An introductory presentation on measuring and showing impact produced by the My Community advice portal.

1. What’s the
impact?
Read this if you want to learn:
1. What do we mean by impact?
2. Why it is important to show impact?
3. How to measure the changes you want to see
4. The 4 steps you can work through:
a. Planning
b. Collecting your data
c. Analysing it
d. Using it

2. What do we mean by impact?
The word impact can be replaced with words like ‘change’, ‘effect’, ‘outcome’, ‘benefit’ and
‘result’, but they all largely mean the same thing.
You’ll hear people talking about demonstrating and measuring impact, which means taking a
step back and thinking about the difference you make through the work you do and collecting
data to show this.
Your impact may be the difference that you make to those who directly use your service, to
those in the local community more generally, or to wider society. The impact you highlight can
be wide ranging and can affect many aspects of people’s lives.
If someone asked you right now “What does your project achieve?”, what would you say to
them? How do you know how it’s going, what works well and what doesn’t?

3. Why is it important to show impact?
Collecting data on the difference your project is making has many benefits:
• Helps you think through the problem you’re tackling
• See how you are doing and how you can improve
• Helps plan what you are going to do next
• Tell your story and inspire others
• Attracts further funding and investment
• Raises awareness in the local community

4. How can we show the impact?
To explore how you’re doing, what’s going well and what could be improved, it’s useful to start by asking a
few questions:
• What need is your project meeting? For example, some young people have nothing to do in the evening on the estate so we are
running street football and street cricket sessions for them
• What's the problem you’re trying to tackle? Because some young people have nothing to do, they are littering, breaking
windows, fighting and getting into trouble
• Who benefits from what you’re doing? Young people on the estate aged 12 – 19, parents, residents, local businesses , sports
clubs
• What do you (and others) do that makes a real difference? The young people learn sports skills and we help them get
along better with each other. We help them see that team work can be positive and that there are adults that care about them.
• What is your projects’ specific goals? We want young people to feel better about themselves, grow in confidence and wanting to
explore their future options.
• How will you know if you’ve achieved them? More young people asking us about coaching qualifications and wanting more
information about sports or educational qualifications, more confidence, fewer reports of anti-social behaviour (ASB) and other low level
criminal activity on the estate.

5. How can we show the impact?
It’s useful to break down the whole process
into 4 steps:
1. Planning it: what will success look like,
what do you need to measure to see
how you’re doing
2. Doing it: gathering the evidence you
need
3. Analysing it: what is the evidence
telling you, assessing how you’re doing
4. Using it: to learn, to improve, to share
and celebrate your successes
Planning
it
Doing it
Analysing
it
Using it

6. Step 1: Planning it
You can map out what you want to change and how to get there using the diagram below. This a
simple Theory of Change, a tool which helps you identify the changes you want your project to
make and then encourages you to work backwards to think about what this would look like
(outcomes) and the steps involved in making that change happen (activities).
You could do this using post-it notes and large bits of paper, perhaps as a group exercise with
different people from your project.
Goals Outcomes Activities
What long-term change do you want to make?
What will success look like?
What changes or benefits result from the project?
What differences do you want to make?
What outcomes are you hoping for to support your
goal?
What are the things you do or fund to make a
difference?
What activities will you do to support your
outcomes?
e.g. fewer reports of Anti-social behaviour (ASB)
and other low level criminal activity on the estate,
lower level of local young people unemployed
e.g. local young people more confident, more
young people using new skills, knowledge and
confidence to gain qualifications and find out about
other opportunities, more friendships
e.g. street football and street cricket sessions,
developing resources coaching information,
signposting to other opportunities

7. What do you need to know?
Building on our Theory of Change, we can start by thinking about the evidence we need to collect
to evaluate a project’s impact. We can break down questions into four areas:
• Inputs: What resources go into a programme and how much do they cost?
• Activities: What do you do that actually makes a difference? Try to be as specific as possible
about how these lead to outputs and contribute to outcomes.
• Outputs: What is produced through these activities? How many people have benefited?
• Outcomes: What difference have you made? What changes/benefits can you see? How have
people changed? Collecting evidence of outcome can be challenging if you are trying to follow up
with people after a project has finished – they may have moved on, or not be willing to give you
further information

8. What do you need to know?
Now, you can map the project’s
outcomes, outputs, activities and
inputs using post-it notes and large
sheets of paper or simply put them
into an Excel table.
It’s important to remember that
outputs tell you what is produced
through activities, while outcomes are
the changes or benefits that result
from the whole project.
Simply measuring outputs does not tell
the whole story, e.g. 25 local young
people attending a sports session
(output) does not necessarily mean
more local young people gaining
qualifications (outcome/impact).
Outcomes/Impact Outputs Activities Inputs
the changes or
benefits that result
from the project
what is
produced
through those
activities
what the project
does to make a
difference
what resources go
into a programme
and how much
they cost
e.g. local young
people more
confident, more
young people using
new skills,
knowledge and
confidence to gain
qualifications and
find out about other
opportunities, more
friendships
e.g. 12 sports
sessions held, 2
introduction to
coaching
sessions held, 25
packs produced
and handed out
e.g. street
football and street
cricket sessions,
developing
resources,
coaching
information,
signposting to
other
opportunities
e.g. 1 coach @ £30
per hour, sports
equipment,
football shirts,
cost of resources
etc.

