Barbara G. Wheeler

(Illustration by iStock/wildpixel) Many organizations claim to value people who “think differently.” Innovation, independent thinking, and challenging assumptions are celebrated in mission statements and leadership rhetoric. Yet the systems these organizations rely on to hire, evaluate, and promote employees often systematically filter out the very people most likely to think differently. Nowhere is this contradiction clearer than in how workplaces treat autistic individuals.

There’s arguably no group more in need of free AI tools and expert staff embedded to deploy them than the nonprofit sector. While the dissolution of USAID and other funding cuts exacerbate growing global demands to address public health, economic opportunity, and climate-related challenges, NGOs and social impact organizations are underwater, triaging widespread and complex needs against limited capacity.

(Illustration by iStock/Viktoria Kurpas) A few years ago, I argued in this SSIR article that strategic capacity building and trust-based philanthropy are not opposing ideas. Funders do not have to choose between being responsive, relationship-centered partners and offering hands-on support that helps nonprofits strengthen as organizations. But as capacity building has become a more common part of philanthropy, another question has become harder to avoid: How do we know whether it works?