Heart, Soul & Data

Heart, Soul & Data

By Alexandra ManneringsBusinessScienceTechnologyNon-Profit
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Heart, Soul & Data episodes

  • 22: Getting Started with Analytics with Julius Bogdan

    Getting started with analytics in your team or organization can seem incredibly daunting. My guest today shares about both the nitty gritty of the analytic journey as well as the overarching big picture to keep you oriented on where you are going. The good news is that you are most likely not starting from complete ground zero - every organization has data of some kind, whether it's transaction data, client management data, volunteer hours, or something else. After all, everything we do these days creates data. The trick is intentionally harnessing that data to transform.

    Before you get started building the next shiny thing, make sure you understand three fundamental pieces of your organization:

    1. Where are you currently? What data and analytics already exist inside your organization?
    2. What is the data culture of your organization or team? What are the current data literacy skills, data decision-making frameworks, and desire for using data?
    3. Are you currently getting decent ROI out of the analytics/data systems that are already in place? Why or why not?

      4. Julius Bogdan is a reformed technologist turned healthcare executive who is passionate about improving health outcomes, equity, and access for everyone. In his current role at HIMSS (Healthcare Information Management and Systems Society), he focuses on digital health transformation, analytics, and driving outcomes through the power of information and technology.

      Find and follow Julius on LinkedIn!

      37 min
    4. 21: Let's Ditch Overhead Ratios with Dr. Thad Calabrese of NYU Wagner

      What we measure matters, and we don't always measure the more impactful things. In today's episode, Dr. Thad Calabrese of NYU Wagner explains how destructive tracking overhead ratios can be to nonprofits, and how the sector is starting to move towards impact evaluation. More funders are looking to spend dollars based on outcomes achieved, rather than simply the proportion of funding that's spent on programs as currently required by accounting standards and the IRS. In order to define this, we need to define what our outcomes even are, then find ways of tracking our progress towards those outcomes - which is not a simple task. 

      Dr. Thad Calabrese studies public and nonprofit financial management, broadly focusing on the management and governance of public and not-for-profit organizations, as well as the institutions that affect managerial decision-making in these entities. His research has appeared numerous journals, textbooks, and other publications. Thad was awarded the Editors' Prize for Best Scholarly Paper in Nonprofit Management & Leadership for 2013. Prior to academia, Thad worked in the New York City Office of Management and Budget in tax policy and also as a financial consultant working with nonprofit organizations in New York City.