9. How do we know? We will have a lower level of local youth unemployment (long-term goal)
Specific changes or
results (outcome)
Declined About the same
Changed/ increased
a little
Changed/increas
ed a lot
How do we know? Our evidence and
examples
(what signs/indicators have we seen, what
have we measured, what have people told
us)
More local young people
have gained sports skills
   
Number of participants who attended
sessions and then were able to demonstrate
skills – survey of participants before and
after sessions
More local young people
have gained a
qualification in sports
coaching or other in the
past 6 months
   
Number of participants who attended
sessions and then got qualifications within 6
months
Survey of participants before and after
session, and follow-up after 6 months
More young people who
have participated in the
sessions have gained
employment
   
Number of participants who attended
sessions and then gained employment within
6 months
Survey of participants before and after
session, and follow-up after 6 months
Try to decide on good things that you
could measure to show how close you
are to achieving your goals.
For each outcome, you can come up
with observable measures (which can
be called indicators) to show the
change the project is making and how
close you are to achieving your
outcomes. We suggest keeping it
simple to start with, so focus on
measuring only one or two outcomes.
You can use this table to think through
how you will know if you’re achieving
your intended outcome.

10. What kind of information can you collect?
There are two main types of data:
• Quantitative e.g. numbers
• Qualitative e.g. what people say, sounds, pictures
Quantitative and qualitative data can be put together to tell a great story, which is often more
persuasive than just a table of figures. Collecting a mixture of numbers and personal accounts can
bring your whole story alive.
Do think about what kind of data you need – different outcomes require different methods of data
collection so it is worth discussing the measures with your stakeholders before you start.
It important to remember that not everything can be counted very easily e.g. enthusiasm or
passion, but you might still might want to record it with a photo.
Experiment and have fun!

11. Step 2: Doing it
To help you gather your evidence, you can start by asking a few questions:
• What information do you already have?
• What information do you still need to collect?
• How are you going to collect it?
• Who/where are you collecting it from?
• Who will collect the evidence – someone from your group or somebody else?
• When does it need to be collected by?

12. How can you collect the data?
To help you gather your evidence, you can start by asking a few questions:
• What information do you already have? E.g. number of participants attending sports skills and
introduction to coaching sessions
• What information do you still need to collect? E.g. age, sex, previous qualifications/education,
contact details etc. of session participants
• How are you going to collect it? E.g. Survey before and after sessions, follow-up of participants 6
months later by e-mail and phone
Depending on the funding and how the commissioners you are working with measure impact, there
may be set definitions and rules for collecting data. What is important is that you have definitions
and rules which everyone applies in the same way.

13. How can you collect evidence?
Showing physical change to a place Take photographs of before and after: Take a photo
Showing physical changes to a place, or talking to
stakeholders about their experiences
Make a video (you don’t need any fancy equipment)
Showing fitness changes before and after for young people Use SurveyMonkey or another website to create a short and
clear feedback survey. A simple questionnaire before and
after a workshop means you can to compare answers.
Being able to gather views and opinions in a more informal
way
Collect data on your social media channel’s usage e.g.
Twitter’s Analytics feature (similar features are available on
blogs and websites)
Talk to people and share their feedback Over coffee, by creating a more formal interview
framework, by asking them to write things down

14. The Legal Bit… Data Protection and Consent
• It is extremely important that if you are collecting information
from people (some of which may be sensitive and personal)
that you are clear with them about;
• What information is being collected
• Why it is being collected
• What will happen to it next
We give more detail on the next page

15. The Legal Bit… Data Protection and Consent
• Explain who is collecting the data and who this is going to be shared with
• Tell people exactly what data you are collecting e.g. first and last name, email address, area
• Explain why you would like to collect their data
• Do not collect more data than you need
• Consent is optional, it is their choice whether they would like to share their information or not and
they can make a decision at any time to no longer be contacted
• You must never share people’s personal data unless you make this clear to them and they agree to this
• If someone doesn’t want a quote attributed to them, you can agree to quote them anonymously
• If you have filmed or taken photos, you should check with the people involved that they are happy with
the final result. If people are pleased with it, they are more likely to want to share it. If your film or
photo includes children or vulnerable adults, first ask their parent or guardian to fill in a consent form.

