Meet the 2024 SIMNA Awards Finalists!

We are delighted to introduce our 2024 SIMNA Awards finalists! We received a fantastic array of high-calibre applications from organisations of all sizes and types, including not-for-profits, social enterprises, funders and corporates, working right across the country. Our sincerest gratitude goes to our 2024 Judging Panel for generously volunteering their time and expertise in the field of social impact measurement to select our finalists.

The winners were announced at our online Awards Ceremony on Thursday 28 November.

And the 2024 SIMNA Awards Finalists are…

Excellence in Social Impact Measurement

• ANZ | Saver Plus
• Community Hubs Australia | 2023 SROI Evaluation
• Life Education Queensland | Stand Up for Respect
• Relationships Australia Victoria | Demonstrating the impact and value of our services (family dispute resolution)
• Seer Data & Analytics, FGG & Social Outcomes | Future Generation Global Impact Measurement Initiative
• The Australian Literacy and Numeracy Foundation | Early Language and Literacy Development Index (ELLDI)

Watch their pitch videos or read more below!

Innovative Design in Social Impact Measurement

• For-Purpose Evaluations & Fams | Amplify Our Sector
• Junction Australia | Social Impact Learning Framework
• The Interplay Project | The Interplay Project
• The Salvation Army | Flexibility in evaluation with culturally diverse victim-survivors of family violence: going beyond “doing no harm”

Watch their pitch videos or read more below!

Outstanding Collaboration in Social Impact Measurement

• Latitude Network | ACE Data Collaboration
• Starlight Children’s Foundation | The Third Birthday Party Initiative
• White Box Enterprises & CSI Swinburne | Evaluation of DSS Payment by Outcomes Trial 3 (PBO Trial 3)

Watch their pitch videos or read more below!

Social Impact Measurement in Funding, Investment and Grantmaking

• Ecstra Foundation | Impact Measurement Framework
• For Purpose Investment Partners | For Purpose Investment Partners
• Foundation for Rural and Regional Renewal | Investing in Rural Community Futures (IRCF)
• Lotterywest | Lotterywest – Impact Design, Measurement & Evaluation

Watch their pitch videos or read more below!

Learn more about each of the finalists

ANZ | Saver Plus

Established by ANZ and Brotherhood of St Laurence (BSL) in 2003, Saver Plus is the world’s largest and longest running matched savings and financial education program. The program helps lower income Australians establish a long-term savings habit by combining incentives, personal support and goal setting.

Since 2003, Australian Government, ANZ, BSL and program partners The Smith Family and Berry Street have commissioned independent research to evaluate the impact of Saver Plus, producing twenty public reports. In October 2024 a longitudinal impact report of Saver Plus was launched, conducted in partnership with ANZ, BSL’s Social Policy and Research Centre (SPARC) and University of Tasmania.

The research involved an online survey to over 26,000 past participants, in-depth interviews with 25 participants, analysis of program data to gain further insights and calculation of social return on investment.

Community Hubs Australia | 2023 SROI Evaluation

In late 2023, Community Hubs Australia (CHA) engaged Deloitte to undertake a social return on investment evaluation (SROI) of the National Community Hubs Program, as it had done previously in 2021. The 2023 SROI evaluation concluded that $65.7 million of social benefits were derived nationally through participation in the community hubs network – generating a return of $3.50 for every dollar invested.

Life Education Queensland | Stand Up for Respect

Stand Up for Respect is a seven-week whole-of-upper primary bullying and violence prevention pilot program, implemented in four South East Queensland schools with lower ICSEA levels. The program targeted students in years five and six with two key aims: 1) to reduce bullying among upper primary students by enhancing schools’ existing bullying prevention efforts, and 2) to prevent future incidents of domestic violence in Queensland.

The focus of this program was chosen in collaboration with Social Marketing @ Griffith University who conducted a literature review, finding a link between childhood bullying and future violent relationships. The pilot developed a whole-of-upper primary approach, involving teachers and parents, based on an evidence-base of successful school-based bullying prevention programs.

To evaluate the program, students and teachers were surveyed at three points, with results shared with schools on an ongoing basis. Griffith University also produced a Social Return on Investment (SROI) report, finding (1) an increase in student confidence to intervene in bullying, (2) reduced victimisation across the Year 5/6 cohorts, and (3) an estimated cost-savings of $55,820 to the Queensland community in reduced domestic violence.

