Reporting on your project and capturing impact

Monitoring and Evaluation

Reporting on your project and capturing impact

Why is reporting and capturing impact important?

For us: we have to consider what impact our funding has had so that we can learn from what went well and what didn’t and be able to tell the community what impact has been.

For you: Being aware of what is and is not working can help you manage your project and services more effectively. You’ll be more adept at handling difficulties. Additionally, you’ll be better able to recognise chances to modify and enhance your practice.

It means you and we can:

  • see what’s working well
  • see and act on things you’d like to do better
  • share experiences, practical tips and ideas with others
  • ask others for help and feedback to tackle challenges
  • reduce duplication
  • show funders and decision-makers how your work makes a difference to achieve funding and support in the future

The important thing to note is that monitoring, and evaluation are positive things. They will help you to manage and deliver your project, measure the difference your project has made and then tell people about it!

What the fund will expect from you:

For details specific to Micro and Vision Fund reporting please see end section but please do read on for useful tips and help

You can give us the information whatever way works best for you, for example by using:

  • an evaluation
  • an annual report
  • feedback from staff, volunteers and participants
  • graphs, charts, statistics and data
  • slide decks and blog posts
  • videos, photos and infographics
  • meeting minutes.

What can you do?

  1. Plan time for regular reflection
    Don’t be tempted to wait until end of project or when asked, make time during the process which makes job easier in the end and means you don’t miss useful information or facts / anecdotes.
  2. Plan what you want to record

Examples include (but you will know what is specific to you)

  • What was problem or opportunity that started this
  • What did you plan to do
  • How actually doing it has gone / is going
  • What has gone better than planned
  • What challenges have there been
  • Who else has been involved (colleagues, trustees, customers, volunteers) and how
  • What has feedback been
  • Collecting stories and evidence about the difference you are helping to make
  • Who else in community can comment on what you are doing / have done (ask them to give their thoughts and share ideas for how things could be improved, based on the learning)
  • How you have shared what funding you received and how the project has gone publicly

Statistics are great but so are individual stories from people working with your project / colleagues / customers.

Think about your audience
If you do this well, it will inform what you need to report to funder but could also be used on social media/website to tell people about what you are doing.

You should always share your learning and insights with:

  • Your beneficiaries or customers / Staff and volunteers

After you report to us as a funder think about sharing that more widely, it can really show your community, customers and other funders what you have achieved and help drive up interest in what you are doing.

  • You could use social media to show what difference funding has made, and what you’ve learned from it. Use data and case studies, quotes, photos, and films where you can.

Tips and Help

  1. Monitoring is the collection and analysis of information about a project, undertaken while the project is ongoing. Monitoring data is usually reported to funders (and/or managers within your organisation) to demonstrate the progress that you’re making. Monitoring data answers questions such as:
  • What progress has the project made in terms of undertaking its activities?
  • How much money has been spent so far?
  • If the project progressing as planned?
  • Monitoring data also feeds into the evaluation of a project.
  1. Evaluation is the about judging how successful a project has been; finding out whether a project has met its objectives. Evaluations are undertaken for various reasons, but the focus is usually on find out what difference your project has made. Questions asked as part of an evaluation include:
  • What difference did this project make, to who and why?
  • What worked well, for whom, in what circumstances, at what time and why?
  • Did anything happen that wasn’t expected to happen?
  • If you were to run this project again, what might you do differently?
  • Is the project on track to meet its desired outcomes?
  • Is the project demonstrating value for money?

 

Different Types of Evaluation

a. Process evaluation – how was the project delivered?

This looks at how a project has been delivered identifying things that have helped or hindered it. Examples of the questions answered by process evaluations include:

  • What did people taking part and/or staff feel worked or didn’t in delivering the project, why and how?
  • Which aspects of the project were most valued or caused difficulties? Was this different for different groups of people?
  • Who took part in the project, who didn’t or dropped out, and why?
  • With hindsight, how could the project be improved? What would you or could you do differently?
  • What to find out more? Interested in how to undertake a process evaluation?

Process evaluation primarily aims to understand the process of how a project has been implemented and delivered and identify factors that have helped or hindered its effectiveness. Process evaluation can generate a detailed description of what activities are involved in delivering a project, who provides them, what form they take, how they are delivered and how they are experienced by the participants and those who deliver them. It can also provide an in-depth understanding of the decisions, choices and judgments involved, how and why they are made and what shapes this.

The process usually involves:

  • Discussions with the team involved in the management and delivery of the project; what worked from their (possibly your) perspective? And what didn’t?
  • A feedback survey of those that have been supported. What did they think of the service they received?
  • Analysis of monitoring data like the number and type of people participating in an activity, spend and so on.

b. Outcomes and impact evaluation What difference did the project make?

What has been the impact on the individuals supported? This type of evaluation is all about finding out whether a project caused a particular outcome or impact to happen.

This kind of evaluation also attempts to estimate what would have happened anyway – that is, what would have happened to if the project did not exist or the action it supported not taken place. The method you use to undertake your impact or outcome evaluation depends on the resource you have available and the data that you can collect.

The type of data that you can collect however includes:

Quantitative data: things that you can count that can be used to measure a change that has taken place. Such data usually needs to be available for a representative sample of the people or organisations that have been supported so that you tell what the average change has been. It can be collected via monitoring data or via surveys.

