GiveDirectly staff across Kenya and Uganda are working hard to send cash transfers to thousands of families each month. Over the last several months, we are actually tracking ahead of our current enrollment budgets for our standard rolling cash transfer campaign for 2016. Right now, we are ahead of these enrollment goals by ~18%.
What does that mean? First it’s good news because it signals that we’re realizing productivity gains in the field beyond what we’d planned for at the beginning of the year. We budget resources based on past speed of enrollment per staff member, and tracking so far ahead of pace means that our staff are working more quickly and efficiency than we expected this year.
Second, it means that the marginal impact of your donation matters even more because we may need to slow down enrollment for a period of time to maintain efficiency. Your decision about whether or not to give this holiday season can make the difference between whether or not a GiveDirectly field officer is helping the poor or not, and we hope you consider this when you’re making your charitable decisions this year.