LSF EVALUATION BULLETIN

SNAPSHOT SURVEY 2
3rd February 2017

This bulletin presents the findings from the second LSF snapshot survey, which explored grant holders
perceptions of organisational sustainability and their experiences of their LSF advisors. It is just for grant
holders and their partners at the moment and should not be published elsewhere.
129 LSF grantees responded to this snapshot survey online, which is a response rate of 49%. This was down
from the first snapshot survey, where 177 replied (67%). We expected a slight decrease between surveys.
It was open for a month between early December and early January 2017. There were ten questions asked,
two of which were open questions. This bulletin presents the findings from the eight closed questions. The
headline themes from the open responses are presented here, but the data will be analysed in greater
depth as part of the ongoing evaluation.

Key findings

For respondents, sustainability in their organisation most commonly meant diversifying income and
becoming less reliant on core or grant income.
How sustainability was defined in LSF was clear to the vast majority of respondents.
Most advisors were already known to the organisation prior to LSF; very few grantees used a
competitive recruitment process. Advisors tended to come on board at the application stage.
Advisors were seen as central to the success of organisations LSF projects and were seen as
succeeding at this so far.
Generally, advisors were used for advice and guidance, and general support. In addition, the skills
of advisors, as well as knowledge, were highly valued.

What we mean by sustainability

In the survey we were interested in finding out more about what grantees think about sustainability and
how they define it. This is because it is a term frequently used in the voluntary sector, but sometimes
referring to very different things to different organisations and agencies. In recent research IVAR (2016)
identify 13 meanings of sustainability, some complementary, others conflicting. There is not space to
outline all these in detail here, but they include:

The importance of sustainability: Various instances where sustainability is seen as a good thing
without defining what that means;

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Financial and organisational survival: This version prioritises financial and organisational survival at
all costs and over other considerations, such as mission creep and change of target beneficiaries;
Diversifying income and creating a business income stream: To become less dependent on grant
income and become more enterprising;
Organisation capacity for service delivery: For government agencies the focus has sometimes been
on prioritisation organisational capacity for service delivery;
Organisational characteristics: A series of organisation characteristics that constitute being a
sustainable organisation. This might include a clear mission and aims, good governance, and
qualified and committed staff.
In the survey respondents were presented with 15 options and asked to select the three that best fitted
with their understanding of sustainability in their organisation. The six most frequently selected options
are presented in the table below. The options selected broadly fell into themes about income
diversification; planning; and improving the organisation in some way (including capability and processes).
The two most frequently cited options were diversifying income streams (50%) and becoming less reliant
on core or grant income (36%). The third most cited was planning, with a third of respondents citing this.

Table 1. Which of the following most closely fit what sustainability actually means in your organisation?

Options Percentage
(n=129)
Diversifying income streams 50%

Being
Being less
less reliant
reliant on
on core
core or
or grant
grant income
income 36%

Planning36.4%
for the long term 33%

Improving organisational
Planning for the long termcapability (including staff,
33.3% 31%
volunteers and trustees)
Improving organisational capability (including staff,
volunteers and funding
Having enough trustees)to keep operating
31.0% 30%

Improving organisational
Having enough funding toprocesses (including
keep operating 26%
finance, 30.2%
IT, marketing)

Improving organisational processes (including

finance, IT, marketing) 26.4%
In terms of what is meant by sustainability in the LSF programme, the respondents had a clear
understanding, with 95% saying they were quite clear or very clear. Only one percent were quite unclear
or very unclear.

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Open responses
There were 63 open responses to the request for further comments about sustainability either as a
concept or how it impacts on their organisations work.
Some common themes were:
Multiple definitions of sustainability: It was felt that the word was used in different ways by
different organisations and sectors. This reflects the research about the proliferation of the term
sustainability. In some cases it was believed that sustainability was seen by the public sector/local
authorities as an excuse for cutting funding to the voluntary sector. Many defined sustainability in a
way that was relevant for their organisation.
Sustainability as a concept can be seen as vague or subjective.
[For government] Their interpretation of sustainable is no longer a burden. For the organisations
themselves, sustainable means surviving. It is a big step to then think about thriving.
External environment affects what is needed to be sustainable: With austerity and cuts, many felt
that sustainability, and what was needed to be sustainable, was largely shaped by the external
environment. Therefore adaptability and flexibility were vital.
However in a changing funding landscape and society it is also being adaptable as needs and
external environments change so quickly.
The need for internal culture change: For some there were barriers within their organisational
culture to sustainability and what was needed to survive and thrive.
Board, CEOs and staff need to get a better grasp of sustainability.
The need to continue to serve beneficiaries/the community: Some respondents pondered the aim
of sustainability. Again reflecting broader debates, was sustainability merely an end in itself? Or
was it the core mission of the organisation and/or continuing to provide important services/support
for their target beneficiaries/communities?

We owe it to our beneficiaries to ensure that our organisation is financially viable, fit for purpose
(now and in the future) and is constantly re-evaluating what it does in line with the changing
environment and the needs and wishes of our customers.

How grantees perceive advisors in LSF

Advisor recruitment and involvement in their application
The vast majority of advisors were already known to the organisation (72%). Just under a third had the
advisors recommended to them (32%). Only 17% said they proactively searched for them and even fewer
had a competitive selection process (5%), with 2% inviting applications or had a formal interview process.
Whilst just over a quarter of advisors were involved at the ODT stage (27%), over two-thirds were involved
in the application stage (70%). The rest came on board after the grant was awarded.

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In terms of the four types of support provided by advisors, advice and guidance was most common (81%),
followed by general support (63%). Fewer cited support discrete aspects of the project (47%) or the actual
delivery (37%).
Table 2. Which of the following types of support is your advisor(s) providing to your organisation?

Support type Percentage

(n=129)
Advice and guidance 81%

General support (e.g. across your organisation's 63%

operations)

Discrete aspects (e.g. financial systems review or 47%

developing a website)

Active delivery (i.e. actually delivering concrete 37%

aspects of the project)

Role and value of advisors

Advisors were seen as central to the organisations LSF projects success and were so far seen as doing well
in this respect. In terms of how important the advisor(s) role is to the overall success of their LSF project,
this was scored, on average, 8.9 out of ten.
The respondents were asked to rate the success of their advisor(s) role in their project so far out of ten.
The overall average was 8.8 out of ten. The advisors were valued for a variety of knowledge and skills. The
most important was sector specific skills (rated 9 out of 10) and technical skills and knowledge (8.1 out of
ten).

Chart 1. The importance of different aspects of an advisor's skills,

knowledge and experience to an LSF project
Organisation-specific knowledge and experience (e.g. having a pre-
existing relationship with your organisation)
Practical experience (e.g. actually been employed as a Finance
Director/ HR Manager)

Technical skills and knowledge (e.g. finance, HR, IT)

Sector-specific skills and knowledge (e.g. VCSE sector)

Service-specific skills and knowledge (e.g. disability, arts,
community)
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Importance out of ten