I've sat on both sides of the funder's table.
I'm Dr. Christian Onyemali, founder of Eleven 11 Consulting. I spent 15+ years evaluating whether nonprofit programs actually work, now I bring that rigor to the donors making major gifts and the advisors who support them.
My journey from Tulsa, Oklahoma to becoming an impact philanthropy advisor gave me a unique perspective on impact and funding.
As a first-generation college student and proud Spelman College graduate, I understand the transformative power of opportunity. That experience informed my academic path, culminating in a Ph.D. in Education Policy & Planning from UT-Austin.
For over 15 years I served as an evaluator for nonprofits and educational institutions, many funded by major donors such as the Gates Foundation and the National Science Foundation. My job was to answer one question: is this program actually working?
That meant going beyond glossy annual reports and stories that tug at your heartstrings to understanding whether a program is actually changing lives, whether the evidence was credible, and whether the organization could sustain results at scale.
I also founded and led, as Executive Director, a youth-serving nonprofit. So I've sat on both sides of the table. I know how organizations present themselves to funders, and I know how to read past the presentation. Today I partner with wealth managers, RIAs, and estate attorneys to provide independent impact evaluation before their clients make major gifts.
Our approach
Four principles behind every assessment.
Evidence over optics
Impact claims need more than a compelling story. We assess whether the evidence behind them is credible.
Independent by design
We have no relationship with the organizations we evaluate. That independence is what makes our assessments trustworthy.
Rigorous but practical
Our methodology comes from 15+ years of formal evaluation, translated into clear, actionable findings your clients can act on.
Your expertise + ours
You handle the financial strategy. We handle the impact evaluation. Different expertise, better outcomes for your clients.
Why our assessments are different
Most philanthropic advisors can tell you whether a nonprofit has good financials and a compelling mission. What they can't tell you is whether it's measuring real change, or just counting activities and calling it impact.
That distinction comes from methodology. My approach is grounded in 15 years of formal program evaluation, the same rigor applied to Gates- and NSF-funded programs. I've served as an internal evaluator, a Director of Evaluation and Learning, and an external evaluator, assessing organizations from the inside out and the outside in.
When I tell a client their $150,000 gift is well-positioned, they can take that to the bank. When I flag concerns, they have the evidence to ask harder questions, or walk away.
What partners say about the work
A decade-plus of evaluation partnerships across education, research, and nonprofit organizations.
Christian entered a role in crisis and within six months created real buy-in for evaluation and built a two-year strategy with strong internal investment.
She took us through building a logic model step by step, compelling, accessible, and incredibly useful. We still use the metrics she created to measure our impact.
Christian guided Muse Knoxville through developing a logic model to support data collection for a new program. A fantastic facilitator and an incredible teacher.
Her ability to communicate outcomes and provide thorough support materials for 30+ coaches was so impressive I've modeled my own work on her approach.