16. Introducing the Community Choir…
Let’s apply what we’ve learned so far to a
completely different example!
A local adult education college has setup a
Community Choir to provide group singing
classes.
This project is part of a wider initiative by
the College’s Community Development Team
to get more people involved in adult
education and life long learning.
The College is hoping to attract people who
would not normally consider the benefits of
adult learning after compulsory education
(outcome).
Image from Skip The Budgie, Flickr

17. Introducing the Community Choir…
How would you show the impact the singing
classes (activity) are having on participants’
lives? Think about your answer for a few
minutes before going any further…
We can count how many people attended the
singing classes or the number of people who
came to the concerts, perhaps asking how
many people each singer brought along
(outputs).
Let’s say one of the outcomes is ‘to involve
more people in adult learning’ especially
people who would not normally consider the
benefits of adult learning after compulsory
education. How would you measure this?
Image from Skip The Budgie, Flickr

18. Introducing the Community Choir…
We could measure the percentage of
participants who went on to take a class at
the College within 1 term (indicator). We
could collect this information with a follow-up
survey.
It would be quite easy to ask the community
singers what they would be doing if they had
not come to the Community Choir. Perhaps
half would have stayed at home.
You could also ask about changes people may
have experienced, e.g. gaining confidence.
You could create a simple questionnaire to
measure confidence levels before and after
the course.
Image from Skip The Budgie, Flickr

19. Step 3: Analysing it
When you’ve collected your evidence you can then start to make sense of it all. Although it’s not
always easy, try to come up with figures and statistics about your work; going back to our sports
example, you might be able to say:
• ‘x number of local young people attended our sports sessions in 2014, an increase of y per cent
on the previous year’
• ‘z per cent went on to gain new qualifications within 6 months’
• ‘x out of y said in our survey that the sessions helped them improve their confidence in exploring
other qualifications ’
You can also try to decipher the general consensus of the community from your conversations with
various people. If you can, pick out any key themes or points of interest.

20. What is the evidence telling us?
When you’ve done all this, it’s time to sit down and decide what it means for the group. You can
work out what went well and what you need to improve and then feed this back into your planning.
It might be helpful to start with these questions:
• What patterns can you see/what links can you make?
• What was unexpected/surprising? Why?
• What are you doing well?
• What isn’t going well? Why? How could this be improved?
• What would have happened if you had not run the project?
It’s a good idea to ask someone else to independently check your findings to help make the best
decision.

21. Step 4: Using it
At this point, we can return to why it’s
important to show the impact of your project:
To learn, improve, share your story and
celebrate success.
You can communicate your findings in every
way you can, with everyone that you can.
Your group members, the local community
and funders will all be delighted to hear what
you’re doing.
You do some amazing things, so feel free to
show off about it!

22. Telling people about your impact
There are many different ways you can reach people, so here are just a few ideas:
• Traditional media (print, radio, TV): Media Trust have a guide on How to hit the headlines,
including hints on how to think like a journalist or editor. They also have a sample press
release with some tips of what to include.
• Posters, leaflets, banners
• Newsletters (printed or e-newsletters)
• Email
• Websites and blogs: Wordpress is one of most popular tools to build a website or blog. Just Act
has a simple guide for community groups to set up their own website with Wordpress.
• Social media (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube): Locality has a social media toolkit to get you
started with Twitter and Facebook, including how to setup a profile and top tips.

23. Useful Resources
Just Act’s Show the impact of your project has links to a wide range of resources and they have
some great tips on showing how you’re making a difference.
The Guardian’s Voluntary Sector Network has a short guide on how to measure your impact as a
small charity and has collected some best bits of expert advice on measuring impact.
The School for Social Entrepreneurs has 5 key lessons on measuring social impact.
UnLtd’s has a comprehensive guide on Measuring, Evaluation and Social Impact Assessment .
The Joseph Rowntree Foundation has also written a practical guide to evaluating community
projects.
Measuring Up! from Inspiring Impact is a step-by-step self-assessment tool that allows you to
review and improve your organisation’s impact practice – that is, the way you plan, evidence,
communicate and learn from the difference that your work makes.

24. And some further ideas for experimentation:
SROI, CBA and the rest….
One way of showing the difference you’re making is by doing a Social Return on Investment (SROI)
calculation, which is a type of cost-benefit analysis (CBA). Don’t be put off by the title, it’s basically
about giving a financial value to all of the things that you put into the project – your money, time,
equipment – and assessing their relationship to any outcomes you achieve.
Then you can say, for example, “for every £1 that we spent on our project we created £5 worth of
value to the local community”. By attaching a financial value to outcomes such as ‘more local young
people in employment’, you can give a monetary figure to your organisation’s social impact.
Being able to show the social return generated from your investment can be a powerful way of
showing your project’s impact. The key bit is finding a figure that roughly represents the value a
person places on the change they experienced. You might find these questions helpful: How could you
put a price on your outcome? or How much would a person be willing to pay?
SROI and similar types of analysis take time and resources to do well so it’s best to check if it’s right
for you. You can do this by looking at Social Value UK’s guide, Starting Out on Social Return on
Investment. They also have a more comprehensive guide on How to do an SROI analysis.

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