Relationships Australia Victoria | Demonstrating the impact and value of our services (family dispute resolution)

Over several years Relationships Australia Victoria has been on a journey to articulate, document and evidence program logics, an organisational theory of change, and outcome measurement framework. Their inaugural Social Impact Report was launched in 2023 (socialimp act.rav.org.au) with a theory of change animation and examples of impact across five key outcome domains. Their theory of change demonstrates how the organisation delivers positive outcomes and improved wellbeing for individuals, families and communities by building the skills, knowledge and attitudes that form the foundation of healthy relationships. As a result of ongoing efforts to embed routine outcome measurement into practice, this year in their Social Impact Report 2024 they have been able to report on high quality paired client-assessed data before and after service delivery, across 4 outcome domains, for a wide range of services.

Clients’ self-assessment of change indicate significant improvements in subjective wellbeing across all these domains. They have been able to use this data, combined with research and practice evidence to conduct a rigorous cost benefit analysis of their family dispute resolution services using wellbeing valuation. This analysis has shown that in addition to being cost-effective for government, families benefit most significantly through increased financial wellbeing and improved outcomes.

Seer Data, FGG & Social Outcomes | Future Generation Global Impact Measurement Initiative

The Future Generation Global (FGG) Impact Measurement Initiative was developed to demonstrate the value of investing in wellbeing and youth mental health prevention, as well as in the core operations and development of high potential not for profits (NFPs). FGG is a listed investment company that waives their management fees and donates 1 per cent of their assets to youth-focused NFPs.

FGG worked with Social Outcomes, and the 14 selected NFPs to develop the portfolio level Theory of Change and impact measurement framework. Seer Data “data activated” the Theory of Change and measurement framework by working closely with FGG and the 14 partners to collect and analyse a diverse range of data to understand and tell the impact story.  In an article for The Australia, David Gonski, veteran philanthropist and business leader, said, “this Impact Measurement initiative is a rare contribution and shows how Australian investors, corporations and non-profit organisations can come together to achieve real outcomes for young people.”

The Australian Literacy and Numeracy Foundation | Early Language and Literacy Development Index (ELLDI)

The Australian Literacy and Numeracy Foundation (ALNF) is a national charity assisting people in marginalised communities to gain vital language and literacy skills. Their flagship program is the Early Language and Literacy Program (EL&L) which aims to increase young children’s early language and literacy development and life outcomes by equipping educators, parents and carers, and community members with the knowledge and tools required to work with their own children to develop foundational oral language and early literacy skills.

ALNF commissioned the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) to develop the ELLDI with robust validation via connections to respected standardised, longitudinal instruments, including phonological awareness assessments. The ELLDI was designed to be a formative assessment tool to measure a child’s oral language and early literacy skills and the longitudinal impact of the EL&L program which has been delivered by ALNF for fifteen years.

For-Purpose Evaluations & Fams | Amplify Our Sector

Fams is the NSW peak body that represents the child protection NGO early intervention and prevention sector. The Amplify Project is a partnership between Fams and For-Purpose Evaluations (FPE) alongside twelve NGOs providing Targeted Early Intervention (TEI) programs from around NSW. Amplify supports a shift from a culture of compliance to a culture of outcomes curiosity across the TEI sector.

Amplify provides free and accessible resources to support organisations to understand their outcomes data, celebrate excellence, identify areas for improvement and communicate their findings. Over nine months Fams and FPE developed the Amplify Toolkit. The Amplify Toolkit is available to download for free on the Fams website and includes: a guide to understanding and communicating outcomes, a worksheet and a Power Point template for organisations to use to create the own Impact Reports.

Participating organisations received individual coaching to apply the Amplify Toolkit, analyse their data and develop their Impact Reports. They presented their Impact Reports at a Showcase Event attended by Department of Communities and Justice (DCJ), other TEI providers, Fams, and FPE. Amplify 2.0 will scale the impact of the original project across the TEI sector, fostering a self-sustaining community of practice among TEI providers across NSW.

Junction Australia | Social Impact Learning Framework

The Young Parent Project was established in 2023 via a three-year grant from the Paul Ramsey Foundation with pilot funding for a partnership between Junction Australia, The Australian Centre for Social Innovation and Better Start (Adelaide University).

The goal of the program is to prevent intergenerational contact with the child protection system. A Program Logic sets out outcomes as per the Junction Impact Framework with progress measured at intake, review points and close, by using the Parent Empowerment and Efficacy Measure (PEEM) and the Personal Wellbeing Index (PWI). TACSI have engaged young people in codesign program content develop the capacity of peer mentors.

Codesigning with Lived Experience has challenged Junction, where key learnings include working with young parents as peer mentors whose lives are in transition, including the birth of a child. The program has been operational for three cycles, with initial participants now becoming paid peer mentors who support other new parents.  After two years, key learnings about engaging this client group and metrics arising from the instruments administered during the program show promising results.

