Charity Navigator - Change of Heart

After completing the Charity Navigator assignment and ratings for my assigned organizations this week, I think it is important that I blog about my experience and thoughts. Initially, I disagreed with Charity Navigator about its additional rating methods in determining accountability and effectiveness. I thought that these additional ratings would mislead donors to think an organization was effective or ineffective because they relied solely on the information provided on a form-990 and website. However, I have had a change of heart. I cannot say that I particularly enjoyed rating my organizations, as the work was tedious, but I did learn that Charity Navigator has some good ideas. After completing my ratings, I found that the organization who rated the highest financially also rated the highest on transparency and accountability and result reporting. This may be a coincidence so it would be interesting to do learn if this happens in all cases, but I have a feeling that an organization who is effective in all rating areas is probably effective as an organization.

In my paper this week I defined effectiveness as the degree to which an organization positively affects its client, but noted that according to what we have learned in class, effectiveness can be defined in many ways. I have accepted that Charity Navigator does not determine effectiveness based on my definition, however I think it does move us in the right step forward. Organizations who are encouraged to be transparent and share results will want to have positive information to share in order to be funded by stakeholders. If organizations are rated based on what they are sharing and what they are not, I do believe they will be more inclined to be transparent. I think this will help improve what organizations are doing in their organizations, because in order to report something positive they have to be doing something positive. I also think that it is important that Charity Navigator linked financial efficiency, accountability and transparency, and results reporting together, because I think they impact a donors decision. I know that when I was rating my organizations, I found that I was more willing to donate to the one that rated high in all of these areas rather than the one who rated low.

Is there anyone else who thought Charity Navigator's new ratings were going to be ineffective but changed their mind? Also, did others find that their organizations' transparency and accountability and/or results reporting were higher if the financial efficiency ratings were higher and vice versa?