All About the Numbers and the Stories

Monitoring and Evaluation for small voluntary and community organisations and groups

If you run a community group or a small local voluntary organisation, you probably wear a lot of hats - organiser, fundraiser, cheerleader, problem-solver. With so much going on, monitoring and evaluation can feel like just one more thing on the never-ending to-do list!

But monitoring and evaluation isn’t just paperwork. It’s your secret weapon for proving the impact that your voluntary organisation or community group has, and making sure your hard work is really making a difference.

So, what is monitoring and evaluation and how can you make it work for you and your organisation?

• Monitoring is about keeping track of what you’re doing as you go. Think of it like checking your progress during a journey. Are you on the right road, and how far have you come?
  
  For a voluntary organisation or community group, this might mean recording attendance at events, tracking volunteer hours, or noting how many people use your services and then checking, if you have any targets set, that you are on route to meeting them.
• Evaluation happens after (or sometimes during) a project. It’s about asking: Did we achieve what we set out to do? What worked well? What could be better next time? Evaluation looks at the bigger picture and helps you learn and improve.

Monitoring and evaluation gives you the all-important evidence about what you do. Whether it’s numbers or stories, it helps you show the real impact of your work and that’s gold when applying for grants or asking for support. Funders, partners, and even your own community will want to know “Is this making a difference?”

Small voluntary organisations and community groups often compete with bigger charities for funding. Having solid data and clear outcomes shows you’re professional and accountable. It’s like saying, “We know what we’re doing…and here’s the proof.”

Getting started on your monitoring

Start with what you want to achieve. Ask yourself the questions: How will I know that we are doing what we set out to do? How will I know we are reaching the people that we need to? Then, think about how you can measure this. For example, if your goal is to reduce social isolation, measure things like event attendance, and ask participants how connected they feel before and after using your project.

If your monitoring is for a specific fund or funder, make sure that you know exactly what it is that they want you to report on, and how and when they want it provided.

Collect numbers and stories

Funders love numbers, but real-life stories really show human impact. Use registers and sign in sheets to collect numbers, ask people to complete short feedback forms with some free text for observations, or provide comment boxes for feedback to collect stories.

You could use surveys to ask people how they feel and what they want to get out of becoming involved with your organisation and then ask again in 6 months whether there has been any change. Are there any of your beneficiaries who would be happy to write a short testimonial about how they have benefitted from your project?

Make collecting this information part of your everyday routine; that way you won’t end up scrabbling around at the last minute when you need to send off a monitoring report.

Review and learn

Set aside time to look at what the information you have collected tells you as you deliver your project. Celebrate your successes and tweak what needs improving.

When your project is complete, take time to show off and tell everyone how amazing your project and your organisation are. Tell everybody about the incredible impact your activities have had.

Think of monitoring and evaluation as a learning tool, not a tick-box exercise. It helps you understand what worked, what didn’t, and what you can do differently. This is one way that small organisations can become stronger over time.

And finally, six top tips for getting started on your monitoring and evaluation

1. Write down what it is that you want to achieve, what is the change that you want to see? If you can, write down the numbers that you want to achieve.
2. Decide what you will count and collect to measure your activities and their impact. Don’t forget to include any information that you might already be collecting.
3. Plan into your everyday delivery how you will record what you are doing.
4. If your project is funded, what information does the funder want, how do they want this fed back to them?
5. Check in on your monitoring regularly to ensure that you are collecting the information that you need and whether there is anything that you need to do differently.
6. Finally, don’t be shy, use your final monitoring report to really shine a light on what you have achieved and what you have learned along the way if things didn’t go quite to plan.

If you are still a bit lost or not sure how to get started, our chatbot is here to help.