RFP: Dashboard Development

Pathways to Housing PA, a Philadelphia-based nonprofit human services organization celebrating 16 years in 2024, is seeking a consultant to support a dashboard development process. We recently completed our strategic plan, which covers 2024-2029, and would like to explore key metrics for tracking impact and progress in each of our departments and programs, which can ultimately be displayed in a dashboard or dashboards.  

As a $21.5 million organization that has undergone significant growth in the last five years, we want to pay particular attention to our clinical work, community inclusion programming, social enterprises, housing  department, and financial data.  

Priority will be given to consultants who are local to Philadelphia and have experience working with housing and human services organizations. We hope to finalize the plan within eight months.  

Organization Background

In 2008, the City of Philadelphia engaged Pathways to bring its evidence-based Housing First model to Philadelphia to help end chronic homelessness. We currently house more than 550 people in regular apartments across the community, with an unprecedented 85% housing retention rate for participants. These same participants would be considered not housing ready in other programs.

As an alternative to emergency shelter and transitional housing, Pathways’ Housing First model is simple: provide housing without preconditions, and then address underlying issues around mental health, substance use, medical care, and education to welcome people back into the community. In our 16 years of operation, we’ve expanded our offerings to include an onsite Integrated Care Clinic and Community Inclusion Program, the Philadelphia Furniture Bank, Good Haul, Pathways Housing Wellness Corporation, and Work First.

Project Scope  

Pathways to Housing PA has several values that we expect our strategic planning partner to hold as well:

• Empathy
• Inclusion
• Accountability
• Respect
• Collaboration
• Adaptability

It is also important to us that the organization we collaborate with hold diversity, equity, and inclusion at the core of their work with us as we chart a path forward. We support a vibrant, diverse population of individuals and we want to ensure their best interests are priority as we chart a path forward.  

The ideal proposal will support our efforts to examine our existing databases (Credible, an in-house housing database, Salesforce, NetSuite, HSX, NextGen, and an in-house invoicing system) to determine what is currently being tracked and what could/should be tracked moving forward to better display impact and progress. Our intention is to move towards managing via dashboard; the organization has grown too large for the systems we are currently using. The chosen partner will analyze our existing systems and their capacity to fulfill our needs, ensure data is being collected appropriately, make recommendations for data tracking moving forward, and support us with implementing new systems and dashboards.  

Please note that there is a requirement for some meetings/focus groups to be held in person at both of our current locations. This is not 100% virtual work.

We will concurrently be working on a Business Plan project to support us in building on our new strategic plan to identify growth and operational plans for our core business, housing development, social enterprise, and real estate. While issued as a separate RFP, we will consider working with the same organization for both projects if the expertise is present. If different organizations are chosen, cooperation is expected as we are on related paths.

Timeline

The timeline for this project is as follows:  

• August 23, 2024: RFP is announced  
• November 30, 2024: all proposals are due to Pathways to Housing PA
• December 31, 2024: all applicants are informed of their status
• January 1, 2025: project begins
• September 30, 2025: project is completed

Application and Selection Process

Submissions are due by November 30, 2024, and should be submitted to development@pthpa.org. Questions may also be submitted to development@pthpa.org, and we will answer them as quickly as we are able prior to the submission deadline.  

We do not require a specific format or template, but we do ask that all proposals include:  

• Your background and expertise including similar work done for other organizations
• Team members and bios
• Your approach to business planning
• List of deliverables
• Project timeline
• Comprehensive budget, not to exceed $100,000 

The Business Planning RFP can be found here.