It is clear that third sector organisations need to do more to demonstrate how they do good. In other words, what social returns are there for any investment or funding in their activities?
In discussions with people at our events, we felt that this would more of an issue for organisations which were delivering innovative services. At a time when money is tight, it is important to be able to show the positive impacts that your service is having.
For this reason we developed a DIY Social Impact Reporting workshop, which we delivered in March 2011. The workshop gave an overview of different approaches to social impact reporting, but focused primarily on looking at practical ways that organisations could begin to record and report on the outcomes they achieve. We looked in particular at
- Trying to express desired outcomes in meaningful language.
- Agreeing outcome indicators which would help you to see if you are making progress towards achieving outcomes.
We also introduced ideas which we hoped could be developed more at future meetings of the Personalisation Made in Bradford Network. These were
- Development of a bank of outcomes. Instead of each organisation working in isolation to develop outcomes, we could work together (and with funders/partners such as Bradford MDC) to agree a common set of outcomes, from which all organisations could choose.
- Form social impact circles to help each other to work more on social impact recording and reporting. This peer-to-peer approach may make it easier for people to make progress – as they will be able to support and challenge each other. It could also be more effective than bringing in external support, e.g. from social auditors.
If you would like to explore this area of work more, please sign up for the Personalisation Made in Bradford Network.
Please see below for presentations and handouts, including a presentation from Shipley-based HALE
