Services

Funders

As well as helping voluntary organisations measure the value of what they are doing, ESS also helps funders improve their own systems so that they can more easily gather good evidence about the difference their funds are making.

We can support you or your funded organisations by phone, email, workshops and face to face support all the way along the journey. See our leaflet Evaluation Support for Funders for more information about our services.

See the Evaluation Pathway for more details about the evaluation path.

Evaluation Declaration

We’ve worked with members of the Scotland Funders' Forum to produce the Evaluation Declaration. This has 5 statements that describe why monitoring, evaluation and reporting are important and what they should achieve. Funders are saying they believe evaluation is valuable, relevant, proportionate, supported and involves looking from the inside and outside at our work.

Evaluation Declaration Health Check Tool

The 'Evaluation Declaration' health check tool helps funders think about the way they undertake monitoring and evaluation and their relationships with funded organisations. Eleven funders have already used the tool and received a personalised report setting out what they do well and making suggestions for improvements. The Evaluation Declaration health check tool and the guidance for this tool are free for you to download. Please contact us if you are a funder and would like support to use this tool.

Harmonising Reporting Working Group

The Scotland Funders’ Forum has set up a working group on harmonising reporting.  We are supporting the group to come up with practical ideas to make reporting to funders more meaningful and useful.  We have produced a summary of the terms of reference for the working group.  If you would like to know more or have ideas to share, please get in touch.

Funders We Have Worked With

We have worked with a number of charitable trusts and other funders in Scotland, including Voluntary Action Fund, Scottish Arts Council, Scottish Community Foundation, Lloyds TSB Foundation for Scotland, Climate Challenge Fund and the Wood Family Trust.