Improving your organisation's performance

There’s always room for improvement. As an organisation this statement should resonate throughout planning and development of services.

In the voluntary sector, improving performance is about assuring services are of a certain standard and that they meet the expectations of service users. It’s about your organisation running as effectively and efficiently as possible. It’s about assuring quality.

According to the Charities Evaluation Service and the Performance Hub, quality is about learning from what your organisation is doing well, and using that to improve and develop your organisation further.

Evaluating the quality of your services and organisation has enormous benefits:

It allows you to identify gaps in your organisation and allocate resources to fill those gaps. This might be an internal issue, such as your finance policy and procedures failing in a particular area. Or there might be a shortcoming in the way your service is delivered.
It also helps your organisation gather evidence and prove to funders, users and other stakeholders that your organisation does what it does well and is constantly looking to improve. This is important, as the information will be needed when fundraising.

Charities Evaluation Service (CES) and the Quality Standards Task Group commissioned a large study of quality assurance practices in the sector and have published some guides on quality. Learn more about the adoption and use of quality systems in the voluntary sector.

Choosing a quality system

Over the years, organisations working in different areas have developed quality systems specific to their needs and the characteristics of their work. Here are some examples, which are flexible enough to adapt to suit your requirements.

If you’re new to quality, there are related terms and jargon which you might want to learn about to understand how quality systems work. CES have produced a jargon buster that provides definitions and examples. Download the jargon buster.

Examples of some quality systems

The Big Picture

This is an internal evaluation system that measures and assesses your organisation. There are many applications, including fundraising and strategic planning. It starts with two areas:
Results - what your organisation achieves
Enablers- what helps your organisation do this
These two areas are broken down into four additional areas that are further broken down into strands. This is organised in four quadrants and, as the title implies, will provide you with a "big" picture of your organisation. Learn more about the Big Picture.

The Outcomes Star

Developed by The London Housing Foundation, this system is for evaluating projects that work with vulnerable people, like the homeless. The system measures a user's progress in ten areas relating to positive changes that an individual would go through while involved in a programme.
The ten areas range from motivation and taking responsibility to managing money and personal administration. The system uses a ladder to map the progress a user has made in an area. The results are then plotted on a star diagram, which gives a graphical representation of a user’s overall progress in all areas. Learn more about the Outcomes Star.

Proving and improving: a quality and impact toolkit for social enterprise

This is an online toolkit for social enterprises. It explores practical ways to measure impacts and demonstrate the quality of these types of organisations. The system is flexible to adapt to other scenarios. Learn more about the toolkit.

Recognising and Recording of Progress and Achievement (RARPA)

RARPA is a five-step system designed for informal or non-accredited learning. Learning and Skills (LSC) funded projects are required to apply the system to their learning programmes. Learn more about RARPA.

Soft Outcomes Universal Learning (The Soul Record)

Developed by Norfolk’s voluntary sector and City College Norwich, this evaluation system is for informal learning projects. It measures soft outcomes and focuses on individual achievement. The system is compatible with the RARPA system mentioned above. Learn more about the Soul Record.

Social Accounting and Audit

A three step, flexible framework that helps organisations measure the social, environmental and economic impact on communities, beneficiaries and other stakeholders. Learn more about social accounting and auditing.

SpiritLevel

This system was developed to measure the progress of young people using soft outcomes. Learn more about SpiritLevel.

Quality standards

There are also some quality assurance systems that offer a standard the sector recognises. Examples include: EFQM Excellence Model, PQASSO, Charter Mark and Investors in People.
The performance hub website can help organisations choose a quality standard that best suits them. Choose a system using the performance hub.

Downloadable documents

The following are related documents to download, and can assist your organisation with planning and developing new or improving existing performance and quality systems.

General Information about Quality

Thinking Quality