it matters most.

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23 Aug, 2023

Stop Prioritizing “One Size Fits All” Solutions

By Nicole Clark, LMSW|2023-08-23T14:10:46-04:00August 23rd, 2023|Categories: Program, Service, & Campaign Design|Tags: Data Driven, Evaluative Thinking, Grantmaking, Nonprofits, program design|0 Comments

A principle in program design is that, if a program is placed in a new location, the program will still perform as expected.

From a program evaluation perspective, we understand that a program’s location presents both challenges and opportunities, as the physical location (whether it’s an actual neighborhood or virtual) is often as unique as the program itself.

So, when you’re evaluating a multi-site program, not only are you assessing the extent that differences in outcomes are due to variations in project implementation, you’re also sensitive to the fact that you’re doing a side-by-side comparison.

Why? Because if you’re a staff member that’s been placed in this new program location, and you’re experiencing the uniques characteristics and quirks of the program’s location in real time, the evaluation can yield results that you’re already aware of. Plus, you’ve most likely informed your staff’s leadership well before the evaluator showed up and this can be frustrating when you need leadership’s help in addressing issues and you’re not being listened to.

A program in multiple locations may have the same outcome goals, but will always be impacted by the conditions it’s operating in.

Every organization has unique needs, capacities, and challenges. Yet funders often make .”one size fits all” requests”. From organizational priorities and resource constraints to lack of internal buy-in and strict accountability, grantees can become resentful of funders when they’re expected to fit into a box as opposed to working together in ways that are flexible and makes sense to both the funder and the grantee.

Funders should let go of one-size-fits-all solutions and play a more crucial role in providing support and guidance to their grantees. They can do this by:

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17 Aug, 2023

Try This: Update Your Logic Model

By Nicole Clark, LMSW|2023-08-16T22:18:56-04:00August 17th, 2023|Categories: Program, Service, & Campaign Design|Tags: Data Driven, Evaluative Thinking, Logic Models, Try This|0 Comments

*Try this activity and let me know how it goes for you.*

When logic models are viewed as a valuable planning and learning tool and used with other programmatic tools, it increases the likelihood that your organization will use them.

So, let’s update your program’s logic model!

This activity is ideal for:

Anyone responsible for designing and/or implementing programs and services

What you’ll need:

A program or service logic model

The steps:

This activity assumes that your program has a logic model, as you won’t be able to update it if you don’t have one.

Visually, your logic model could look like this:

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Objective:

This activity is ideal for:

What you’ll need:

The steps:

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