The Interplay Project | The Interplay Project

The Interplay Project came from a campaign by Aboriginal leaders in central Australian communities to empower desert knowledge. Funding for the research initiative was secured from the Australian Government to develop a wellbeing framework to quantify Aboriginal knowledge and ways of being.

The Interplay Wellbeing Framework was designed from the ground-up, over six years in Aboriginal communities in remote Australia. The idea was to measure Aboriginal values and bring these into policy. Even with much cultural diversity, all groups voiced the same priorities – culture, empowerment and community. They worked with communities to translate their stories into numbers, to show how these values were important to peoples’ wellbeing.

This research has been published in over 20 academic publications and the knowledge shared across communities through data visualisations of ‘Interplay Mapping’ of wellbeing. The framework is now applied to measure social impact for Aboriginal and other organisations that support Aboriginal values and progress.

The Salvation Army | Flexibility in evaluation with culturally diverse victim-survivors of family violence: going beyond “doing no harm”

The Carinya Therapeutic Program was developed by The Salvation Army Carinya Women and Children’s Service, in partnership with Women Illawarra. The program was funded to support victim-survivors of family violence that are unable to access timely therapeutic interventions due to extensive waiting periods in the Illawarra and Shoalhaven (NSW). This important impact measurement project aimed to examine outcomes and benefits of the pilot therapeutic program for women and children accessing family violence services. There are very few existing, valid and reliable measurement tools suitable for women and child victim-survivors of family violence, and this project necessitated thoughtful experimentation and innovation.

The evaluation team took a transformative and co-design approach to evaluating the program. There were several considerations in measuring social impact in a way which privileged and respected: trauma experience of participants, children as victim-survivors in their own right, and diverse participants, including Indigenous peoples.

The Research team prioritised decolonising the evaluation approach, balancing evaluation rigour with flexibility and promotion of social inclusion, social justice and sustainability in programming and evaluation, genuine collaboration and consultation, promoting cultural safety and lived experience perspectives and diversity of data sources.

Latitude Network | ACE Data Collaboration

The ACE Data Collaboration project arose from the need for Adult and Community Education Providers to demonstrate their impact to funders and work together as a sector. Recognising the power of collective intelligence, the project facilitates secure data sharing and analysis across the sector. Social impact measurement is central to this initiative, enabling organisations to track student demographics, needs and outcomes (both end of course and longer term ‘employment ladder’ outcomes), and to benchmark their performance against peers. The sector serves people not able to access the mainstream education system, including migrants with low English skills, people with disabilities and people with social disadvantages.

By sharing and analysing this data, organisations can identify areas for improvement, adopt best practices and advocate for change, ultimately leading to a more effective and equitable education system. The project has been built and is now live. Data is being pulled at an individual level for 42,000 students across five datasets and 100 data fields – it’s a large-scale data impact project, with more data refreshed daily. Plans for 2025 include reporting on social impact, setting benchmarks, and doing ‘big data’ analysis on what factors drive outcomes and student satisfaction.

Starlight Children’s Foundation | The Third Birthday Party Initiative

Aboriginal children, particularly in remote areas, face higher rates of serious and preventable health conditions compared to other Australian children. To address this, the Starlight Children’s Foundation (Starlight), guided by its Theory of Change, partnered with Cherbourg Health Service, SQRH and Western Sydney University’s (WSU) Indigenous Health Unit to pilot a “birthday party” event in Cherbourg, Queensland. The initiative aimed to reach children impacted by intergenerational trauma in healthcare and break down barriers by providing all three-year-olds with health checks in a culturally sensitive, appealing, and positive environment.

Health service providers and Starlight Captains (professional performers) collaborated to create a party atmosphere that made the health checks more engaging and less intimidating for children. Starlight’s Theory of Change ensured the program was designed for measurable impact, focusing on improving children’s healthcare experiences. Data were collected using a culturally informed, age-appropriate approach to gather satisfaction feedback from children and caregivers, along with semi-structured interviews with staff and health professionals, which were recorded, de-identified, and analysed. This pilot program and evaluation approach aligns with Starlight’s mission to improve health outcomes and highlights the value of co-designed, culturally respectful interventions, offering a model for improving healthcare access and engagement for First Nations children.

White Box Enterprises & CSI Swinburne | Evaluation of DSS Payment by Outcomes Trial 3 (PBO Trial 3)

PBO Trial 3 is the first of its kind in Australia. The Department of Social Services has partnered since July 2022 with White Box Enterprises and 17 social enterprises to measure the effectiveness of jobs-focused social enterprises in creating long-term meaningful employment for people who face barriers to work.

