"In the for-profit world, firms are accountable to their customers. If customers don’t value their products, the firm doesn’t make a profit. If the firm doesn’t do better, it goes out of business and investors lose their money. Both firms and investors are accountable to the customer. Provide value or die. The nonprofit world doesn’t work like that. The customers—we presume to call them “beneficiaries”—pretty much have to take what they’re given. There’s no meaningful way for them to signal whether the “product” has value for them or not. There are no direct consequences for a failure to benefit the beneficiaries. Meanwhile, the investors—funders of all stripes—are even more insulated from consequences. We can fund whatever ineffective crap we want. Blindly funding stuff that doesn’t work won’t sully your image as a generous champion of the poor (or the environment, or whatever). Your reputation—the one thing funders really care about—doesn’t suffer." from https://ssir.org/articles/entry/funders-do-your-job
You don't hear this called out often. But it should be. Appreciation to @mulagostarr.bsky.social for doing so. Funders holding themselves and their grantees accountable would also force right-sizing of grants and inclusion of dedicated M&E/impact analysis $ as needed.
ssir.org/articles/ent...
