Better polling needed

[Guest]

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[craigbolland]

ATTN KIVA STAFF

This is in relation to the cuttent hot-button topic of loans to US recipients. I am reposting it here, as this is the formal suggestion area.

And also for comment from other lenders here.

I think this debate underlines the fact that indvidual enders have a sense of ownership in the organisation - which is exactly what any community-based organisation needs, of course. Personally, in evaluating this issue, I'd think it is imperative to see a more sophisticated poll of at Kiva Lenders, and a central attempt to get Kiva lenders to participate in that poll (via an email contact from head office or similiar). Thus far, the polls I have seen are extremely crude - do you support it / do you not / are you undecided.

Personally, I think a must-have addition to this is - what country are you from? It would be fascinating to see if support or opposition to this move is concentrated in certain areas or widely distributed.

Please, if you are genuinely seeking our input on this I'd like to see a formal, Kiva-driven attempt to guage the temperature of those who fund and a are responsible for the viability of your organisation.

I'm sure you have people skilled at survey design on-board. But of course a spectrum (strongly disagree to strongly agree) is a more refined tool than a yes/no metric.

The issue of who to lend to is obvously a more granular one, and it does seem that elegibility to be proposed is an issue. So questions unpacking that would be useful. Agree/Disagree about lending to the US is a very different question to Agree/Disagree to lending to an unemployed mother in New Orleans wanting to re-establish a post-Katrina business, as opposed to sponsoring an aspiring, middle class country and western singer.

I think you need much more sophisticated data on this to fully assess the impacts of this move on your organisation and the people it benefits.

[AccountAbility]

ATTN KIVA STAFF
I'm sure you have people skilled at survey design on-board. But of course a spectrum (strongly disagree to strongly agree) is a more refined tool than a yes/no metric.

Craig - Welcome to Kiva Friends. 

While Kiva staff do occasionally visit here, this forum is essentially unrelated to the Kiva organization.  You would need to contact Kiva directly to be sure they receive your message.

The sentence I quoted out of your post was worth commenting on.  Kiva staff is extremely small with low overhead.  I seriously doubt if the internal staff has the capacities you attribute to them, so what you would like to see in a survey might mirror their own wish list but nevertheless be beyond their means.

Dan

[Eva W.]

I agree with Craig, and I for one would be fascinated to see the results of a more detailed poll like the one suggested. I was however also thinking along Dan's post that the Kiva staff might not have enough bandwidth to support such a survey. Sooo, I was thinking that if we can hash out the questions here, I (being a bit of a data monkey) would be happy to research up a free survey hosting service, create the survey, then analyze and share the results. Obviously this wouldn't be as formal as if it was driven by Kiva staff, and I can't say I'm a survey expert by any means... but I've been really interested in the discussion here so far on Kiva's U.S. loans initiative, and would love to see what the numbers from a more detailed survey might look like.

My question now to my fellow Kiva Friends if my proposal has any merit. If I were to set up a more detailed survey re: Kiva's U.S. loans, would you take it? : )

Some of the questions I'd like to see on such a survey include:

- Age (optional)
- Gender (optional)
- Location (City / Country)
- Country of Citizenship (I was originally thinking "ethnicity" which is probably not the right term, but the thought here is to capture if you're an American living abroad in Asia, etc.)
- How long you've been actively involved in Kiva's loans program
- Total amount of $ that you've lent (Not sure if people would find this question awkward to answer...)
- Have you made any loans to any U.S. entrepreneurs? (Yes/No)
- Do you plan to make loans to U.S. entrepreneurs going forward? (Yes/No)
- Would you encourage families/friends to participate in Kiva's U.S. lending initiative? (Yes/No)
- Additional comments

Craig, your point about "eligibility" is interesting, but rather a hard one to quantify in the form of a survey question, so I'm going to stew on this some more...

[Jane Sladen]

Some of the questions I'd like to see on such a survey include:

- Age (optional)
- Gender (optional)
- Location (City / Country)
- Country of Citizenship (I was originally thinking "ethnicity" which is probably not the right term, but the thought here is to capture if you're an American living abroad in Asia, etc.)
- How long you've been actively involved in Kiva's loans program
- Total amount of $ that you've lent (Not sure if people would find this question awkward to answer...)
- Have you made any loans to any U.S. entrepreneurs? (Yes/No)
- Do you plan to make loans to U.S. entrepreneurs going forward? (Yes/No)
- Would you encourage families/friends to participate in Kiva's U.S. lending initiative? (Yes/No)
- Additional comments

I think age and gender are totally irrelevant, eventhough stated as optional.

