The Difference

Matt Stevenson-Dodd
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Take a deeper dive into the case studies featured in the book 'The Difference: how to understand, measure and maximise social impact' by Matt Stevenson-Dodd. Join Helen and Matt from Trust Impact as they talk to the leaders behind the stories from some of the most impactful social impact organisations in the world.

Episodes

  1. 2d ago

    The Difference - Episode 5 - Renae Mann

    The Difference Podcast: Renae Mann, Refugee Council “It's hard to find the space to step back and really think: what are we here for?” That's Renae Mann, Executive Director of Services at Refugee Council, on how easy it is to lose sight of the bigger picture when you're doing frontline work in a complex space. Renae has spent twenty-five years in the social justice sphere, with a particular focus on refugee and migrant justice. She's social work and community development trained, and after five years at Refugee Council she has just been appointed CEO of Unseen, which provides safe houses and community support for survivors of trafficking and modern slavery. Finding the golden thread When Renae arrived at Refugee Council, the organisation was doing brilliant work, but it had no single, joined-up story about the impact it wanted to have. Lots of great outputs. No North Star. We talk about the three-year process of building one: starting in service delivery, then realising they needed to step back and rebuild the theory of change from scratch, sense-checked directly with refugees. Renae's advice for anyone starting an impact journey: it must be bottom-up, not top-down, and the conversations with the people you serve should come first, not last. The tension between delivery and influence One of my favourite moments from our work with Refugee Council was a room split right down the middle, half the team thought the greatest impact came from direct service delivery, half thought it came from changing government policy. Renae reflects on that tension, and why the answer wasn't to pick a side but to get clearer about what each was actually for. Safety as an outcome Refugee Council's data has shown a stark difference in how safe people feel depending on how they arrived in the UK, through the asylum system versus a safe route. Renae talks about what that uncertainty does to people, and how the political landscape around it has shifted since the Refugee Convention's tenth anniversary of the Brexit vote. Risk, or “bold action” We've asked a few guests about risk during this podcast series, and Renae's answer was particularly insightful: reframe it. Risk implies fear. What organisations actually need is bold action - grounded in robust governance and a psychologically safe culture, so people have permission to try things that might not work. Also in this episode Why 50,000+ people's worth of outcome data has changed how Refugee Council tells its story, including through last year's rebrandWhat “holistic” support actually means when casework, therapy, community development and volunteering work togetherListen now Renae Mann was until recently Executive Director of Services at Refugee Council. The case study features in The Difference: How to Understand, Measure and Maximise Social Impact, out now. The Difference Podcast is hosted by Matt Stevenson-Dodd and Helen Gregg.

  2. Aug 5

    The Difference - Episode 4 - James Blake

    The Difference Podcast: James Blake, Chief Executive of YHA (England & Wales) “It isn’t rocket science, nor is it incredibly expensive.” That’s James Blake, Chief Executive of YHA (England & Wales), on realising that YHA’s impact didn’t need a big new programme or budget – just a different way of using the moments the charity already had with every guest. James has led YHA since 2017. Before that, his career ran through central and local government, from neighbourhood renewal policy under the Blair and Brown governments to Chief Executive of St Albans City and District Council.  James’s YHA story is one of the case studies in the book. This is the conversation behind that chapter. Finding the North Star Coming out of Covid, Trust Impact were invited to help YHA think about impact. They put a question to YHA’s board and exec team: are you a social tourism business, a wellbeing charity, or a youth charity? The debate didn’t land on any single answer. Instead it produced something sharper: connection, between people inside the hostel, and between people and nature and heritage outside it, eventually distilled into three measurable outcomes – connection, confidence, and belonging. Impact you don’t need a big budget for The interventions that came from this insight cost next to nothing to implement: a different conversation at check-in, staff prompting guests to talk to each other in a self-catering kitchen, clearly marked walking routes. James built connection, confidence and belonging straight into YHA’s KPIs and dashboards. YHA has now completed its first full year of baseline data – one early outlier being Black Sail, a hostel reachable only on foot, running at roughly 140 against an average score of 100. Also in this episode Why prioritisation was the hardest part of the process for James and the teamHow aligning impact and income, rather than treating them as competing, de-risked decisions across fundraising and school trip programmesWhat James is now recommending to Hosteling International, the global federation of youth hostel associationsHis honest answer on whether the work of YHA will ever be “done”Listen now James Blake is Chief Executive of YHA (England & Wales). His case study features in The Difference: How to Understand, Measure and Maximise Social Impact, out now and a number one Amazon bestseller. The Difference Podcast is hosted by Matt Stevenson-Dodd and Helen Gregg.

