Blue Ridge Foundation New York partnered with Wellspring Consulting to create a tool to help grantees focus their program strategy and track their organizational performance. We call this tool the BluePrint.

The BluePrint helps new nonprofits clarify their mission, vision, values, and theory of change, and to connect this broad thinking to their program activities. The BluePrint culminates with two exercises. One, nonprofit managers identify the high level measurable, hard-to-measure, and financial benefits that they expect their work to deliver to various constituencies, including organization clients, staff, funders, and broader community. Two, managers specify the short and long-term operating achievements they expect to reach in relation to their own business processes, staff development, and fundraising. We then work with each grantee to track their performance according to the benefits and operating achievements that have been specified.

Ideally, the BluePrint helps our grantees plan, manage their performance, and communicate their impact to stakeholders. It can also help Blue Ridge Foundation New York identify what kinds of capacity-building support would best serve each organization in our portfolio.

You might also want to check out other performance management tools:

Logic Model — The W.K. Kellogg Foundation has produced a Logic Model Development Guide help nonprofits in their program planning, implementation, and dissemination activities.

Balanced Scorecard —The venture philanthropy firm New Profit Inc. is a leader in applying the Balanced Scorecard in the nonprofit context.

Capacity Assessment Grid — McKinsey & Company in conjunction with Venture Philanthropy Partners created a Capacity Assessment Grid for nonprofits to assess their own performance levels in different management areas.