This week, I have been reflecting on the work done over the past year to evolve our strategy and demonstrate our impact. As Head of Policy and Programmes, I oversee the different strategic areas and activities we do to drive change. It has been a continuous learning curve for me, always interesting and pushing me to think differently.

Through this collaborative strategy work, the story of how Replacing Animal Research is making a difference has clicked into place for me more firmly than ever before. This deeper understanding is making it easier to make strategic decisions with more confidence. This wasn’t quite so easy seven years ago when I first started work for the charity.

Who are our beneficiaries, really?

Within a year of starting my job, as the only full-time member of staff, I was involved in all aspects of the charity’s work and learning on the job.  I went on a course with a well-established training provider to help me develop the knowledge and skills to lead our corporate fundraising work.  In the course, we considered the problem faced by our beneficiaries, the solutions we provided and how to tell stories that showcased examples of these solutions in action. I realised quickly our story was more nuanced than some charities and our beneficiaries less obvious.

The ultimate beneficiaries of our work are the animals that DON’T get bred and used in research.

But we achieve this by supporting scientists. This has always been the case, since Dorothy Hegarty founded Replacing Animal Research, or FRAME as it was then. She realised that positive engagement with the scientists was a more effective way to bring change than simply saying ‘stop using animals’. This is still reflected in our work and mission today, ‘to ensure scientists use non-animal approaches in biomedical research and testing.’

What to measure?

Once we had discussed who our beneficiaries were, we shared the ‘solutions’ our charity had in place to help bring change. Despite being very familiar with all aspects of our work to fund and publish research, I found our stories harder to tell. I struggled to pinpoint the best stats and measures to truly demonstrate our impact.

Was it the number of science projects funded? The number of papers published, or scientists supported?

Whilst there is annual data on the number of animals used in regulated scientific research and testing in the UK, we can’t claim that a fall in animal use is all down to our work, and I found it tricky to articulate or demonstrate our specific contribution.

Our impact journey

As our team has grown over the past few years, we have gained more experience, ideas and skills –  all of which have fed into our strategy development over the past couple of years.

Even now, as impact data measures are being implemented within the team to help better communicate our story, this is an ongoing journey. As an example, when I first started, we set up the Innovation Grant scheme with the specific intention of providing small pots of money to researchers to do ‘proof of principle’ work to allow them to apply for larger grants.

In the early days, the success of the grant was judged on the scientific outputs reported back. Today, we are putting in place follow-up processes to establish whether follow-on funding has been achieved and how science has progressed and been disseminated, and the potential impact on Replacement progress more widely.

The more effort we have put into strategic thinking around the problem and potential solutions, the easier it has been to pinpoint where our small organisation can make the most difference. This has resulted in, for example, the development of a Replacement Checklist and specific policy elements aimed at strengthening Replacement implementation within existing law. As a result, our outputs have become more useful to our beneficiaries, our impact has become more obvious and the storytelling has become easier.

Our special ingredient

I do a bit of amateur musical theatre in my spare time. Our last show, Shrek, contained an upbeat song titled ‘This is Our Story’ which has the line ‘What makes us special, makes us strong!’ This line reminds me of a fundraising course where the trainer discussed our ‘special ingredient’ – the unique aspect that a charity brings to the table to help solve the problem it is tackling.

Today, this is very obvious to me. Replacing Animal Research is dedicated to supporting scientists and policymakers with credible, useful information and practical, simple solutions that meet a need. Solutions that are helping to bring positive change for animals now and in the future.

If you are interested in hearing more about how this is being achieved, please follow us on social media (Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook) and sign up for our newsletters. We’re excited to share our story with you.