Joss Saunders is a very busy man. His full time day job is to be Oxfam’s lawyer. He is also Oxfam’s Company Secretary, and in his spare time he writes Oxfam’s accountability reports. Luckily he had time to address delegates at a recent CharityComms conference about measuring and demonstrating impact.
In his presentation Saunders was extraordinarily open, honest and passionate about Oxfam’s accountability reporting. For Saunders accountability is about three things: “Transparency, participation and evaluation... and it’s also about putting beneficiaries at the centre of everything we do” he said.
Saunders continued: “Quality and accountability are two sides of the same coin. You cannot improve the quality of your work tremendously if you’re not accountable. And you certainly won’t be accountable if you’re not improving quality.”
Saunders had plenty of advice for delegates on how to improve their accountability reporting - so we thought we’d share some of these tips with you
Tip 1: Don’t reinvent the wheel.
Use the policies and frameworks which already exist. For example “look at The Charity Commission’s website for complaints procedures ...look at Oxfam for transparency policies...and feel free to steal anything of mine” Saunders said.
Tip 2:Participation is key.
Getting buy-in from the communities you work in is absolutely necessary and will make so much difference to your accountability reporting.
Tip 3: You SHOULD report embarrassing things in your accountability report.
Reporting on embarrassing issues is positive – “it provides the pressure needed for change” Saunders assured. While charities are legally bound to report all fraud to the Charity Commission they are not obliged to report on it Saunders said. However it is best to be honest and transparent about difficult issues to ensure future change. For example in 2006/2007 staff and partners stole £183,483 from Oxfam, who decided to go public with this fact, earning commendation from newspapers. Saunders said: “It’s better to out it yourself than let someone else out it for you.”
Tip 4: Learn from each other.
Get together in groups of 2 or 3 charities and visit each others’ projects, give feedback and challenge each others’ reporting.
Tip 5: Don’t just report from the top down.
We should be reporting from the bottom up as well, involve the people you are trying to help.
Tip 6: Practice what you preach.
Accountability reports should contain information on how your organisation is doing on the very issues it campaigns about. For example a key Oxfam campaign focuses on carbon footprints and therefore Oxfam’s accountability reports include facts about their own attempts to reduce carbon emissions.
Tip 7: Three tools to help you with your own accountability reporting:
One World Trust report, Global Reporting Initiative and stakeholder mapping - which gives you details of hostiles and analysis of external frameworks.
Tip 8: Complaints are free feedback.
You don’t have to pay for focus groups or expensive research when people will let you know what they dislike for free! At the end of his presentation Joss Saunders confided: “It’s been hard work. At times it’s been quite a painful process...But the relief we felt when our first report went out...even though it contained bad news, we we’re extremely proud of it...The process itself - of having to write the report has been the most valuable thing. And it’s making a real difference, it’s encouraging us in the changes we’re trying to make... Accountability - it’s practical, it’s hard work, it’s great.”
