Department of Management Studies, The University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus, Barbados.
Eval Program Plann. 2021 Dec;89:101985. doi: 10.1016/j.evalprogplan.2021.101985. Epub 2021 Aug 10.
Data are the lifeblood of decision-making and provide a critical component into the complex mosaic from which decisions emerge. Evaluators and decision-makers should, therefore, continuously seek to explore the use of tools that can produce more meaningful, insightful, and useful data so that decision-making can be enhanced and improved. Traditional economic appraisal methods offer much and are very useful and relevant. Standard financial accounting reporting for tax purposes also provide insightful information on the organization's financial health and that of its individual programs. However, neither offer insight into cost behavior-an important consideration for making program operations more efficient and for long-term strategic planning, forecasting, and design of program operations. Before COVID-19, programs were already challenged with competition for donor dollars and the pursuit for financial sustainability. The COVID-19 environment has considerably exacerbated these challenges. In this current environment, it is more important than ever for nonprofits to optimize limited financial resources to do more societal good. This paper will illustrate how selected concepts from cost and management accounting can be used by both independent program evaluators to improve their recommendations, as well as program administrators in-charge of nonprofits to enhance decision-making.
数据是决策的命脉，为决策的复杂组合提供了关键部分。因此，评估人员和决策者应不断寻求探索使用能够产生更有意义、更有洞察力和更有用的数据的工具，以增强和改进决策。传统的经济评估方法提供了很多，非常有用和相关。出于纳税目的的标准财务会计报告也提供了有关组织财务状况及其各个项目的深入信息。然而，两者都没有深入了解成本行为——这对于提高项目运营效率和进行长期战略规划、预测和项目运营设计都非常重要。在 COVID-19 之前，项目已经面临着争夺捐赠资金和追求财务可持续性的挑战。COVID-19 的环境使这些挑战大大加剧。在当前的环境下，非营利组织优化有限的财务资源以实现更多的社会效益比以往任何时候都更为重要。本文将说明成本和管理会计的一些概念如何可供独立的项目评估人员使用，以改进他们的建议，以及负责非营利组织的项目管理人员使用，以增强决策能力。
