Clear Impact Blog

By: Kayleigh Weaver
March 9th, 2023

Results-Based Accountability (RBA) is a powerful tool that helps organizations improve their performance and achieve measurable community impact. However, implementing RBA can be challenging, especially if the organization lacks a common language, struggles with data overload, lacks the right data management software system, or fails to disaggregate data for equity. This blog will explore four practical ways to boost Results-Based Accountability implementation by addressing these challenges head-on. By following these strategies, you can increase the effectiveness of your RBA implementation, improve your organization’s performance, and accelerate your journey to measurable impact.

In this blog, you’ll learn four tactics you can start implementing today to boost your RBA implementation and accelerate your measurable results.

Table of Contents:

1. Method One: Create a Common Language Glossary
2. Method Two: Use Software Systems Designed to Support Results-Based Accountability Data Collection, Analysis, and Strategic Planning
3. Method Three: Cut Down Your List of Performance Measures
4. Method Four: Choose One Measure That You Haven’t Disaggregated and Disaggregate for Race, Gender, Age, or Another Category
5. Final Thoughts
6. Helpful Links

Creating a Common Language Glossary is a helpful way to establish consistency in terminology. Once finished, you can copy and distribute the glossary among team members or departments. Keep reading for a set of steps and helpful resources to get you started.

1. Create a Common Language Glossary

Implementing Results-Based Accountability (RBA) in your organization can be a powerful tool to measure and improve social outcomes. However, to ensure success, it’s essential to have a common language that all team members understand and use consistently. A “Common Language Glossary” is a valuable tool to achieve this goal.

Words are merely labels for ideas. It’s less important what words you use than it is to use them consistently. For instance, you may call a condition of wellbeing for children, adults, and families a “Result,” “Outcome, or “Goal.” What matters is that you agree on and use the same word every time you refer to “a condition of wellbeing.” When a team uses words consistently, it’s like everyone is using the same map and legend to reach a desired destination. 

Creating a Common Language Glossary is a helpful way to establish consistency in terminology. Once finished, you can copy and distribute the glossary among team members or departments.

Here’s a set of steps to create a Common Language Glossary:

1.  Start by creating a simple table. 
2. In the leftmost column, put the definition or core RBA framework idea.
3. In another column next to that, list possible terms your team can choose from. 
4. In the next column, list possible “modifiers.” Modifiers are words that further clarify other words. They are handy if you want to use the same words to refer to ideas belonging to different categories of ideas.
5. After creating the table, have each team member vote on each word and modifier and record the final selection in the last column of your table. 

Using modifying language is critical to avoid confusion between Population and Performance Accountability. This distinction is the most significant source of confusion holding teams back from making progress on their social missions. Therefore, using modifiers in front of words like “Outcome” and “Result” when talking about Programs or Performance accountability is essential. For example, you could say “Program Results” or “Client Outcomes” to distinguish these terms from words referring to whole populations.

Creating a Common Language Glossary can boost your Results-Based Accountability implementation by establishing consistency in terminology. By agreeing on a set of definitions that start with ideas and not words and using modifiers to avoid confusion, you can get more disciplined, waste less time explaining concepts, and take your RBA work to the next level.

Check out our Results-Based Accountability Glossary of Terms to help get you started.

You can also download our free “Tool for Choosing a Common Language” to help you construct a meaningful glossary.

Sure, you can perform a Turn the Curve exercise on a piece of paper, but paper will never be enough for the sophisticated data needs of RBA practitioners. Using software built to support RBA will save you time and help ensure your data is accurate, up-to-date, and organized for effective decision-making.

2. Use Software Systems Designed to Support Results-Based Accountability Data Collection, Analysis, and Strategic Planning.

Implementing Results-Based Accountability effectively requires accessible, accurate, timely, and valuable data. Depending on the size of your organization and the number of collaborators you work with, you may deal with vast quantities of numerical and contextual data. Much of this data may be sensitive, so your data management must also be secure. Paper-based data collection and analysis methods are not sophisticated or secure enough for the extensive data management needs of social and public sector organizations. 

