From Scatter to Strategy

Helping Nonprofits Shift from Reactive Reporting to Purposeful Learning

We’ve officially wrapped up six projects since April. Six! That’s a lot of impact summaries, memos, and full-blown reports—and as a pen-and-paper person who drafts by hand before typing, I’ve got the calloused fingers to prove it.

In the midst of all the closing, we also kicked off a new project I’m especially excited about. It checks all my boxes: the key project leads are genuinely excited about evaluation (dream!), there’s deep community engagement built into the data collection plan, and the whole project is oriented around transforming data into real, resonant stories. More to come on that soon.

Oh—and I’m finally seeing tomatoes in the garden! Fresh peppers too. My boys love picking snacks to eat on the way to the garage, and I love any excuse to get them connected to where our food comes from.

With so many reports behind us and so much new growth (literal and figurative!) underway, I’ve been thinking a lot about the difference between reactive and proactive evaluation—and how many of the organizations I work with are right in the middle of that shift.

The Telltale Signs of Reactive Evaluation

Here’s how it usually starts:
You get an email from a funder asking for outcomes data—and you realize no one’s totally sure where that data is, what it means, or whether it answers the questions the funder actually cares about.

You’ve got spreadsheets with attendance, survey results from two years ago, a few quotes saved from participant interviews, and maybe a logic model that hasn’t been touched since the grant application.

You’re not alone. Most nonprofits are doing the best they can with the time and tools they have. But too often, evaluation becomes something we scramble to do after the fact—rather than something that’s designed to inform, inspire, and guide as we go.

What Proactive Evaluation Looks Like

At Bridgepoint Evaluation, we work with mission-driven organizations who are ready to make a shift—from reactive reporting to purposeful learning.

Proactive evaluation is:

• Intentional: You have a clear, shared understanding of what you want to learn—and why it matters.

• Collaborative: Your evaluation design reflects the voices of your team, your partners, and the people you serve.

• Useful: You collect data you actually use—to reflect, adjust, tell your story, and make strategic decisions.

This doesn’t happen by accident. It begins with formalized evaluation design—what we often build with clients through an Evaluation Strategy Map. That means identifying the right questions to ask, choosing data sources that make sense, and agreeing on what success looks like before you're knee-deep in reporting season.

The Path from Scatter to Strategy

We love working with organizations who are:

• Feeling overwhelmed by disconnected data points

• Frustrated by grant requirements that don’t tell the full story of their impact

• Ready to align their evaluation with decision-making, learning, and long-term growth

Through collaborative planning sessions, hands-on coaching, or our fractional evaluation manager service, we help teams build systems that work—so evaluation becomes a tool for insight, not just a checkbox.

And yes, we still help you meet those funder requirements. But we also help you do something more powerful: use your data to guide your work, not just justify it.

Want to Build This Muscle? Here’s How.

We believe evaluation should be practical, accessible, and useful—not just aspirational. If you're ready to build internal capacity, check out these how-to’s and tools:

🧠 How to Engage Your Team in Drafting Evaluation Questions
→ Read: Collaborative Design for Evaluation Questions

🗺️ Evaluation Strategy Map – Build Your Learning Plan with Intention
→ Download the Evaluation Strategy Map Toolkit (Pay-What-You-Can)

📝 Survey Design Builder – Ask Better Questions, Get Better Data
→ Download the Survey Design Builder (Pay-What-You-Can)

📬 Want these resources in your inbox every other week?
→ Subscribe to the Evaluation Essentials Newsletter

Ready to Move from Reactive to Proactive?

If you’re feeling stuck in scramble mode, let’s talk. Whether you need help designing a full evaluation strategy or want support throughout the year, we’re here to help you turn scattered data into meaningful insight.

📬 Reach out here to schedule a discovery call

About Me:
I’m Kayla—Founder of Bridgepoint Evaluation, evaluation coach, adjunct professor, and notebook hoarder. Pokémon master-in-training via my two little boys, and a firm believer that evaluation should be useful, ethical, and a little bit joyful.