Urgent: Charities must record and remember this crisis

There is something urgent all charities need to do as soon as possible. That is, to capture, record, and be ready to demonstrate, the amazing value and impact that they have had during the pandemic. This is especially vital for small, local charities. It was a commonplace at the beginning of the crisis for us all to notice how much worse eveything would have been without us. Funders rightly poured core funds into the sector because without us, there would have been nothing for many people. Now, we need to avoid the backsliding.

Funders need to remember the value that unrestricted, core funds had when they supported charities they knew and trusted to just do what they do. The public sector needs to remember that charities did the work they couldn't, and often shouldn't, do to hold society together, and stop some of the most vulnerable falling between the cracks (the elderly, the isolated, people with mental illness, excluded and disadvantaged groups, and so many others). The Government needs to openly and specifically recognise that value they relied on, but barely acknowledged, and commit to funding and supporting the voluntary and community sector.

What we all saw was how much resilience we bring to the world. When things go wrong, we are there. And even more so, we provide a social fabric of help, support, and mutuality that is vital all the time, but even more so at times of crisis. It has always been the case: one charity I work with helped hold together their community, and supported hundreds of families in the First World War, and during the Blitz. Not to mention through successive rounds of austerity - often almost as damaging.

Striking while the iron is hot

I'm currently working with several charities on evaluations and research projects, and I see how much 'material' there is, and just how much there is to say. It takes my breath away, the difference they have made.

We never have time for this kind of reflection or capturing of our impact - but if there's any way at all to do it, we have to do it soon. These things get lost, narratives get moved on, and decision-makers slide back into their old ways of thinking. It's a matter of urgency that we all record the vital impact we made during this time of crisis - in many ways, in itself, a continuation of the impact we make every single day.

Not everyone has the time for, or can afford, a professional evaluation or research project. Funders rarely fund them unless they have done so for a specific project. They are pulling together their own accounts of the impact made by the charities they fund - framed, of course, at a high level, and across their portfolio. This is vital, but not enough.

What you can do right now

My suggestion is that at the minimal level, we all try to find a couple of hours for our delivery staff to come together and reflect on the biggest impacts they had during the crisis. Record a few stories of how they made a difference. Write them down, put them on your website, tell them to your funders, send them to your MP or your councillor, or even just save them on your hard drives. Tell those stories wherever you can - we need to make sure that we shout loud about the difference we make.

At the same time, there is a more business-driven reason. At some point, a funder, or indeed, a commissioner, or other stakeholder, is likely to ask what value there is in your work, and whether it really is 'life and death' stuff. Or indeed, they will ask you to demonstrate the value you present to the social fabric of your community, thinking, perhaps, that it will be impossible to demonstrate (a tactic I have seen many times). That, I think, is now much harder for the sceptical to ask, and to expect (hope for?) no clear answer. Capturing what we do is vital to the survival and thriving of charities who operate in a climate where they are constantly asked to prove the value of what they do, nd keep doing it anyway.

This is our chance. The tales we can tell cannot fail to impress the value of what we do, not just for our communities, but for society as a whole. If nothing else, it will help us all remember, on the bad days as well as the good, just what we have achieved.