23
May 2016
Impact – the Heart of the Matter
By Sandy Blackburn-Wright. The following article appeared in Generosity Magazine on 5 May 2016 Why does impact matter, how has it become important and how do we measure it? These are fundamental questions that we have been asking recently but they also speak to the very heart our ongoing search for meaning. One of the most fundamental human needs is for validation – “do you see me, do I matter
When I first started working with One Earth Future Foundation in the USA, we were a small team looking at how to suppress maritime piracy off the coast of Somalia. In the initial stages of our counter-piracy strategy, we and our international partners, were focused on deterring the crime. The emphasis was on keeping the lid on the criminal activity. However, it didn’t take long to realise that you can’t
Through our work with the social sector, we at Social Outcomes quickly came to realise that many stakeholders in the sector want more training and information about the measurement of social outcomes. As a sector, how do we measure our impact and performance? How do we robustly measure who our interventions benefit? What about the potential cost savings of our programs? How do we build budgets for programs? With all these