Demonstrating Effectiveness & Winning Support

"While the politicians sharpen their knives for the inevitable

radical surgery, those managing and delivering services

must make the best possible case… the losers will be those

unable to demonstrate clear value for money. God help

any service without proven outcomes…"

David Brindle, The Guardian's public services editor.

Commentators talk of the recession moving in waves, first through the commercial sector, with the public and voluntary sectors yet to feel the full force. For those that haven't seen a collapse in the value of their investments, the recession might so far seem something of a phony war. The sandbags have been stacked, an eerie silence has descended and we wait for the windows to start crashing in.

Political choices will be key. A third of the charity sector's income comes from government and local government contracts and grants. Once the general election is safely out of the way the smart money is on a swift and blood curdling Government spending review with a dramatic scaling back of public expenditure from 2011 onwards.

Results, efficiency and value for money

As the recession pushes up demand on frontline services - while squeezing budgets - demonstrating results and efficiency will be critical to winning new support and keeping existing funders on side.

This page takes a look at some of the major ways voluntary organisations can demonstrate effectiveness and efficiency, starting with organisational diagnosis and then moving on to outcomes monitoring and quality assurance.

Organisational diagnosis - a good starting point

For those new to this terrain, and even seasoned campaigners, the language and approaches of organisational performance can be difficult. The approaches can blur into each other, and it's far from clear where to start or which approach will be best suited to your particular needs. A good starting point may be to use a diagnostic tool to smoke out areas of your organisational practice that need action now. One I recommend is the C3 toolkit. It can be accessed by numerous people within an organisation or by multiple sites, and the programme will collate responses and provide an overall score. The score can be benchmarked against other organisations that have completed the tool. Another is the GRIPP tool. Developed by Greater Merseyside ChangeUp, it has five questions in each of five key areas: Governance, Resources, Information, Projects, People and takes ten minutes for self-completion.

Outcomes monitoring

To demonstrate effectiveness it won't be enough to describe what you do and who you work with. You'll need to describe and provide some evidence of the changes and benefits that happen as a result of your work. These are your outcomes. Why are outcomes important? Knowing what they are helps you make your work more effective by identifying what works well and what you might change. You'll be able to see how to use your resources most efficiently, provide more effective reports to funders and be in a better position to attract further funding. Outcomes information can help demonstrate that your organisation is one that learns from its experience in order to develop and improve - that it's a learning organisation.

Having a focus on outcomes could enable you not just to scrape through the recession but to build a vision of a much stronger organisation emerging out of it by helping you:

• re-think your service provision and be more needs-led
• 'sell' your services more effectively
• be more accountable and credible
• build relationships and improve dialogue with funders and commissioners.

Click on this link for CES' free guide to outcomes monitoring, Your Project & Its Outcomes.

There is growing interest in specific models used to present outcomes information such as Social Return on Investment, Social Accounting, and the Outcomes Star.

Paying for an external evaluation

The evidence you gather from routine, ingrained monitoring and self-evaluation is the bedrock of demonstrating your effectiveness. But from time to time you may want to supplement your self-evaluation by commissioning an external evaluation from an independent evaluator. This could be because a funder requires it, or for your own organisational development, or both. The external evaluation might focus on a particular product, project or service, or the effectiveness of your organisation as a whole against its mission. It might look at service uptake by your target audiences, user feedback, achievement of outcomes or impact, the effectiveness of the processes involved, or all of these!

External evaluation doesn't remove the need for your own routine monitoring and self-evaluation. Indeed the evaluator will almost certainly begin by looking at the information you are already collecting.

Click on the following links for free information on Costing an Evaluation and What to Include in an Evaluation Brief.

Quality systems

Like evaluation, quality has a dual function. Internally, it can stimulate reflection and improvement; externally, it can be used to build credibility and win support. As sources of funding come under pressure, potential supporters are likely to be even choosier about where they invest. They will expect evidence of high standards, a commitment to improvement, and efficient, business-like processes to underpin effective services and campaigns.

One way of approaching this is through a quality system, either your own bespoke system or an off-the-shelf one. Many commissioners already expect a commitment to quality to come as standard, as with health and safety and equal opportunities, and they may prescribe specific systems. So expect to see a section on quality in the pre-qualification questionnaire at the tendering stage.

Different quality systems do different things. Some, like the EFQM Excellence Model and PQASSO, aim to be comprehensive and holistic; others, like Investors in People, home in on specific organisational areas. Some offer external verification and a quality badge, while others are purely self-assessed. So there is a range of choices available and it's crucial to prepare well before making your choice and introducing the system. The main challenges are finding out what's available, making sure the system you choose fits with your organisation, securing staff and trustee commitment and making sure you have the resources needed. For more on this, see The Funders' Briefing on the Adoption of Quality Systems

For those new to quality, CES has a free guide First Steps to Quality. Click on the links to find our more about CES' PQASSO system and the new externally assessed PQASSO Quality Mark.

Colin Nee
Chief Executive
Charities Evaluation Services
www.ces-vol.org.uk

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