Location?  Country is enough.

I have dual citizenship!!  Maybe "Country you consider 'home'".

What you have lent doesn't matter.  We all do what we can.

Just some suggestions.... but it definitely needs more work.

Jane Sladen.

[RichardF]

Hi Eva,
Thanks for the offer! 

However, my basic concern at this point is the "Would you lend to people in the U.S.?" question alone misses the confounding issue of "Would you lend to not-so-poor after all people, no matter where they live?"

I've outlined my views on this here and there.
http://www.kivafriends.org/index.php/topic,3922.msg61025.html#msg61025
http://www.kivafriends.org/index.php/topic,3922.msg61085.html#msg61085

If we don't ferret out the difference between objections to posting loans to "not poor enough countries" vs. posting loans to "not poor enough people," then I'm afraid Kiva still wouldn't have much clarity on what's going on.

Not that you or anyone else has said otherwise, this next part is just to clarify my views.  Even though I certainly support learning more about what people think about this, I don't believe this should be thought of like a California-style referendum - let the people decide.  I still believe it's Kiva's job to decide what's important to it as an organization, what it's mission really is, how it's going to pursue that mission, and how its going to communicate and market this mission to the public.  Knowing what its lender base thinks about this hot issue is great market research, but Kiva still needs to be the leader here on what happens next.

[AccountAbility]

I think you make a valid point, Richard. 

In addition, the hard part of interpreting any poll would be that existing lenders obviously were engaging with loans to borrowers who were nearer the bottom of the "working poor".  Some of Kiva's marketing research must include how many would-be lenders would it entice into lending in the US or other more developed areas if they expanded in this direction.

Of course, the corollary research would be how much of their existing lender base would they alienate or put off by such actions (which I guess is the root of all these new threads and posts).

Dan

[craigbolland]

Craig - Welcome to Kiva Friends. 

While Kiva staff do occasionally visit here, this forum is essentially unrelated to the Kiva organization.  You would need to contact Kiva directly to be sure they receive your message.

The sentence I quoted out of your post was worth commenting on.  Kiva staff is extremely small with low overhead.  I seriously doubt if the internal staff has the capacities you attribute to them, so what you would like to see in a survey might mirror their own wish list but nevertheless be beyond their means.

Dan

Thanks for that, mate! Kiva have mentioned in their latest blog post that they are indeed auditing this site at the moment to test the temperature around this issue.

The point you make about staff limitations is a good one. Surely from the lender base they could source some assistance, though? I'm an academic and would be glad to design and host (if needed) an impartial survey (as I'm in favour of the idea of US loans in principle, with some caveats related to the demographics being funded). I do think that a democratic way to engage the lender community is sorely needed here, with good data to inform the evaluation of the pilot.

[craigbolland]

I agree with Craig, and I for one would be fascinated to see the results of a more detailed poll like the one suggested. I was however also thinking along Dan's post that the Kiva staff might not have enough bandwidth to support such a survey. Sooo, I was thinking that if we can hash out the questions here, I (being a bit of a data monkey) would be happy to research up a free survey hosting service, create the survey, then analyze and share the results. Obviously this wouldn't be as formal as if it was driven by Kiva staff, and I can't say I'm a survey expert by any means... but I've been really interested in the discussion here so far on Kiva's U.S. loans initiative, and would love to see what the numbers from a more detailed survey might look like.

My question now to my fellow Kiva Friends if my proposal has any merit. If I were to set up a more detailed survey re: Kiva's U.S. loans, would you take it? : )

Some of the questions I'd like to see on such a survey include:

- Age (optional)
- Gender (optional)
- Location (City / Country)
- Country of Citizenship (I was originally thinking "ethnicity" which is probably not the right term, but the thought here is to capture if you're an American living abroad in Asia, etc.)
- How long you've been actively involved in Kiva's loans program
- Total amount of $ that you've lent (Not sure if people would find this question awkward to answer...)
- Have you made any loans to any U.S. entrepreneurs? (Yes/No)
- Do you plan to make loans to U.S. entrepreneurs going forward? (Yes/No)
- Would you encourage families/friends to participate in Kiva's U.S. lending initiative? (Yes/No)
- Additional comments

Craig, your point about "eligibility" is interesting, but rather a hard one to quantify in the form of a survey question, so I'm going to stew on this some more...

