Yesterday, Ascendant hosted a nonprofit and government networking breakfast that was focused on performance management. Over 80 people confirmed their attendance, and Dr. David Norton, creator of the Balanced Scorecard, gave a keynote address.

The session started with 30 minutes of networking over a hot breakfast at the Hotel Monaco. Laura Downing, Partner at Ascendant, then facilitated a discussion about key challenges facing nonprofits and agencies. Participants shared their experiences with others at their tables and then reported back to the overall group. If I recall correctly, the final vote winner was "Ensuring organization capacity for growth" as the biggest challenge.

David Norton then spoke for 45 minutes about the Balanced Scorecard and gave many different nonprofit and government agency examples. We had a lively Q&A session following Dr. Norton's presentation. It was exciting to see that about 20% of the attendees were CEO/President/Executive Directors, and many of them brought their leadership teams to learn more about implementing the performance management framework.

The feedback from the event was overwhelmingly positive, and we are looking forward to engaging the nonprofit community more on the subject of performance management.