Showing the social value of your community work

Organisations we work with

We met some of them through Impact Hub Amsterdam’s Food Chain Accelerator and Impact Hub Amsterdam’s Regeneration Program.

What you get

• Simple for volunteers

  Measurement methods that fit into the activities you already run

• Local and recognisable

  Indicators that match your neighbourhood and still fit funder requirements

• Skills stay in your group

  Short, practical training so volunteers can collect stories and data themselves

• Residents’ voices heard

  Participatory methods that capture what residents and participants experience

• A stronger funding application

  Evidence that helps a small organisation make a convincing case to funders

Why we do what we do

Read the film as text

1. We all want to know
2. our place in the world.
3. Thin grey lines join dots into a web.
4. We like to believe that what we do is part of something larger.
5. It is.
6. Together we make our surroundings, our brands, our communities.
7. We shape the work of others, as they shape ours.
8. The web grows dense.
9. We live in one web of cause and consequence.
10. Each path tells a story, part of a larger narrative.
11. A system of meaning.
12. So what is our impact?
13. Whose lives do we touch?
14. What changed? For whom? How much? And what part was ours?
15. Intended or not, for better or worse.
16. Knowing that changes what you do next.
17. A dark line draws a path through the web. Impact management helps you see it, steer it, and use it.
18. A large word: Lead. A purple path runs through the web. Lead with purpose, and fund your mission.
19. A large word: Improve. A green path runs through the web. Learn what doesn’t work and design for better.
20. A large word: Engage. A blue-green path runs through the web. Share your story, and bring others into it.
21. A large word: Account. A blue path runs through the web. State your claim, and prove it.
22. A large word: Discover. A yellow path runs through the web. Find your next impact before it happens.
23. “How do you measure impact?”
24. It sounds hard.
25. It isn’t.
26. It’s not about the how.
27. It’s about
28. Portraits of people fill the screen.
29. A large word: Who.
30. About rights-holders, whose lives are touched.
31. And stakeholders, whose choices shape them.
32. The people stand side by side, at the same height. A wave of colour runs through the web. Every voice, every perspective, equally weighed.
33. The web turns many colours. Pluriform and equivalent.
34. Who determines what.
35. And what determines how.
36. That’s it. No more, no less.
37. We count what can be counted, and listen to the rest.
38. Coloured paths wind across the web. We find the stories that connect the dots, and make sense of the whole.
39. We love our craft:
40. to ask the questions,
41. to measure what matters,
42. and narrate what works.
43. One dark path remains. Let’s reveal your path.
44. The word narrate, with the line: impact in numbers and stories.

What we often hear

• “The council wants figures and reports, and we run on volunteers with little time.”

  A few indicators and simple tools that volunteers can keep up without extra evenings

• “Big organisations get the grant, because their monitoring looks more professional.”

  A proportionate approach that delivers convincing evidence on a small budget

• “What residents experience with us doesn’t fit the funder’s boxes.”

  Combine participatory methods with recognised frameworks, so community voice counts in your reporting

• “I know we make a difference in the neighbourhood, but funders ask for numbers.”

  Stories and figures combined into an account that is both credible and recognisable

What you may be wondering

• We run on volunteers. Is this really for us?

  Yes. We choose a few indicators that fit what you already organise. A photo, a short story or a tally sheet can be enough.

• Will we end up measuring what the funder wants?

  Residents help choose what counts. Alongside that, you collect the few figures your council or funder really needs.

• Who owns the residents’ data?

  You do. You collect only what you need, and you decide what you share.

To read

• How impact management shapes democracy

  Measuring can make democracy stronger, and quietly hollow it out. On accountability, having a say, who sets the yardstick and what happens when a figure replaces the debate.

• The go-betweens

  Between a neighbourhood and the town hall there is often one person who knows both sides. This story is about the people who connect two worlds, what it costs them and how to make their work visible.

• Your funder asks for results. Where do you start?

  Many organisations only start measuring when a funder asks. This is how we approach it: small, and with the people it is about.

• You don’t have to measure everything to start

  Many organisations never start, because measuring looks big and expensive. This is how we start small, with what is already there.

All articles for this group (5)