      51 min
    5. 20: Grow Your Survey Superpowers with Kristin Williams of NineteenEleven
      If you do any kind of surveys, this episode is a must-listen for you. Learn how to avoid critical mistakes in what questions you chose, how you word them, the order you ask them, and the type of question format you select. Surveys are a critical source of data for organizations that serve a community, because they are one of the best ways of getting information straight from the source. But too often we don't invest enough time and skills into the survey itself. Today's guest helps us solve that. 
      You can also check out her tips and tricks on survey writing here!
      Dr. Kristin N. Williams is a professional sociologist with more than 15 years of social science research experience. Trained in both quantitative and qualitative methods, Kristin offers a comprehensive approach to community engagement and research.
      Kristin served as the first Planning Engagement Coordinator for the City of Raleigh. During her tenure, she managed the creation of an engagement playbook, standardized the use of quality surveys, and initiated innovative outreach strategies. She continues this work at PublicInput.com, assisting clients with outreach best practices.
      Through NineteenEleven Consulting, Kristin works with local, state, and federal agencies to:
      Create and implement Public Involvement Plans,
      Draft surveys to produce meaningful data,
      Conduct focus groups and interviews that ask the right questions, and
      Analyze quantitative and qualitative data to maximize insights garnered through outreach. 
      Looking to learn more about surveys? Kristin recommends the Pew Research Center's introduction to survey writing: https://www.pewresearch.org/our-methods/u-s-surveys/writing-survey-questions/
      When you're ready for something a little more advanced, consider Harvard's Program on Survey Research. They host a comprehensive collection of survey-related materials, including tips on how to tell a good survey contractor from a bad one: https://psr.iq.harvard.edu/book/psr-resources
      And finally, Kristin's go-to book is "The Complete Guide to Writing Questionnaires: How to Get Better Information for Better Decisions" by David F. Harris.
      51 min
    6. 19: All Payer Claims Databases with Julia Tremaroli
      Capturing healthcare, from doctor's visits to prescription fills and everything in between, is a daunting task. Turning all those events and details in usable data is even harder. Today we explore one such endeavor with the Center for Improving Value in Health Care - CIVHC for short. They have the responsibility of running the All Payer Claims Database (APCD) here in Colorado.
      Never heard of an APCD before? Well, that's why we're talking to Julia Tremaroli today. She works for CIVHC as a health care data analyst, and is a wealth of knowledge on all things APCD. Listen in to hear how you might be able to use a state APCD to help your organization, even if you aren't an analyst yourself. 
      And if you haven't yet listened to Ep. 17 on health claims data, I highly recommend you check it out next! Julia does a great job introducing what claims data are, and we go deep in the weeds in Ep. 17 to explore how claims come to be. 
      Then head over to CIVHC to check out their publicly available dashboards already analyzed just for you!
      Julia Tremaroli has worked as a health care data analyst for the Colorado All Payer Claims Database (COAPCD) at the Center for Improving Value in Health Care (CIVHC) for the last four years. Day-to-day, she engages data submitters to ensure their submissions to the CO APCD are timely, accurate, and high-quality. She also works as an analyst on several projects that utilize data from the CO ACPD, including many analyses that support state agencies and governing bodies to achieve the Triple Aim of lower costs, higher-quality care, and healthier people. Julia has a degree from the University of Denver in Business Information and Analytics. She enjoys jigsaw puzzles, snuggling with her cat, and eating sushi.
      33 min
    7. 18: Data Viz Engagement with Alli Torban
      Too often we think that if we make a decent data visualization, it's a guarantee that people will stop, look, and listen. There's a big chasm between information and action. The bridge across that chasm is engagement. The brilliant Alli Torban joins me today to explore how we can more effectively address engagement with interventions targeted for the particular kind of audience you're trying to reach. Those four audience types, and what you can do to engage them, are:
      Interested & Focused (e.g. a board director reading an annual report): Reduce the friction with clean, approachable charts and clear information. No "chart junk"!
      Interested & Distracted/Overwhelmed (e.g. a CEO or Executive Director): "What's in it for me?" - put the viewer at the center of the chart by highlighting what they specifically need to know.
      Disinterested & Focused (e.g. a reader of a general magazine, a high-net worth donor seeking a fitting recipient): Offer a "welcoming gesture." Make your chart inviting, artistic, or story-driven. This is data art - engaging in its own sake.
      Disinterested & Distracted (everyone on social media!): It has to be eye-catching, tastefully animated, entertaining, unique or unusual. Stop the scroll! Check out the fascinating animated chart I reference here.
      Alli Torban is an Information Design Consultant in Washington, D.C. where she helps researchers get more engagement with their work by creating data visualizations, infographics, and data art. She's worked with clients like P&G, Axios, Michael J Fox Foundation, and Data Literacy. Alli is also the host of the popular podcast Data Viz Today, which has been downloaded over 150,000 times. In her spare time, she loves designing tessellations and reading to her two young daughters. Find her at www.allitorban.com or on Twitter and Instagram with @allitorban.
      32 min
    8. 17: A Goldmine of Health Data with Lindy Nichols
      The complex, highly-charged process of converting healthcare you receive into a dollar amount has generated not just decades of heated political debates but also a standard way of recording healthcare activities and health information. Have you ever received a bill from your doctor and seen weird codes like 99201 or R05.9 next to the descriptions of your visit? These codes are captured on something called billing claims. Billing claims first purpose is to justify a request for payment from an insurance company for providing healthcare, but they also offer a vast and often untapped source of healthcare data. 
      Using internationally standard codes called "ICD-10", billing claims can capture past medical history like tobacco use, current healthcare needs like symptoms or accidents, and procedures from sutures to organ transplants. These codes explain and justify why certain care was provided to a patient. Additional codes called "CPT codes" offer a bridge from that situation and care to standard activities with associated financial charges. 