Hey Eva.

Great work. I have to admit I'd feel uncomfortable doing this without the sanction of Kiva itself - although they don't seem to have problems with existing polls thusfar. The advantage of having Kiva on board would be, of course, a likely higher participation rate and a more representative sample of replies. Also, it would be really good to know what data would be especially useful for Kiva itself in assessing their new initiative. I'll contact them and specifically alert them to this thread.

Failing that dialogue (Kiva, please do reply here), I think yours is a really good idea.

So, to workshop the proposal:

- Age (optional)
- Gender (optional)

I agree that these first two are probably largely irrelevant. And keeping it as short and core as possible is important.

- Location (City / Country)
- Country of Citizenship (I was originally thinking "ethnicity" which is probably not the right term, but the thought here is to capture if you're an American living abroad in Asia, etc.)

Agree that city probably isn't needed. Good thinking to make this differentiation between location and ex-pats. Maybe if this latter is a text field rather than a drop-down it would allow people with dual citizenship to specify - although crunching text is harder, of course, due to spelling inaccuracies, etc.) Maybe the most elegant solution is drop-down for both, with the option to multiple select? (Country of Citizenship - select more than one if a dual citizen)

- How long you've been actively involved in Kiva's loans program

Again, good as this would de-facto capture people who have joined since the new initiative - if the data shows that they are largely in support of the initiative, then it would be reasonable to conclude that these may be new lenders attracted to the site since the announcement of the US loans. There was certainly a membership spike after the announcement.

- Total amount of $ that you've lent (Not sure if people would find this question awkward to answer...)

Hmmm. A sticky one. personally I think this is useful data, in that it will allow analysis of how prolific lenders as opposed to one-off lenders. I do agre that we all do what we can, but clearly prolific lenders are more useful organisationally than someone eho made one loan in 2007. Maybe number of loans made, rather than a dollar amount? The former also demonstrates a level of engagement with the community and is easier data for a user to locate. It also may more accurately measure enthusiasm for the Kiva concept rather than an individual's wealth.

I might drop one here, because it's useful social data if nothing else:

- Are you more interested in lending to certain geographical areas than others (Yes/No/Sometimes)

- Have you made any loans to any U.S. entrepreneurs? (Yes/No)
- Do you plan to make loans to U.S. entrepreneurs going forward? (Yes/No)

I think the latter is off the mark. I'd be a 'maybe' in that category. Perhaps 'Might you consider' rather than 'do you plan' and include an undecided option.

As you mention, the sticky bit is getting granular information about what the lower-level issues with lending to the US are. So, as a first stab:

Do you have concerns about lending to US entrepreneurs? (Yes/No)

If yes, please identify your points of concern (drop down list - multiple selection allowed):
I am concerned that lending to US entrepreneurs may mean less funds available to developing countries
I am concerned about the size of the loans being requested
I am concerned about potential ramifications if a larger loan defaults
I am concerned about lending to people who do not seem to be genuinely disadvantaged
I am concerned about the types and nature of loans currently being requested
I am concerned about lending to citizens of what I percieve to be an affluent country
I have other concerns that I will detail in the additional comments section below

(I'm trying to find ways of drilling down into if people have an 'in principal' objection, or merely an objection to the current demographics being represented)

- Would you encourage families/friends to participate in Kiva's U.S. lending initiative? (Yes/No)
- Additional comments

Both good. Some Qualatative feedback definately augments the quantatative.

Now - I am wary of my own agenda creeping in, so all feedback very welcome! Kiva, please do let us know what you think, if it will be useful to you to proceed with this, and if there is any other data that would be useful to you in evaluating your pilot.

[Eva W.]

I very much agree with most of what's been stated so far. Esp. re: Richard, and recalling Matt & Premal's announcement - "Our decision to work in the U.S. is controversial. Over the past few years, one of the top questions asked by our users has been "Why aren't you working in the U.S.?" We've been criticized for helping out entrepreneurs abroad while "ignoring" those in our own backyard (Kiva is based in San Francisco). Thus, long ago, we made a promise to research the idea. It took us nearly four years to get here, but we finally made the move on June 10th." This decision wasn't made lightly by Kiva, and I agree that this poll shouldn't be referendum-like. Especially if this ends up being driven unofficially here, I think the main idea would be to present a different snapshot on what this community thinks at this point in time. (I was also thinking it might be interesting if this poll was conducted again a month or two down the line too see how the community response changes, but anyways...)

