January 30, 2017
Written by Steve Schwartz, Tableau Software, Inc.
Chris McFadin needed a bridge.
On one side, the data manager for United Way of Greater Milwaukee & Waukesha County had suburban commuters who came to downtown Milwaukee each day for work.
On the other side, he had a fundraising team that raised over $60 million through workplace campaigns to support 220+ programs at over 110 local nonprofit agencies, providing essential services to people across the greater Milwaukee area.
These were agencies like the AIDS Resource Center of WI, with a program called Lifepoint that provides clean needles, screening, treatment resources, and Narcan to intravenous drug users throughout the community. Many employees from commuter communities assumed that these are “downtown” problems that are left behind at the end of each day.
Chris’s bridge needed to make clear that these issues were not left behind when someone left the office, that LifePoint services were just as necessary in the suburbs as in the city, and that signing up for a monthly donation through United Way helps people in need much closer to home than they realized.
The more Chris explored the services-delivered data, the more he saw an opportunity to build that bridge. “The big question we get (from donors) is: how many people in our neighborhood have we helped?” said Chris.
The United Way data team measures the number of people that benefit from funding, then share insights about this impact with donors. But when people don’t live and work in the same area, the emotional connection to that impact isn’t as strong. The weaker the connection, the less likely someone is to continue to contribute each year.
Chris built the “Who We Help” map as a way of dispelling those myths and strengthening the bond between donors and service providers.
The map shows the number of people benefiting from United Way-funded programs by zip code. The map also works as a filter, allowing anyone to see the specific agencies—what and for how many—are serving that area.
This filtering makes it easy for anyone to see exactly how United Way is making a difference both where they work and live. By slicing the aggregate data by zip code, Chris could make the issues and the interventions personal for everyone.
“People in the suburbs are surprised to see these problems so close to home,” said Chris.
Article originally published on tableau.com on December 13th, 2016. Click here to read the full article.
Learn more about United Way’s impact.