The Sustainability Mindset: Using the Matrix Map to Make Strategic Decisions

Chapter 5Assessing Mission Impact

Mission impact is assessed for both the mission-specific and fund-development programs identified in chapter 4 and is done by rating or assessing each program on four criteria and then blending the scores to arrive at an overall mission impact score. The rigor and strategic utility of the matrix map process hinges substantially on the design and execution of the impact assessment process. When maps haven’t had their desired effect, the reason is typically that the organization’s leadership did not manage this process well. Too few staff and board had confidence in the resulting analysis, or the result wasn’t challenging enough to the programmatic status quo to catalyze bold decision making. There are a number ...