      So why should you care about this, besides trying to understand your next medical bill? These claims can be used to track everything from opioid overdoses to impacts of a medical food nonprofit program. If you work anywhere in the health, wellness, or healthcare space, understanding exactly what claims data contain and can offer you is critical. And even if you don't - governments, companies, and nonprofits across the county are using these claims are being in research, policy, and more. If you want to better interpret and be aware of the benefits and limitations of this rich datasource, this podcast will help answers your questions.
      If you're ready to jump into claims data, be sure to tune into an upcoming episode on state all-payer claims databases.
      Lindy Nichols is a Certified Professional Coder for the Denver Health and Hospital Authority in Denver, Colorado. Her decade of experience in the medical coding space combined with her approachable discussions make her a fabulous resource to understanding the power - and danger - of claims data.
      33 min
    9. 16: Intro to Analytics Types with Pier Bobys from Alteryx
      "Analytics" is a very broad term - what can it cover? What are different kinds of analytics that we can do, and when should we use each type? Come learn about all the cool things you can do with analytics from the dynamic and approachable Pier Bobys!
      Pier Bobys is currently a Solutions Consultant in the Alteryx Center of Excellence.  She began her career over 20 years ago as a SAS programmer/consultant where she worked on a variety of projects, ranging from marketing analysis at Time magazine and American Express, to fraud detection at the IRS and the FBI.  She switched into sales engineering mid-career at IBM where she helped sell SPSS to various agencies in the Federal government.  Prior to joining Alteryx she was a sales engineer at SAP where her primary responsibility was to sell SAP Predictive Analytics to the commercial sector.  She holds an MBA from Georgetown University and a MS in Biostatistics from the University of Pittsburgh’s School of Public Health.
      46 min
    10. 15: Small Shop Data with Rachel Bearbower
      If you wanted to hear from someone who's walked in your shoes, look no farther than today's guest. As a previous solo executive director of a nonprofit and an entrepreneur, Rachel Bearbower bravely shares the mistakes she's made with data and how we can learn from them. 
      The first takeaway from our conversation was the challenge of balancing two seemingly opposing truths: 1) you don't need ALL THE DATA, and 2) data are incredibly valuable. The trick is to first find the mission-critical pieces by identifying the goals of your team or organization and the necessary information to achieve those - and focus on getting that and ONLY that data. Then you must be willing to invest resources in order to collect, analyze, share, and act on that data.
      When you're ready to take the next step with data, Rachel's concept of "stabilize, optimize, expand" will guide you well. While this applies to everything you might attempt in your organization, it is especially important when it comes to getting started with data. Pick a particular goal or need that you can tackle right now, and determine what data you need for that and whether you can safely collect, store, and process that data. Once you have the basics in place, work on streamlining and automating that analytic process. Only then should you try to tackle a new data process.
      Rachel Bearbower is the CEO/Founder of Small Shop Strategies. She is also a fundraiser and former ED. She has been in the trenches of an underfunded, limited resource, system-less organization, and the stress, overwhelm and frustration it can cause. This is why Rachel is the one you turn to for systems, structure, and a plan. When all of these are in place, she promises you’ll have more time to serve those who mean most to your organization and raise the funds needed to keep moving your mission forward.
      You can find Rachel at:
      Instagram:: https://www.instagram.com/smallshopstrategies
      LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachelbearbower/
      Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/smallshopstrategies
      One thing you can do right now: Standardize how you collect people's names! This one mistake causes so many headaches for Rachel's clients and other organizations. Just make sure that names are always collected the same way (all in one field? First and last name in separate fields?), same order, and same formatting.
      And if you want to claim back some time from all the "where DID I put that file?!" you can try out Rachel's guide to file organization: www.smallshopstrategies.com/fileforfun
      38 min
    11. 14: Don't Fly with Blinders On
      Would you get in an airplane if the pilot had no idea where he was flying to, had no fuel gauge, and wasn't sure which lever was the accelerator and which was the rudder? Probably not. But we take off with our organizations all the time not knowing these things. In today's episode, I share my PLANE framework for the essential data that you need to succeed.
      This episode has a free worksheet that you can download here if you'd like to follow along with the framework for your own organization. No pressure though! You can always just listen first and come back later to the worksheet. If you want to see an example completed worksheet, I filled one in for Merakinos that you can download here. I'm laying it all out there for you :) 
      Step three in the framework, Aviate, is a bit tricky to explain with no visuals. So I made up some example flows! You can download one specifically for a nonprofit here. You'll also get a bonus data flight plan example as well.
      52 min
    12. 13: Confirmation Bias with Dr. Rick Kamins, Psychologist
      Just in time for Thanksgiving arguements about politics, I bring you today's episode on the mistakes we make in interpreting or even hearing data that don't agree with the way we see the world. 
      Dr. Rick Kamins is a clinical psychologist with decades of experience in therapy and managed health care. He's an award-winning teacher, a deep font of knowledge on how we function as thinking humans, and also my dad. I'm honored and lucky to be able share a piece of his wisdom with you in this interview.
      Happy Thanksgiving to you all!
      43 min

    About Heart, Soul & Data

    From the publisher's feed

    It takes more than heart and soul to change the world - you also need data. Learn how to measure what matters to drive impact, no matter how 'small' your nonprofit is. Dr. Alexandra Mannerings brings experts from every corner of the public good sector and beyond to have approachable, actionable conversations about how to take your next step with analytics, especially if you don't fancy yourself a 'data person'.