Chief Impact Officer

Sara Olsen
Founding Partner, Social Venture Technology Group

Many others have written and will continue to write eloquently about the implications of the failure, recently exposed by 60 MInutes and Jon Krakauer, by Greg Mortenson and Central Asia Institute to keep adequate track of and separation between personal and charitable income and expenditures, or to account accurately for the results of their work, and what all this means about governance, oversight, donor culture, and the President.  This story does not show us that something needs to be done to change both this one organization’s practices and those of the philanthropic system overall– we all already knew that– but it does lend us a sense of urgency.

While part of the issue is that Mortenson didn’t let folks know license had been taken with his story in the book, and part is that his board and staff didn’t insist once a certain scale of funding had been attained that clearer lines be drawn between what he personally earned and spent and what CAI earned and spent (since prior to that point it was likely that every dollar Mortenson earned was in fact the same as a dollar that literally kept CAI operating), the third factor is the lack of focus by donors on the organization’s results: the promotion [especially to US audiences] and support [especially financial] of education for children and particularly girls in tribal Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Why didn’t donors focus more on this, or look for solid evidence? That’s complex. The simple answer is that it’s nobody’s job to account for impact.

It is time that instead of a Chief Development Officer, every nonprofit had a Chief Impact Officer.

The responsibility for raising money should be based on the ability to articulate goals and demonstrate results in relation to money invested. As the size of an organization’s budget passes a certain threshold, there should be third-party verification of the performance data and results. Boards and donors should expect and require this.

Foundations- you can and should lead the way! Now is the time!