UK civil society leaders join forces to campaign on social impact

Twelve heavy hitters have joined forces to drive a 10-year campaign to make impact measurement the norm for organisations, commissioners and investors in the UK civil society arena.

The ‘inspiring impact’ group – including the Office for Civil Society, Acevo and Big Society Capital among many others – has a vision to make the next ten years the ‘decade of high impact’.

They are starting with a 12-month action plan that focuses on changing the attitudes of leaders in the sector towards measurement. The first year will also aim to test shared measurement approaches with more organisations and to develop a new system to advise organisations which measurement tools best suit their needs. The group will provide a web-based resource, and set up a ‘Community of Impact Funders’ to drive impact forward.

The campaign is detailed in a new report launched today, called Inspiring Impact.

It follows the convening of an Impact Summit in September, attended by 30 leaders in the field of social impact measurement.

They discussed how leadership and collaboration could make impact measurement part of everyday practice for the thousands of charities, social enterprises, funders, commissioners and investors that make up the social sector.

The starting point for discussions at the summit was simple: more social organisations need help to be focused on impact, using measurement to demonstrate their achievements and improve the way they work, ultimately changing more people’s lives.

The report says there is a huge incentive for impact measurement to become the ‘norm’, with funders, investors and government wanting evidence of impact.

But there are still problems in the sector because measurement is often not as robust as it could be, impact data is not always used to then improve services, evidence of successful approaches often isn’t shared and there is confusion because of all the different approaches.

Organisations are also often having to do measurement in isolation, which means there are few common standards and the quality varies considerably.

Meanwhile, funders, commissioners and investors also struggle to know what and how impact should be measured.

The report echoes sentiments expressed in Making it Count, a publication produced in partnership by SocialEnterpriselive.com with the SROI Network and Buzzacott Accountants in November.

Gareth Davies, head of the Office for Civil Society (OCS), commented: “I’m really pleased to see so many organisations collaborating and stepping up to lead work to tackle the issues around social impact measurement. It is essential to crack these if we want to succeed in growing the social economy. In ten years time I want consistent social impact measurement to be a routine part of doing business for organisations, commissioners and investors.”

Dr Richard Piper, Head of Improvement & Innovation, National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO), said: "If it is successful, this initiative will lead to tens of thousands of charities and social enterprises each making more of a difference to society, changing the world better and faster. That has to be exciting and NCVO will play its part."

Professor Paul Palmer, of Cass Business School, said: "At a time of austerity the importance of robust methods to measure added value are vitally important.”

Tris Lumley, one of the authors of the report and the Head of Development at New Philanthropy Capital, emphasised that this was not a “new programme to add to the often confusing landscape of approaches to measuring results” but “an attempt to work collectively, with a shared vision and a commitment to supporting each other’s efforts”.

He added: “Only by working in partnership can we achieve what we all want—charities and social enterprises, funders, commissioners and investors realising their full potential by focusing on impact.”