The trial specifically focuses on individuals living with a disability or those eligible for the Community Development Program, who have been out of work for at least nine of the last 12 months. Social enterprises are being paid for the first time for job outcomes they create at six, 12 and 18 months. These payments are designed to cover the costs of wrap-around supports.

Almost two years into the trial and results show social enterprises are incredibly effective in creating meaningful employment for people who have previously been out of work for at least nine of the last 12 months. White Box, with the support of Macquarie Group Foundation, has engaged CSI Swinburne to independently evaluate the trial over the three-year period (July 2022 – June 2025).

Ecstra Foundation | Impact Measurement Framework

Ecstra is a grant-making foundation committed to improving financial wellbeing (FWB) in Australia. Ecstra works with partners in communities, schools and other learning environments to map, design, deliver and measure financial education initiatives that help build individual financial literacy, capability and confidence. They also provide grants and support to consumer and community organisations in their work to address the many structural barriers to financial inclusion and economic security. The Australian FWB ecosystem is fractured and has historically lacked consistent measurement methodology and capability, partly due to structural underinvestment.

Ecstra has committed $23m of grant funding over four years to address these issues and the overall national decline in financial wellbeing. They seek to identify, fund and share effective approaches to building FWB. Their custom-built Outcomes Framework and tools efficiently integrate, measure and report FWB outcomes. These results underpin their advocacy efforts for a holistic, nationally coordinated approach to building financial wellbeing in Australia.

For Purpose Investment Partners | For Purpose Investment Partners

For Purpose Investment Partners (FPIP) is a not-for-profit social impact investment fund manager, created to pursue an important mission, bringing private sector capital and capabilities into sizeable businesses and projects to create significant social impact. They run businesses with efficacy while deeply embedding social purpose at the core of the business’ governance framework. Their overarching objective is to enhance the quality and accessibility of essential social services across Australia, making social impact investing a mainstream asset class.

At the core of For Purpose Investment Partners’ impact strategy is their “For Purpose Flywheel” theory of change. This steps out how embedding social purpose into organisations drives significant social and financial returns. By centring on customer needs and attracting mission-driven talent, they foster robust business models that prioritise societal benefits. They carefully select portfolio companies to align with these principles, actively working to embed social impact metrics that reflect their long-term goals.

Foundation for Rural and Regional Renewal | Investing in Rural Community Futures (IRCF)

The IRCF pilot program originated from FRRR’s 2017 Impact Report which reviewed 15 years of funding activity and highlighted a gap in support for organisational capacity building. This was evidenced by a high percentage of unsuccessful applications to FRRR for resourcing and capacity building. The Vincent Fairfax Family Foundation (VFFF) approached FRRR to explore options to address this gap in line with their own strategy.

IRCF was created as a place-based investment totalling $5 million over five years, with $1 million in direct grants in each of the three participating communities. Significant investment and emphasis were placed on a responsive action-research methodology of program evaluation. As well as creating direct community impact, the program tested a new model of community support comprising; a community roadmap; partnership grants throughout the program supporting capacity building initiatives; a local Community Facilitator role to coach, mentor, and support collaboration; collaborative ‘toolbox’ grants to support responsive collective impact via an expedited grants process; a digital information hub; and multi-faceted program evaluation (delivered in person and online) to support ongoing learning and program evolution. On the basis of the evaluation results, this program has received philanthropy support for implementation in regional Victoria, commencing late 2024.

Lotterywest | Lotterywest – Impact Design, Measurement and Evaluation

Lotterywest, a state government organisation and outcomes-based grant maker, applies social impact measurement and evaluation to ensure effective use of community resources. Last financial year, Lotterywest granted over $130M through 489 grants to 437 organisations, with amounts ranging from $3,000 to $7.7M. Eligible recipients include not-for-profits and local governments for projects serving charitable or benevolent purposes. Due to the diverse nature of its funding, no single approach can sufficiently evidence the impact of Lotterywest’s grants. Therefore, multiple elements contribute to a comprehensive social impact strategy, aligned with its outcomes-based Community Investment Framework (CIF).

Five principles underpin this approach: know the WA social, political, and environmental context; monitor outcomes and impact; evaluate and generate new knowledge; sustain outcomes and impact; and communicate and disseminate knowledge. In late 2022, Lotterywest launched the Community Impact Hub, an online platform that equitises access to an innovative suite of resources and tools designed for social impact measurement and evaluation. This structured approach ensures evidence aligns with strategic objectives while delivering meaningful community outcomes.