THE McKINSEY QUARTERLY 2001 NUMBER 2
106
programs to counter the most criti- cal threats to environmental health in particular places (Exhibit 3). If the organization meets these two goals in all its project areas, it will ultimately have a lasting, positive impact on biodiversity. One of the benefits of this approach is that microlevel goals can be simple and clear. The mission of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation (CBF) is to preserve the health of the Chesapeake estuary. In 1995, CBF worked out nine indicators of the bay’s health, such as water clarity, levels of dissolved oxygen, migratory fish populations, and the size of the surrounding wetlands. It collected baseline data for each indicator and then set specific ten-year targets rep- resenting significant progress for the bay. The power of this approach lies in its simplicity: government agencies already collect information about the
E X H I B I T 3
Assessing mission success: Mixed results
The Nature Conservancy’s self-reported measure of mission success across all US sites, 2000, percent of sites
Very good Poor 100% = 62 sites Aggregate biodiversity health 2 6
Different conservation targets—such as the quality of the terrain or plant life—are measured at each site. Targets are ranked according to size, condition, and landscape context on a scale from very good to poor.
Fair
42
50
Good
100% = 62 sites Aggregate threat
Each site is surveyed for levels of threat to the conservation targets. Threats are ranked on a scale from very high to low. Examples of threats include: • Alien, invasive species • Rise in sea level • Road construction • Home, resort development
Low
1
Medium
22
Very high
40
37
High
Source: The Nature Conservancy
nine indicators, at no cost in time or money to CBF. The general public and potential donors easily understand the indicators: adding 125,000 acres of wetlands to the bay’s watershed by 2005 is quite clear. CBF’s president holds an annual press conference to issue a report card on the bay’s health, thus increasing public awareness and mobilizing support. If CBF reaches its goal for each of the nine indicators, it will have met its broader objective of pre- serving the health of the bay. What about organizations with more ambiguous and ambitious social goals? Preventing cancer and reducing the anguish and deaths from it are far more difficult tasks. How can the American Cancer Society (ACS) distinguish between its impact and the effect of the many other variables that influence cancer rates? The management of ACS reasoned that it doesn’t matter who deserves credit for any decline in cancer rates. What does matter is that ACS should use its own resources in the most effective possible way. It has thus set specific goals: reducing cancer mortality rates by 50 percent and the over- all incidence of cancer by 25 percent as of 2015. Because empirical research
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