When it comes to data, your success in RBA hinges on your ability to:

1. Directly collect client-level data from your program participants (if you deliver services). 
2. Translate the client-level data you collect into Program Performance Measures.
3. Visualize the connection between your Performance and Population data. 
4. Quickly see how your Performance Measure and Indicator data changes over time. 
5. Disaggregate your metrics by race, gender, or other factors to analyze equity.
6. Access all the information you need in one place to make data-based decisions.
7. Share your data with partners, stakeholders, and the community (where necessary) to improve collaboration and create buy-in.

One way to improve your data management and boost your RBA implementation is to utilize a “Unified Data Management” software system designed to support all of these data-related RBA activities. A Unified Data Management system is any set of data software systems designed to work together so that individuals and organizations can complete all six essential data management tasks in one place. 

When organizations use unified data management systems, these are some benefits they can experience:

1. Data processing becomes more accurate.
2. People save time when they don’t have to process data manually data.
3. Purchasing integrated systems from one vendor — rather than multiple systems from multiple vendors — usually saves organizations money.

Clear Impact Suite is one example of a Unified Data Management system. It is also the only fully-integrated system designed to support all essential Results-Based Accountability data management tasks. 

Clear Impact Suite comprises two complimentary data software tools: Compyle and Scorecard. 

Compyle allows organizations to collect the client-level data they need via custom forms, surveys, and assessments. Even better, you can deliver the same surveys over multiple instances and analyze how survey responses change over time. This is a critical data management task that most other surveying software tools can’t do. Users can then feed their Compyle data into Scorecard for further analysis and strategic planning.

Here are just a few ways Scorecard supports Results-Based Accountability:

1. It organizes your data with adherence to the Population-Performance distinction while allowing you to see connections between the two, roll up data into aggregates, or get more detailed views through disaggregated data.
2. It supports transparency and accountability by allowing users to share data and Turn the Curve plans publicly.
3. It guides you through the RBA Turn the Curve Thinking process for each Performance Measure or Indicator.
4. It has built-in RBA training and support.
5. Learn more about how Scorecard supports RBA in this blog >>

You can learn more about how Clear Impact Suite supports Results-Based Accountability in a private, custom demo with one of our friendly staff.

Read More About This Topic:

Read more about the importance of using software to support RBA data management in our blog 5Reasons You Need Data Collection and Management Software to Implement Results-Based Accountability Effectively.

Are you using too many Performance Measures? How many Performance Measures do you really need to make a difference? Keep reading to find out.

3. Audit and Cut Down Your List of Performance Measures

While implementing Results-Based Accountability, it’s essential to avoid “Organizational Side-Quests” that can distract your team from your primary mission. Organizational Side-Quests” are extraneous activities or details that provide little to no value or distract you from what creates impact. In Adam Luecking’s book Social Sector Hero, he encourages social and public sector leaders to minimize side quests to accelerate progress on their social impact journeys.

One of the biggest side-quest time-wasters in Results-Based Accountability is requiring too many Performance Measures or focusing on measures that don’t reflect the programmatic impact on clients or communities. Therefore, reducing the number of Performance Measures you’re working on can save time, energy, and resources. It can also ensure that social impact remains the primary focus.

It may seem like you should consider every piece of data or unit of information available, but this can lead to data overload and “analysis paralysis.” Instead, focus on preserving the most essential “better off” Performance Measures that speak to the impact of programs on the lives of the clients and communities you serve. Other measures, like the “number of clients” or the “number of program pamphlets handed out,” can be helpful, but they shouldn’t be a proxy for impact.

You only need three to five Performance Measures per focus area to understand your program’s impact. By reducing your Performance Measures, you can keep your data collection and analysis practical, useful, and powerful. Fewer measures can lead to greater efficiency and less stress. Performance Measurement should be a means to an end, not a compliance exercise.

