Last month the nonprofit group America Achieves released a report titled Geek Cities: How Smarter Use of Data and Evidence Can Improve Lives through their Results for America initiative with support from Bloomberg Philanthropies. The report dissects how leaders in six major cities throughout the United States (and one initiative in London) are using data and technology to improve the lives of their residents. Rapidly improving technology and the digitalization of information has made mass data collection easier than ever, and cities are using this data to find effective programs and measures to combat social, economic, and physical challenges that many face today.

Cities are not only collecting and analyzing more data, they are increasingly starting to share their results-based best practices and offer advice to other cities who want to emulate their successes. The cities in the study, as well many others across the United States, are deciding which programs to fund based on concrete, measurable evidence of success that certain measures have had in other, comparable locations.

This evidence-based approach to decision making has gained steam in recent years, as federal, state, and local funding has become increasingly scarce. In today’s political and social climate, when trust in the government’s decision-making is waning, these measures can only serve to help increase the people’s trust in their elected leadership, at least at a local level.

It is not just the governmental leadership adopting this evidence-based approach either. An increasing number of philanthropies, both local and national, are starting to require measurable results when reviewing grant and funding requests as well. Public and private collaboration is vitally important for involving all stakeholders when tackling these challenges, and it helps when both parties are basing decisions on the same principles.

The Geek Cities report offers an exciting possibility of what the future of city leadership may look like. The case studies in the report illustrate how effective use of data and technology can improve the ability of cities to address a wide range of issues affecting our nation today. As the successes of the results-based approach taken by the cities outlined in the report become more evident, even more cities will be encouraged to adopt the same approach, as the efficiency of lending becomes maximized. 

To read the full report, click here.