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How Large NGOs Are Using Data to Transform Themselves

Harvard Business Review

and globally, and Habitat for Humanity, which works in 70-plus nations to provide home construction, rehabilitation, and increased access to shelter and financing, gathered data from their sites to make the case for profound change. A critical part was adapting a proven model in a related field: microfinance.

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Funders Can Give More than Money

Harvard Business Review

In 2012 the world's problems grew more complex, but America's top 400 charities saw very little growth in their resources to address them. Six years ago, David and Donna Allman approached Opportunity with an idea that fell outside our traditional microfinance model: to build a Community Economic Development (CED) program in Nicaragua.

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Entrepreneurs: You're More Important Than Your Business Plan

Harvard Business Review

As Amar Bhide said in " Bootstrap Finance: The Art of Start-ups " (a 20-year-old HBR article that is an uncanny precursor to today's "lean startup" meme), traditional business planning processes are less relevant to bootstrappers — where resilience trumps planning and energy trumps experience. In short, the business plan is overrated.