Krochet Kids International Uses Data to Fight Poverty in Developing Countries

Nonprofit focused on women's empowerment and alleviating poverty uses Tableau for programmatic monitoring and evaluation

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Sep 23, 2014, 09:00 ET

SEATTLE, Sept. 23, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Krochet Kids International, a nonprofit organization focused on empowering women and lifting them out of poverty, is using Tableau to analyze the effectiveness of its programs in developing countries. Krochet Kids has developed an innovative approach to poverty alleviation through job creation, mentorship, and education. The organization is currently working with 180 women in Northern Uganda and Peru.

Women enrolled in Krochet Kids' program work to create hand-crafted attire which is sold in the United States. In addition, they receive high-touch mentorship from locally-based social workers and education on topics such as personal finance, literacy, and healthcare. Tracking each woman's progress in these areas is a critical part of the organization's work, as it lets social workers see precisely how each participant is progressing toward their ultimate goal of empowerment and financial independence. With Tableau, Krochet Kids is able to quantify and analyze the impacts of its work and provide its social workers with data that helps them better assist their mentees.

"Our work with Tableau allows us to have more impact in the developing world," said Adam Thomson, Vice President of Impact at Krochet Kids International. "One critical question we face is: how do you quantify empowerment? With Tableau, we are making data-driven decisions to help us build a better program. And our social workers can see and understand data in an impactful way."

To analyze the progress that each woman is making, Krochet Kids collects data on 45 indicators for every woman in its program, every month. These indicators include economic factors, educational progress, health data, and psycho-social information. Indicators are compiled in Tableau dashboards which are published to a secure server so that the organization's staff, including social workers on the ground, can explore the data and see how each woman is progressing.

"Taking a person from vulnerability to well-being is a complicated process, and Tableau gives us a comprehensive monitoring and analytics system to know if our efforts are working," Thomson said. "We estimate that for every woman we help, five more people are positively impacted. Our focus on data-driven programs has yielded incredible results for the women we work with and their communities."

Exploring its data has already yielded helpful insights for Krochet Kids. Thomson cites the value of being able to see data on how women's lives change over the course of their program. For instance, in year one of the program data shows that participants typically improve in basic budgeting skills, and in areas like clean water and safe food consumption. By year three, the data begins to show improvement in business development and economic skills.

"We are obsessed with impact," said Thomson. "Tableau is how we leverage that impact to help more people and more communities."

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