Capacity Institute

Ellen Bass launched and directs the Capacity Institute, which helps nonprofits improve participant outcomes as a measure of mission attainment, by building and implementing their performance management systems over two-years. Nonprofits have improved intermediate outcome success rates by 198% and long-term outcome success rates by 291%! For twenty... years, Ellen has taught and coached staff from more than three hundred nonprofits how to use logic models and outcome measurement to strengthen participant outcomes, programs, staff, strategy, partnerships, and fundraising. Ellen also founded and leads the Nonprofit Performance Management Consultant Network, to improve the effectiveness of human service nonprofits nationally by engaging consultants, nonprofits and funders to invest in performance management practices. In an effort to advance nonprofit performance management at a national scale, Ellen engages groups in dialogue and training on related topics. Ellen is a member of the Leap of Reason Ambassadors Community , which includes more than 130 nonprofit thought leaders and practitioners who advance nonprofit high performance as the norm. Ambassadors share the belief that mission and performance are inextricably linked. She serves on the Board of Directors of Idealware, which helps nonprofits make smart technology decisions. Previously, Ellen was the first director of the Boston Capacity Tank at the Black Ministerial Alliance of Greater Boston, where she raised and redistributed more than $10 million in grants and capacity-building services to nonprofit youth agencies in Boston. The Tank also measured capacity-building outcomes from its workshops, consultancies, and grants. With an MBA in public and nonprofit management, Ellen has served in resource development for twenty years and in program development for thirty-five years, in both secular and faith-based organizations that serve youth in the Boston community. Ellen and her husband Jeff live in Boston; they have two grown sons. She loves coaching young women ...Read More