If you already have a list of measures you’re working with, it’s crucial to audit it. Here is a list of questions that can help you identify which measures are most critical and which are just distracting side quests:

1. How many Performance Measures do you have per program or focus area?
2. Is each Performance Measure being actively used?
3. How often do you update the data for each measure?
4. Is there quality data available for each measure?
5. Is the measure required from a funder?
6. How could you simplify or cut down the list? 

You can learn more about organizational side quests and simplifying your Performance Measures in Social Sector Hero.

Need to create your measures? Check out our Performance Measure library for inspiration.

Disaggregating your Indicators and Performance Measures can help unlock insights that accelerate Turned Curves and stimulate innovative ideas. You’ve probably disaggregated some metrics before. Choose one metric that you haven’t disaggregated yet and disaggregate it by a relevant category to see what you find out.

4. Choose One Measure That You Haven’t Disaggregated and Disaggregate for Race, Gender, Age, or Another Category.

Data totals may imply success, but in reality, some groups fall behind others almost all the time. This reality is why disaggregating data is essential in Results-Based Accountability implementation.

Disaggregation means taking a single measure and breaking it down into multiple measures that reflect particular characteristics or subpopulations. Characteristics are things like race, gender, and socioeconomic status, while subpopulations are things like regions, counties, and neighborhoods. Ultimately, through disaggregation, you are digging deeper into your data to unlock insights that accelerate progress and maximize the impact of your social investments. 

When you don’t disaggregate your data, it can mask severe disparities in your community. In contrast, disaggregating data allows you to focus your funding and improvement strategies on the groups that fare the worst. By doing this, you may achieve a more significant impact and Turn the Curve on a Performance Measure or Indicator faster. Additionally, disaggregation can help ensure your programs are accessible and culturally appropriate for the individuals you serve.

You can see the power of disaggregating data in the story of March of Dimes. A few years ago, March of Dimes began disaggregating its infant and maternal health data. When they did, they found that the historical impacts of systemic racism across education, legal, and healthcare significantly drive birth outcomes and cause disproportionate suffering for Black moms and their babies.

March of Dimes overlaid birth outcome maps with old redlining maps in St. Louis, Missouri, and found that the boundaries were almost identical. In these communities, there are fewer investments, clinics, hospitals, and transportation options, the primary social determinants of health. This knowledge allowed March of Dimes to identify five root causes of inequitable birth outcomes and tailor their solutions accordingly.

To boost your Results-Based Accountability efforts, try choosing one new measure and disaggregating it by race, gender, age, or another relevant category to your community. Through this process, you may uncover previously unidentified inequities and stimulate innovative solutions. This may help you accelerate Turned Curves.

Final Thoughts

Creating a Common Language Glossary ensures consistency in communication and minimizes confusion and miscommunication. Utilizing Unified Data Management software improves the accessibility, accuracy, and timeliness of data, ultimately leading to better data-based decision-making. Monitoring fewer Performance measures makes data practical, useful, and powerful. Finally, disaggregating data unlocks insights that accelerate progress and maximize the impact of social investments. By implementing these four strategies, organizations can take their RBA implementation to the next level and Turn Curves faster.

Helpful Links

• Check out our Results-Based Accountability Glossary for common terms and definitions.
• Download our free “Tool for Choosing a Common Language” to help you construct a meaningful glossary.
• Learn more about organizational side quests and simplifying your Performance Measures in Social Sector Hero.
• Need to create your measures? Check out our Performance Measure library for inspiration.
• Read more about the importance of using software to support RBA.
• Learn more about how Clear Impact Suite supports Results-Based Accountability in a private, custom demo.
• Learn more about the importance of Unified Data Management.
• Learn about the six essential data management tasks and how Clear Impact Suite supports the data management needs of partnerships.
• Learn more about how Scorecard supports RBA.
• Learn more about the importance of disaggregating data.
• Read the full March of Dimes Social Sector Hero Spotlight.