Understanding the CRMA Key Indicator Validation Scorecard
The SBA requires all SBDCs and WBCs to validate the information that they submit to Nexus. SBDCs are asked to validate:
- Unique Clients Counseled
- Number of Capital Infusion Transactions
- New Business Starts
And WBCs are asked to validate the following metrics:
- Unique Clients Served
- Number of Capital Infusion Transactions
- New Business Starts
Nexus provides a CRMA dashboard with these metrics (and a few extra) that is updated once every 24 hours:
Thus, when you submit your Nexus export today, then the CRMA dashboard will not reflect your lastest information until tomorrow or possibly not until the following day. Assuming the CRMA dashboard properly reflects your most recent export, then you can compare the Nexus CRMA dashboard with the Neoserra CRMA Key Indicator Validation Scorecard.
As always, when running a scorecard make sure that the funding sources, centers and date range match the data that you have exported to Nexus. Furthermore, remember that Neoserra is an active database, used daily by your counselors who may be entering new information as well as editing records in prior quarters. As such, Neoserra is always current up to the minute. Nexus reflects a frozen snapshot of data that was made at the time of the export. Some differences (albeit small) can be expected between Neoserra's CRMA Key Indicator Validation Scorecard and the Nexus CRMA dashboard.
The CRMA Key Indicator Validation Scorecard includes the following 6 lines items which were pulled from the Economic Impact/Capital Infusion (ver. 2023) scorecard:
- Unique Clients Served
- Unique Clients Counseled
- Unique Clients Trained
- Amount of Capital Infusion
- New Business Starts
- Capital Infusion Transactions
Unique Clients Served
SBA has provided the following definition of "Unique Clients Served":
Unique Clients Counseled
The "Unique Clients Counseled" line item does not take training attendance into consideration and only looks to see if a client has been counseled during the period, or whether they received capital funding. Again, a client counseled multiple times is still only counted as one unique client.
Unique Clients Trained
The "Unique Clients Trained" line item counts the unique clients who attended your training events. A client record must exist for the attendee! Contact-only attendees and pre-clients do not count. If Jane Doe, from Company X, attends multiple events, it will only count as one client trained. If Jane Doe and John Smith, both from the same Company X, attend one of your events, they will also only be counted as one client trained.
NOTE: This line item requires you to capture client details for each of your training attendees! Thus, if Mary Roe attends one of your events and she does not have a corresponding client record (active or inactive), then she will not be included in this line item. Again, pre-clients and contact-only records are excluded from this line item calculation.
Amount of Capital Infusion
The "Amount of Capital Infusion" line item provides the total dollar amount of all capital funding records in your database that have been "Approved" plus all SBIR or STTR contract awards.
As always, the records must be reportable, the funding source and center in the capital funding/awards sessions must match the funding source and center(s) in your scorecard definition. And again, records with pre-clients are always excluded.
New Business Starts
The "New Business Starts" line item counts all clients with an Impact session. Impact sessions are automatically created in Neoserra when a client record is updated with a Reportable Business Start Impact date. The Impact session is specifically designed to update Nexus with the date when your program assisted the client with the start of their business operations.
Note: The center indicated in the Impact session will be the center that gets "credit" for the Reportable Business Start Impact on the scorecard. Neoserra will automatically assign the session to the counselor/center associated with the user who adds the Reportable Business Start Impact Date to the client record. A client that has been counseled by multiple counselors at multiple centers will only be counted as one new business start impact in Nexus.
Capital Infusion Transactions
The "Capital Infusion Transactions" line item counts the number of capital funding records in your database that have been "Approved" plus the number of SBIR or STTR contract awards.
As always, the records must be reportable, the funding source and center in the sessions must match the funding source and center(s) in your scorecard definition. And again, records with pre-clients are always excluded.
Want more? Browse our extensive list of Neoserra FAQs.