What KPIs Should Churches Track?

First, what are “KPIs”?

KPIs are “Key Performance Indicators”. They are the most important data points of your organization when it comes to success. However, they are not all financial related. Even though most will be related to a dollar amount, all organizations would usually have several KPIs that do not.

How do you know what to track?

In general, you want to track the data that would best describe whether your organization is successful or not. Income, expenses, and profit are common, simple financial KPIs. Debt service coverage ratio, months of cash on hand, and number of unique donors are more advanced KPIs for churches.

How can they be useful?

Let’s give a common example that includes a dollar amount data point and non-dollar amount data points:

Most giving softwares show the number of unique donors for each month. Using that number and the amount for General Giving you determine that, on average, each unique donor gives $300 per month. Over the past 12 months the number of unique donors has increased by 5, on average, each month. This will help you be able to forecast future giving and plan accordingly.

The above example is dependent on tracking those numbers on a monthly basis. By doing so you are able to compute averages and identify trends that aid in predicting your financial future.

How We Help

We understand the importance of tracking KPIs. We set up our partners with a custom KPI dashboard that they are able to access at anytime. The dashboard (see example below) is able to show current or historical information. We also work with our partners to figure out what KPIs they should be tracking based on our church knowledge and by assessing their personal mission.