Qualitative data: this is more about describing something than measuring it. This type of data usefully seeks to help understand how or why an impact has taken place but also captures impacts that it may not be possible to measure quantitatively. For example, how people feel about themselves or an area. This type of data is often collected via in depth interviews with people or focus groups. It is often reported as a case study.

This is a useful impact measurement toolkit: https://mooreks.co.uk/upload/pdf/ImpactToolkit2013_updated_FINAL_1.pdf

And here’s another one: https://www.thinknpc.org/resource-hub/npcs-four-pillar-approach/

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/evaluation-in-health-and-well-being-overview/outcome-evaluation

Profiling Places Wales: This tool provides a range of information about towns and places across Wales. It’s really useful if you need statistics about an area: http://www.profilingplaces.wales/chooseplaces.aspx

Thriving Places Wales is based on Happy City’s ground-breaking Thriving Places Index, which measures how well areas are doing at growing the conditions for equitable, sustainable wellbeing. It could be useful if you’re looking for some statistics at a Local Authority level: http://www.thrivingplaces.wales/default?lang=en-GB

InfoBase Cymru: Need a statistic? You can probably find it here: http://www.infobasecymru.net/IAS/eng

NOMIS: a service provided by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) to give you free access to the most detailed and up-to-date UK labour market statistics from official sources. You can type in a name of a post-code to see (and download) all the latest stats on population, age structure, unemployment, etc. https://www.nomisweb.co.uk/

MICRO FUND

In your application form, we ask you to tell us what you hope the three main outcomes of your project will be (there can be more!). We understand that things change and don’t always go to plan, so don’t worry – it’s all useful learning.
When your funded project comes to an end, we’ll ask you to tell us whether or not the expected outcomes happened and what your experience was. Providing this information is part of your commitment when you accept your grant. We’ll either send you a form to complete or have a phone chat with you – whichever works best for you. Photographs and quotes from any participants help to bring the project alive! We may also ask for evidence of expenditure – receipts, invoices etc.

VISION FUND

Projects supported by the Community Fund vary widely. Some will be funded over many years, with revenue funding payments made throughout the project period – others may just need one capital grant payment. Reporting requirements will be tailored accordingly. Whatever the arrangements, all funding recipients need to tell us how the money has been spent, and crucially, what difference the work supported has made.

  1. Before the funded work starts, we’ll meet with you to review the plan you provided in your application form and to discuss and agree the monitoring and evaluation process, any support you may need, publicity guidance/requirements and so on.
  2. As you know, you’ll need to let us have regular updates about project delivery, both during and at the end of the funding period. For larger projects, we may also ask for a final legacy report 6 months after the funded work is complete.

Projects supported by the Community Fund vary widely. Some will be funded over many years, with revenue funding payments made throughout the project period – others may just need one capital grant payment. Reporting requirements will be tailored accordingly.  Whatever the arrangements, all funding recipients need to tell us how the money has been spent, and crucially, what difference the work supported has made.

This is what we’ll ask you for:

a. Projects where funding is paid in full at the outset:

Interim informal progress report

End of Project Report

Legacy Report

b.Projects running for more than one year

Grant spend and claim profile

Interim Update Form whenever you make a grant claim

Annual Report form on each anniversary of your grant award

Completion Report form at the end of your project, when the funded activities have ended.

Legacy Report Form 6-12 months after the funded work is complete. To be agreed with you at project outset.

What we would expect to see in annual report 

  1. A review of original project / activity aim(s) – are these still valid? Do they need to be amended?
  2. What activities have taken place over the last year?
  3. What’s been achieved? More or less than anticipated?
  4. What difference has the project made so far? How do you know – what supporting evidence do you have (e.g. survey results, case studies etc.)?
  5. What’s worked well? What hasn’t gone so well?
  6. What if anything has changed about your project based on lessons learned during this period?
  7. Have project finances matched forecasts? If not, what’s happened?
  8. What are the key actions planned for the year ahead?
  9. What will happen when the funding comes to an end? How are you planning for this?

What we would expect to see in a completion report

Reflection and demonstration of what difference your project has made and what has been learned.  Photographs and quotes will help to bring your work alive, so do include them if you can. The report should cover:

  1. A review of original project objectives – if you were starting the project again now, would these still be your objectives?
  2. What activities (outputs) have taken place over the project lifetime? You can tell us about aspects funded by others too.
  3. What’s been achieved as a result of the activities (the outcomes)? More or less than anticipated?
  4. What difference has the project made? How do you know – what supporting evidence do you have  (e.g. survey results, case studies etc.).
  5. What worked well? What hasn’t gone so well? What have you learned that will inform your future work?
  6. Did project finances match forecasts? If not, why was that?
  7. What are your plans now? How will what’s been achieved be sustained and developed?
  8. What other funding did you secure for the project? Did you bring in more resources as the project developed?
  9. Anything else that you’d like us to know.

What we would expect to see in a legacy report

  • Is the service or support that your project was providing still running? If so, how is it being resourced?
  • Have there been any changes in how the project is delivered since Pen y Cymoedd funding ended?
  • What is the financial position of your organisation? Is it solvent? Do you hold contingency reserves?
  • (If relevant) What are the people that your project employed doing now?
  • Is the benefit that your project created still as clear today as it was 6 months ago? – Do the outcomes that your project generated still exist? If they do, how do you know? What is the evidence that the outcome is still there?

Need help?

RCT – Events and Training – Interlink RCT English

NPT – Home – Neath Port Talbot Council for Voluntary Service (nptcvs.wales)

These can help you with training, events, mentoring and advice