New Profit is a non-profit organization that seeks to combine the principles of venture capital and social impact to create systems change by investing in innovative, high-impact organizations. New Profit’s unique model provides unrestricted funds over multiple years to grant recipients and capacity building support to organizational leaders called social entrepreneurs.
Research for Action (RFA) was contracted to conduct an evaluation of New Profit’s capacity building supports, which includes: 1) one-to-one supports from New Profit’s Deal Partners who provide strategic advising to social entrepreneurs and 2) one-to-many group events and activities that offer content as well as opportunities for networking and collaboration with other social entrepreneurs and non-profit organizations. RFA also explored the impact of New Profit’s capacity building on organizational growth and social entrepreneur perceptions of New Profit as a funder and capacity builder. To understand these perceptions, RFA conducted qualitative interviews and administered a survey to social entrepreneurs from New Profit’s grant recipients and provided internal reports to New Profit.