When Vicky Browning, the director of CharityComms, collaborated with volunteer, economist and research manager Tim Livesley she set out to understand her organisation's impact. What she achieved was an impact assessment plan, a refreshing viewpoint and an understanding that, whatever the size of the organisation, impact can be measured as long as it is logical.
The Guardian Voluntary Sector Network spoke to both Vicky and Tim to talk through the partnership, the knowledge they have gained, and what both achieved from this voluntary sector and private sector collaboration.
What inspired you to put yourself forward for the programme?
TL: Prior to my current job I was working in economic development and did a lot of evaluation and impact work on regeneration projects. We would be asked to come in and work out how many jobs it created, how many people gained better skills and what effect it has had on economic success in the region.
Some of the more interesting projects I was involved with concerned disadvantaged people. For example, I was working with the prison service to look at programmes within prisons that aimed to help people get jobs when released and in turn decrease their chances of reoffending.
VB: The problem we have is we are a second-tier organisation, our beneficiaries are communications professionals not end users. While it is relatively straightforward for us to show the impact on our members and the charity communications community, it is quite hard for us to take the next step and find out what our end impact is and whether we are making a better world.
Our vision is to help charities improve their communications because effective communications means you are a better charity and therefore creating a better world.
Secondly we are a small organisation – there are only five of us so that kind of project is difficult to fit in with business as usual. To have this partnership felt really useful because it gave me some outside guidance and forced me to finally spend time on this. It fitted perfectly with what we wanted to do.
How was it working together?
TL: I thought CharityComms was a really impressive organisation and I got on really well with Vicky. In a way it felt like I was stepping back into the consultancy work so I didn't feel like a fish out of water – I was really impressed with what they were doing as a charity. The culture of CharityComms is really different to what I am used to – I work for a large organisation and at CharityComms there is a handful of people. It was really nice to have meetings and you kind of get a hug when you walk through the door, which isn't what you get when you meet a City law firm as a regulator. It was very different.
VB: There were two key things I think. One is that he has an outside perspective. Everybody I deal with in CharityComms is in the sector and in communications, my trustees are all communication professionals working in charities and my staff are all in the midst of it, so working with someone who knows nothing about the sector gave a really refreshing viewpoint.
I found that really useful and the kind of chap he is – he is very analytical and this is his stuff and what he does. He is very logical so in terms of his skill-set and personality it is something we do not have in house – so that was brilliant.
What key challenges did you face?
TL: The first was purely from a research and technical perspective of getting impact assessment right. The whole point of trying to do this in the first place is because CharityComms has this strong belief that communications is essential for charities to make the impact they want to have. You are two steps removed then from frontline activity and trying to associate those benefits back to CharityComms gets very difficult.
The second challenge was that it took a little time to get the board members on side. I felt there was a bit of a mismatch between what was said on paper and what they were actually doing in reality. They are rightfully very passionate about their organisation and some guy coming in from a completely different background asking lots of difficult questions wasn't the first thing they wanted.
VB: The key challenge goes back to looking at our impact and how we decide what that is. We need to get to the nitty gritty of finding our performance indicators and finding something you can't directly measure, finding a proxy for it and working out the methodology to collect that. That was a challenging thing and what was great to have his help on.
What have you learnt?
TL: It made me go back to the basics of impact assessment. It ties in quite nicely with some of the projects I am currently working on and it made me come at these problems with a different mindset.
VB: I learnt how important it is to get an outsider's perspective. It's not easy because it is hard to find somebody who is looking at it from a fresh viewpoint. This was my first charity role, I came from the private sector where impact is measured by whether we make enough money. It is completely different in not-for-profit, so I learnt a lot in the process about how you measure impact.
What one piece of advice would you give to someone entering a similar partnership?
TL: Be prepared with information and set out ground rules. We respected each other's expertise. You have to be open minded and open to listening about the project, and you need to understand what is really important to that organisation and organise your methodology around that.
VB: Take advantage of having the opportunity to have an outsider look at what you are doing. Don't resist the fact that they do not know your organisation inside out – embrace it.
Vicky and Tim's partnership was arranged by the CSV and Coalition for Efficency.
For more updates and opinions on the challenges and opportunities facing the voluntary sector, join our network or follow us on twitter @GdnVoluntary. If you have an idea or suggestions don't hesitate to email us on voluntarysectornetwork@theguardian.com.
