KPIs in Grantmaking: the metrics funders use to judge program performance
In grantmaking, KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) are the specific metrics a program uses to judge its performance.
They typically span three areas: reach (beneficiaries, communities), efficiency (cost per outcome, time-to-decision) and alignment (share of funding to priority causes). Choosing a focused set of KPIs at design time avoids the common problem of only being able to report activity rather than impact.
Frequently Asked Questions
Related terms
The newest terms we've added, the words teams managing grants, sponsorship, and CSR come across most often.
Value of Volunteer Time
The value of volunteer time is an hourly monetary rate applied to volunteer hours in order to express a volunteering programme's contribution in currency terms, used in impact reports and in-kind accounting.
The figure is an estimate, not a payment. It states what those hours would have cost to buy, which makes programmes comparable over time — and says nothing about what the receiving organisation actually gained.
Post-Award
Post-award is the phase of the grant lifecycle that follows the funding decision: disbursing funds, tracking how they are spent, collecting grantee reports, measuring outcomes against the objectives set at the start, and closing the grant.
Post-award is where impact is either evidenced or lost. A funder whose attention stops at the payment has spent the money without being able to say what it produced.
Brand Lift
Brand lift is the measurable change in awareness, consideration or perception of a brand that follows exposure to a sponsorship or campaign, calculated by comparing an exposed audience with a control group that was not exposed.
Lift is a difference, not a total. A brand recognised by 40% of an audience before a sponsorship and 46% after has a six-point lift, and the figure is only credible if both groups were surveyed the same way over the same period.
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