Thursday, September 23, 2004

Bad news from Brookings Institution

During election season, all we seem to get is surveys about who is ahead (in addition to shady data about who did what 30 years ago). I get to the point where I don't pay attention to the surveys, since it's the one on election day that matters....uh oh, I sound like a candidate...

Anyway, a survey you should pay attention to is the annual Brookings Institution survey of American public opinion about charitable organizations. The survey shows that opinions about charities have not rebounded significantly, and that many citizens are very skeptical about charities' ability to spend money wisely, and about their management competence. The paper is called "The Continued Crisis in Charitable Confidence"

I've been harping here, and in my books and training about the need for organizational transparency, and more outcome measurement. The latter is good, but without the former, no one knows how good a job we're doing!

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