Do you as a municipality have the ambition to work more impact-orientated? Then you have taken the first step already! And now you face a challenge: choosing the right route. From smaller municipalities to the biggest cities, there is a growing demand for concrete and feasible strategies to shape the ambition for impact-orientated work. Because how do you do it and how do you do it right?
Based on our experiences with various organisations in recent years, we outline five scenarios to be able to work more impact-orientated as a municipality. All scenarios are good. Making a clear choice for one of these scenarios helps you to create clarity and to achieve concrete results.
We briefly describe each scenario, including opportunities and risks, and for which type of municipality this is particularly suitable. Additionally, we offer a practical tip for getting started with each scenario, empowering you to take the next step quickly!
Scenario 1: Start focused and impactful
Focus on one specific programme or project. This allows you to go through the impact management cycle on a manageable scale. This approach provides the perfect opportunity to test and refine impact-orientated work. To do this:
- Clearly define the impact you expect to achieve with the programme or project, including the underlying assumptions. This is your roadmap for a clear research approach.
- Perform a specific and well-defined (first) impact measurement.
- Use the lessons learned from the measurement to adjust and improve the strategy.
Opportunities
- By starting small, you limit the risks.
- The lessons learnt provide a solid basis for expansion.
Risks
- Limited transferability of findings.
- Limited involvement of other programmes.
Suitable for municipalities or departments
- That have not yet widely embraced the added value of impact-orientated working. They, therefore, need a good example.
- Organisations with limited resources.
First step
- Choose a well-defined programme with clear potential for a positive impact and start a pilot.
Scenario 2: Strategic start
This scenario provides a structured approach to realise change, with a focus on strategy and collaboration with partners. To do this:
- Analyse which societal challenges are most pressing in your municipality and determine a focus.
- Identify potential solutions and change strategies with partners.
- Specify (without using detailed policy language) how you can realise change in the coming years.
- Develop subsidy frameworks that direct funding towards jointly agreed-upon impacts.
- Collaborate with partners in measuring and monitoring direct results and impact.
Opportunities
- Promotes closer collaboration with partners.
- Makes impact management a priority.
Risks
- Possibly too top-down.
Need for alignment with existing processes.
Suitable for municipalities or departments
- That want to make a structural change in the way in which they address societal challenges.
- That soon will be working on new strategies/policy frameworks and funding rounds.
First step
- Organise a strategic session with important partners to identify and prioritise the key societal challenges. This session is an excellent opportunity to learn from each other and to strengthen mutual relationships.
Scenario 3: Focus on partners
The underlying idea here is that you start working more impact-orientated in places where it is noticed most by residents of your municipality. This works as follows:
- Start with those that implement your policy (the partners) and engage them in the impact management process.
- Train them in the impact management process. This will empower them to identify areas for improvement and contribute to innovative solutions.
- Use the insights of partners to learn about the jointly realised impact and adjust accordingly.
Opportunities
- Strengthens the engagement of partners and promotes joint responsibility for impact.
- Brings together the world of policy and implementation.
Risk
- Requires significant investments in time and resources to bring partners to a similar level of understanding and capacity.
Suitable for municipalities or departments
- That collaborate extensively with partners.
- Where there is no internal doubt about the value of impact-orientated working.
First step
- Organise workshops on impact-orientated working with implementation teams. These workshops offer an accessible way to inform, enthuse and involve partners in the process.
Scenario 4: Impact deep diving
In this scenario, you will focus on measuring and monitoring impact around specific learning questions. This way you will learn about the impact your municipality is making. In contrast to scenario 1, the focus here is primarily on systematically answering learning questions that arise through research rather than going through the entire impact management cycle. This works as follows:
- Determine together what the learning questions are, and prioritise them.
- Define an approach for each learning question - some questions require larger-scale empirical research; while others can be answered through literature reviews or a few interviews with target groups or experts.
- Allocate responsibilities and get started with answering the questions.
- Once answers are found, discuss them and provide context and interpreation.
- Continue by choosing another learning question to answer!
Opportunities
- Providessolid substantiation of your impact
- This is a scenario where you can quickly shift the focus depending on (political) requirements
Risks
- May involve only a relatively small group of stakeholders.
- This approach contributes, to a lesser extent, to a new way of thinking.
Suitable for municipalities or departments
- That want to improve how they measure, research and evaluate impact in a targeted way, without reviewing their entire way of working.
First step
- Create a list of the learning questions that exist within your municipality or team and select the most urgent ones that you want to answer in the short term.
Scenario 5: training
This approach embeds impact-orientated working in the culture of your municipality: everyone speaks the same language and is aware of the main models of impact-orientated working. This works as follows:
- Determine clearly who needs to be trained (all employees, specific teams, etc.) and what the concrete learning goals of the training are.
- Start by developing a basic training course that includes the core principles and models of impact-orientated working.
- Organise coaching and practical support to put the gained insights into practice.
- Reflect with each other on the lessons learned so that people learn from experiences and the new knowledge becomes part of the standard ways of working.
Opportunities
- Stimulates a shared understanding of impact-orientated working and contributes to culture change.
- Integrates impact thinking into different aspects of work, leading to better decisions and results.
Risks
- The process requires a significant (time) investment from participants.
- Some participants want to go faster/slower than the programme allows.
Suitable for municipalities or departments
- That seek to thoroughly embed impact-orientated working int heir organisation.
- Where management propagates the importance of training and development and creates space for this.
First step
- Start with a pilot training programme for a small and motivated team and refine the approach.
Take the next step quickly!
Explore and evaluate how these scenarios fit within your context. Only then will you make the best choice. Each scenario offers unique advantages and challenges and all scenarios can be a successful route to more impact-orientated working. Of course, no municipality is the same and sometimes a combination of scenarios is the most effective. Our most important tip: dare to make a choice and take that next step! Impact-orientated working helps you make a positive difference for the residents of your municipality.
Would you like to know more about impact-orientated working and how to get there?
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