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Reporting key terms and concepts

This article explains the key terms used throughout Reporting and how they fit together. It's written for readers who may not have a background in impact reporting.

The big picture

Reporting has two sides:

  • Who and when: programs, organizations, reporting cycles, reporting periods, and report submissions. These decide who reports, how often, and what they send back.
  • What you ask: questions, question groups, and forms. These are the content organizations respond to.

Who and when

Program

A theme or portfolio, such as "Climate Fund," that brings together your grants or investments, the organizations you support, and the impact they report. Programs stay the same from year to year, even as reporting inside them changes.

Organization

Any entity on the platform, whether a funder, investor, grantee, or portfolio company. Organizations can play different roles: some request reports, some respond to them, and some do both.

Reporting cycle

A data collection effort for a program, with a set start and end. A reporting cycle:

  • defines which organizations participate and how often they report
  • contains one or more reporting periods
  • can last one year or several, depending on the program

Reporting period

One collection window within a reporting cycle. For example, a one-year cycle with quarterly reporting has four periods: Q1, Q2, Q3, and Q4.

  • Each participating organization sends one submission per reporting period.
  • Each period has its own set of forms, which can go to all organizations or only some.
Reporting window

The date range that the reported data covers. For example, a Q1 period's reporting window might be January 1 to March 31.

  • You set a start date and an end date for each reporting period.
  • It describes the time the data is about, not when organizations fill out the report.
Submission window

The dates when organizations can complete and submit their report. It has an open date and a due date.

  • Organizations get access to the report when the submission window opens.
  • The default dates apply to every organization in the reporting period.
  • The submission window often opens after the reporting window ends, so organizations can report on a period that has already happened.

Report submission

One organization's complete response for a reporting period.

  • It includes all the forms that organization received. Even if there are several forms, they're submitted together at once.
  • After it's submitted, you can approve it or request changes.
  • Only approved submissions appear in analytics and aggregate reporting.

What you ask

Question

The smallest building block. Each question is a single prompt with a defined response type, such as short answer, numeric, single select, or file upload, and captures a single data point.

Question group

A reusable cluster of related questions. A question group can include logic that shows or hides questions based on prior answers within the same group.

Question library

Your organization's collection of all its questions and question groups. Questions can be created in the question library, a form, or a report. Wherever a question is created, it's always added to the question library.

Form

A set of questions and question groups used together as part of a report. A form can include conditional logic that shows or hides questions or entire question groups based on earlier answers. A form on its own isn't sent to anyone. You choose who receives it when you add it to a reporting period.

Report

What you build to send forms to organizations. When you create a report, you choose its program and how often it repeats, which sets up its reporting cycle and periods.

How the concepts fits together

  • A question can belong to zero, one, or many question groups.
  • Question groups are created and managed only in the question library.
  • A question group is complete and indivisible. Its questions and their order travel together wherever the group is used.
  • Forms can include individual questions, question groups, or both.

Think of it like this: A question is a single line on a tax form. A question group is a section of related lines, like "income" or "deductions." A form is the blank tax form itself. A reporting period is the tax year, and a report submission is your filed return: several forms, sent in together as one filing.

Design once, deploy many times

This structure lets you build content once and reuse it. You can update a question's wording over time without breaking continuity in your data, and when you change a question or question group, you'll see a clear explanation of the downstream effects on the forms and reports that use it.