Nonprofit Impact Report Template
Three documents and three sheets that compute cost per outcome on four denominators, because the same ledger gives a different answer on each.
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Every impact report template hands you a slot for a hero statistic and a section called impact by the numbers. None of them asks the question a sophisticated funder asks first, which is cost per outcome. That figure is not a single number. It is a ladder of denominators, because a programme touches more people than it enrols, enrols more than it completes, and completes more than it can show an outcome for.
So this pack computes the figure on every rung and prints them side by side. In the worked example a literacy programme runs from $226.10 per person reached to $2,927.44 per outcome achieved, a factor of 12.9, on one year of one ledger with no arithmetic error anywhere. The rungs also disagree about which programme is cheapest. Adult Literacy leads on cost per person reached, Housing Stability leads on cost per outcome achieved, and two of the three change position between those columns.
The second undeclared choice is what to do with the participants nobody measured. 341 adults completed and 268 hold both a baseline and an exit score, so counting only measured successes gives $2,927.44 per outcome and extrapolating the responder rate gives $2,296.29. Last year gets recounted on this year's definitions before any trend is claimed, because in the worked example the published comparison reads as a 67.2% collapse and the programme grew on every definition applied to both years. The whole exercise starts from the indicators you can actually collect.
What is in the pack
Cost per Outcome on four rungs
Full cost against people reached, enrolled, completed and shown to have achieved, with the between-programme ranking printed on every rung.
The numerator nobody strips
Participants who did not reach the outcome stay in the cost, because taking them out produces a figure that rewards a programme for losing people.
Outcome Summary by Programme
Every rate carries its numerator, its denominator, the instrument and the threshold on the same line, so no figure travels without them.
The unmeasured group, characterised
Counted and extrapolated side by side with the reason they differ, so the published figure is an interval rather than whichever endpoint reads better.
Trend Against Prior Year
Last year recounted on this year's definitions, then the change decomposed so better data collection cannot pass as a better programme.
Methodology Note, read before the narrative
Counts, definitions, the allocation basis and the limitation register, with every figure in the report tracing back to a line in it.
How it works
- 1
Send the outcome data at participant level
Not the summary counts. A summary has already collapsed the four populations the funnel needs, and it cannot be decomposed back into them. Where the participant records do not exist yet, that is a data collection design problem rather than a reporting one.
- 2
Build the funnel before any rate
Reached, enrolled, completed, measured and achieved, per programme, with the rule behind each. A funnel that goes back up is a definition problem, and it stops there.
- 3
Allocate the cost and name the basis
Management and general spread on a stated basis, fundraising held out and priced as a share of spending, so a reader knows what sits outside every figure.
- 4
Restate last year, then decompose
Recount the prior year on current definitions, then split the change into more completers, better coverage and the success rate among those measured. The figures you already filed have to survive it.
Frequently asked questions
Which cost per outcome should we publish?
All four, with the rung named on each. If one figure has to lead, lead with cost per outcome achieved and put the other three underneath it. A single figure with no denominator stated is not wrong, it is unfalsifiable, and a board cannot make a portfolio decision on one.
Should the cost of participants who did not succeed come out?
No, and the practitioner guidance on this is explicit. A cost per outcome incorporates the cost of delivering services to people who did not reach the intended outcome as well as those who did, which is what makes it cost per outcome rather than cost per success. Strip it and the figure rewards attrition.
Do funders actually ask for cost per outcome?
Federal awards ask in writing. A recipient must relate financial data to the performance goals of the award and supply unit cost data where the terms require it, and performance reports compare costs to units of accomplishment. Private funders ask the same question less formally, usually in the second meeting.
Can we extrapolate over the participants we never measured?
Yes, if it is labelled, the counted figure sits next to it, and the unmeasured group has been characterised first. In the worked example 51 of 73 unmeasured completers left in the final third of the course, so they are the group least likely to have succeeded and extrapolation flatters the result.
Our numbers went down. Do we publish that?
Check whether they went down first. A definition that tightened between two reports produces a fall nobody caused: 1,842 against 604 reads as a 67.2% collapse, and the same programme grew on reached, enrolled and completed. Restate the prior year from its records before you explain a decline.
Where does overhead belong in a cost per outcome?
In the numerator, on a basis you write down. The worked example allocates management and general on direct programme cost and holds fundraising out entirely, which leaves $203,600 of real spending, 13.3% of the total, outside every figure. Your functional expense statement is where the pools come from.
Is this the same thing as an evaluation?
No, and the report should say so. There is no comparison group here, so nothing in it establishes that the programme caused the change. A proper evaluation is the separate exercise built for that question. This report's honest limitation is what makes the figures reusable in the next grant proposal.
Find out which rung your number is on
Send the programme data and the expense detail. The first thing back is cost per outcome on four denominators and the spread between them.
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