I also very much agree w/ Craig about how this would be ideal if it was Kiva-driven. But I'm also geekily excited about this proposed idea and have also been thinking about another possible questions. These might make the scope of this survey really quite broad, but will throw out on the table for consideration and continuation of a good discussion

Firstly to add on to one of the earlier proposed questions:
- Have you made any loans to any U.S. entrepreneurs? (Yes/No)
- If yes, how many? (For more quantification -)

- Do you as a Kiva lender believe that lending to U.S. entrepreneurs is in conflict with Kiva's mission, "to connect people through lending for the sake of alleviating poverty"?
- If yes, why? (Text box)

- How do you define poverty? (This question is probably better suited for a general forum thread, but I feel like people's answers to this isn't always clear + may be a key driver behind people's reactions to U.S. lending.)

Craig I agree w/ your comments on the draft questions, and I really like your "concerns" question!
 

As you mention, the sticky bit is getting granular information about what the lower-level issues with lending to the US are. So, as a first stab:

Do you have concerns about lending to US entrepreneurs? (Yes/No)

If yes, please identify your points of concern (drop down list - multiple selection allowed):
I am concerned that lending to US entrepreneurs may mean less funds available to developing countries
I am concerned about the size of the loans being requested
I am concerned about potential ramifications if a larger loan defaults
I am concerned about lending to people who do not seem to be genuinely disadvantaged
I am concerned about the types and nature of loans currently being requested
I am concerned about lending to citizens of what I percieve to be an affluent country
I have other concerns that I will detail in the additional comments section below

(I'm trying to find ways of drilling down into if people have an 'in principal' objection, or merely an objection to the current demographics being represented)

I think these options are really comprehensive and thoughtful in reflecting many of the concerns that have been posted in other relevant threads.  The only one that leaves me a bit confused is the "I am concerned about the types and nature of loans currently being requested" option, partially because it seems to tie in to some of the other options like "concerned about lending to people who do not seem to be genuinely disadvantaged" or "concern about size of loans requested." To give a possible/random scenario... would this option be for people who may for some reason have a problem with (giving a random scenario here) lending $25 to a U.S. entrepreneur for a camera vs. $25 to a Cambodian entrepreneur for livestock? I'm just not quite sure what "types and nature" mean here.

[craigbolland]

Hey all. Just an update on this.

Good karma to all of us for our hourable intentions

I've held off on commenting here again until hearing back about how Kiva feels about the notion. I still feel that the current survey is a blunt instrument, but Kiva are monitoring the qualitative data coming through the discussions here and are also looking at lending trend analysis as part of their standard practices. So, the vibe I get is that while they're not saying don't do the poll, that are happy with the level and type of data that they are getting.

I'm of the opinion that if Kiva doesn't find this idea to have merit or particular use to them, then I'll withdraw my involvement from it. But a special thanks to Eva for her intelligent and thoughtful work on this. I like your style!

So that is now my 2c.

[Jan & John]

thanks Craig.
everyone at Kiva Friends has different interests / involvements / pet peeves ...etc...

it's because of people like you, offering knowledge and suggestions, that Kiva will continue to be the success that it is.

and Dan with the TOU, and Ian with the spreadsheets, and Diane on the liason job and Kay with her quiet words of wisdom now and then and Mona with her drawing us in to do more... I can go on and on and on...

and I don't doubt that the Kiva staff are listening but so very very busy all the time

jan

[linaka]

Sorry I'm coming in late on this discussion but better late than never (unless I'm "too late" on this one - sorry again!)

I'm not a "survey expert" but I have completed a dozen or so statistics and methodology classes (yikes!), including survey research, so I have maybe one & a half cents to contribute to the discussion.  I do think the idea of conducting surveys is a good one - but they need to be carefully designed and kept SHORT to be effective - if a piece of data isn't relevant, don't ask for it. That is, if there isn't going to be a multivariate analysis correlating attitudes, number of loans or other survey items with age, gender, location or any other criteria, or if it isn't going to produce USEFUL information, don't ask.

