Notes on the Ford's Foundation Organizational Mapping Tool

It is centered on the nonprofit, not the foundation paying for the assessment.

It leaves it to the nonprofit to set priority areas to work on.

Areas are comprehensive, reasonable, adequate, but siloed, disconnected. It tacitly implies that a NP is a collection of ‘areas of work’. There isn’t a unifying theory that brings it all together.

It uses a maturity model that works on a continuum from Minimal to Strong, where each level is clearly defined. This allows the nonprofit to have an idea of what to do to move on to the next level of maturity. JPBerriz CAT has a continuum from level 1 to 5, and then it includes technological maturity and capacity for innovation.

Almost every element can be matched to an element of JPBerriz’s CAT. The maximum expression of competence of each element can be very different in each system. i.e. governance highest level of competence in one system may be different than in the other. This may point to different theories of why every element (e.g. governance) is relevant and important to a nonprofit. Why something is measured and how it is supposed to improve may be significantly different in both tools. This points to philosophical and theoretical differences.