Measuring Impact - Nicva

Identifying & categorising the sector’s impacts 25
Education and training
Health and social care
Community
Children and families
Intermediaries
Youth
Disability
Volunteering
Arts, culture and heritage
Environment
Advice and advocacy
Sport and recreation
Gender
Benevolent organisations
Employment
Religion
International aid & emergency relief
Animal welfare
Housing
Community justice
Ethnic minorities
Outcome and impact are likely to
be well described using the
descriptors cited in this study.
Outcome and impact are likely to
be fairly well described using the
descriptors cited in this study.
Outcome and impact measurement are
likely to need additional descriptors to
those cited in this study.
Outcome and impact measurement are
likely to need tailored methodologies.
Not enough case-studies to give
a true representation.
Table 4.4 – Activity areas ranked by occurrence of outcomes and impact
Critique of methodology 4.4
The study used a large number and broad range of organisations. These organisations
described a wide range of activities and identified many areas where the voluntary sector is
having an impact. However, this approach has a number of drawbacks:
• The approach allowed for description rather than demonstration of impact, except
where external studies were quoted by organisations.
• Using a questionnaire relied heavily on the respondent understanding what was
meant by impact or added value.
• Concentrating on just one stakeholder group (staff of the organisation) will have
resulted in a bias in the types of impact identified, and may have made it more likely
that negative impacts were not reported.
• It is also hard to draw causal links between particular impacts and any outputs or
inputs of the organisations, or the context or system in which the organisations operate.
• The wording of the questionnaire, and the use of a questionnaire rather than
interviews also reduced the ability of the study to identify negative impacts.