Surveys should start with a well-defined research question - something you are trying to determine and make sure it is free of bias before going further. Then analyze each question to see how it relates to the research issue.

Instead of "Country of Citizenship" or "Ethnicity," why not "Country of origin" if that's relevant - people who have moved to another country have a different perspective than those who have lived only one place. It might be just as interesting to know about, let's say, Cambodians living in California as a Californian living in Cambodia. However, the main issue is whether this is going to be USEFUL rather than "interesting" and how will this data be used in the overall research design?

I would suggest that if you want relevant and useful data that is VALID, be sure to eliminate all bias in questions. For instance, "I am concerned about lending to people who do not seem to be genuinely disadvantaged" is a fairly leading question - I made me think "Well, duh, none of us want to loan to someone who wants to refinish the teak in their yacht" but the term "genuinely disadvantaged" is very relative and cannot be determined simply by looking at the country they are located, in most cases.

For instance, a lot of people seem to think capital is readily available in the United States - IT IS NOT, especially for small-time borrowers!! It can actually be easier to get a loan for millions of dollars than it is for $3500, although most individuals are finding that it's just not easy to get loans at all these days, regardless of what may have been the case in the past. So is the research issue proximity to wealthy people or personal circumstances relative to the surroundings? I have no way of knowing whether someone in Peru is the "richest person in town" or one of the poorest when I see their loan on Kiva - so is the real question one of determining individual poverty level or is it simply an anti-US bias? All of that needs to be worked out as part of the research design before starting on the survey!!

There also seems to be the perception that housing, medical care, food and economic opportunities abound here, which is the truth for some but absolutely not for all US residents. Right now we are in the middle of a terrible recession and many who never experienced hardship before have become desperate and we can't judge others by a superficial perception. So are we trying to determine whether an unemployed person who is living in their recent year Honda Odyssey van with 4 kids after they lost their home to foreclosure because they were unable to find a job after they were laid off might be less needy than someone in Uganda who has a home, food and clothing but wants to buy more cows? It's not something that ANY of us can determine by superficial examination so questions like that seem designed to promote an agenda rather than actually discover facts. A good research design needs to eliminate preconceived ideas or assumptions to produce valid results.

The same can be said about many of the "concerns" questions that have been mentioned - each of us has our own idea of what might be a concern! Whether it's type of business, location, amount of loan or something else about how it's structured, there are probably a million reasons why each of us might choose to skip over another loan. If we REALLY want to discover a truth, we need to be very careful about how the survey questions are structured and whether they will reveal the answer to the primary research question. It may take MANY surveys to gather information and still not be enough to result in legitimate answers. For instance, do we want to include questions about whether Kiva loans should be used to fund pubs? Or polygamists? Do we want to ask about any of the million other things that are "of concern" to "someone" out there!! [No intent to offend anyone by picking those two examples - I just wanted to point out that we need to know how much truth we are searching for when we design the research project - so do we want to know ALL concerns lenders have or are we simply trying to get more information about a select few?]

A good survey should also have a very clear idea of how the data is going to be analyzed - it's not an easy task to accomplish that, which is why open-ended questions like "how do you define poverty" could result in a nightmare task of analysis. Maybe a discussion board "focus group" could generate a list of criteria for poverty definition and a survey could include a check-box option to rank them - survey participants often like to have an "other" category where they can "fill in the blank" but that may not produce useful results, depending on the research question and proposed analysis. But the further issue on this is whether the data is USEFUL - we may determine a generalized definition of poverty but that is just the beginning of the next research issue - for instance, if we determine that "being hungry" is part of the definition, we probably need to go further to determine just what "hungry" means, how frequently "hungry" is experienced and maybe what the reasons for the hunger are. And once we have all the definitions pinned down, how will the same definition be applied to all loan applicants and is that an issue for Kiva itself, individual lenders or for the MFIs? And how will we know if each individual borrower meets our definition of "poverty" once it's established? Are we going to request a detailed credit report or continue accepting the recommendation of the MFIs that loans are worthy and the judgment of Kiva that each MFI uses "proper" criteria for their loans. These are all the types of issues that are relevant to creating a USEFUL study - otherwise, it's just promoting yet-another political agenda.

I would suggest finding a survey expert to help (and before anybody even thinks the thought, I'd love to have the time to do it but I'm way too overloaded to tackle a project like this)

Good luck with the survey and may we all continue in our quest for better lives!