  3. Jul 22

    The Difference - Episode 3 - Marchu Belete

    The Difference Podcast: Marchu Belete, Director of Migration Exchange (formerly CEO of Hibiscus) “The moment required us to step up.” That’s Marchu Belete, on why she chose to challenge Hibiscus’s biggest source of income rather than let the organisation drift further from why it was founded. Marchu is an excellent leader in the UK’s migration and refugee sector. She was co-director at Women for Refugee Women, then Chief Executive of Hibiscus, and is now Director of Migration Exchange at Global Dialogue. Helen worked alongside Marchu during her time at Hibiscus, in her Trust Impact capacity, so this conversation carries real history with it. Marchu’s story is one of the case studies behind Chapter 4 of the book. This is the conversation behind that chapter. The biggest question - purpose or money? Marchu joined Hibiscus in October 2020 to lead an organisation set up to support migrant women. When she looked at the numbers, most of the people Hibiscus was working with were men – this was the result of government contracts that had quietly pulled the organisation away from its founding purpose. Rather than asserting a fix, she went and found Olga Heavens, the woman who founded Hibiscus in 1986, and invited her back in to tell the team why the organisation existed in the first place. Marchu made the case to walk away from a government contract worth a huge share of Hibiscus’s income, because keeping it meant working against the very reason the charity existed. Centring the right risk We talk about what Helen calls Marchu’s quiet leadership, and Marchu’s answer to how you build a culture that takes risks: keep pointing back to who you’re there to serve. Her sharpest point is on risk itself – the reputational risk a funder worries about is nothing next to the risk migrant women face to their safety, their homes, their children. Getting that comparison right changes every decision that follows. Also in this episode Why the pandemic and the Black Lives Matter moment made 2020 the right time to force the purpose question, not the wrong oneHow Marchu carried the same discipline into Migration Exchange, building a clear purpose statement from day oneHer case for why charities can’t afford to work in silos any longerHer honest answer on when the work of a charity like hers is never “done”Listen now Marchu Belete is Director of Migration Exchange at Global Dialogue, and former Chief Executive of Hibiscus. Her case study features in The Difference: How to Understand, Measure and Maximise Social Impact, out now and a number one Amazon bestseller. The Difference Podcast is hosted by Matt Stevenson-Dodd and Helen Greig.

  4. Jul 6

    The Difference - Episode 2 - Kate Lee

    The Difference Podcast: Kate Lee, Chief Executive of NCVO "We're not MI5. There's not that many secrets here." That's Kate Lee, talking about why she thinks charities are far too nervous about being honest with the public. Kate is Chief Executive of NCVO, the National Council for Voluntary Organisations. Before that she led Alzheimer's Society and Young Lives vs Cancer, and before that she spent nearly seventeen years at the Red Cross. She has an OBE. She also, this week, accidentally kicked a hornet's nest while gardening. Both of those things are relevant to this episode, though only one of them is about impact measurement. Kate’s story is one of the case studies behind Chapter 2 of the book, ‘Failure versus Success’. This is the conversation behind that chapter. Two truths and a lie We always start the same way. Kate gave us three statements - one false. She was once asked to advise a BBC drama about charities; she kicked a hornet's nest at the weekend; a friend of hers refuses to use the downstairs toilet because that's where Kate keeps her OBE! Helen and I both got it right, for what it's worth. Listen to find out which one was the lie and stick around for Kate's pitch for the charity-sector drama nobody's made yet. The Good, the Bad and the Ugly The heart of this episode is a report Kate published back in 2019 while she was at Young Lives vs Cancer, an annual report that did something most annual reports don't: it told people what hadn't worked. We talk about why the "bad" and "ugly" sections did more for donor trust than the "good" ever could alone, and why Kate thinks transparency is a journey you start two years before you publish anything, not a decision you make on the day. Trust, and why the logic doesn't work We talked about the Ipsos Veracity Index (charity chief executives are trusted less than bankers), and Kate's answer wasn't what we expected. Her argument: this isn't a logic problem. You can't win a moral disagreement about executive pay with better impact data. Sector leaders keep trying to argue their way out of a values conversation, and it isn't working. Data the sector already has Kate also talks about the "wholesale impact" of the sector - the idea that charities collectively hold an enormous amount of evidence about what works, scattered across thousands of organisations that never talk to each other. NCVO has 17,000 members. What could we learn if even a fraction of them pooled what they know? It's a genuinely exciting idea, and one I suspect we'll come back to. Also in this episode Why Kate is "evidence informed" rather than "evidence led"The reach-versus-resource-versus-impact triangle she uses when a service isn't proportionate to its costHer message for the next Prime MinisterWhat "done" would even look like for NCVO (spoiler: not any time soon) Listen now Kate Lee is Chief Executive of NCVO. Her case study features in The Difference: How to Understand, Measure and Maximise Social Impact, out now and a number one Amazon bestseller. The Difference Podcast is hosted by Matt Stevenson-Dodd and Helen Gregg.

  5. Jun 15

    The Difference - Episode 1 - Frank Fletcher

    Frank Fletcher: from "Do" to "Difference" Find out more at - https://www.thedifference.guide Most charities can tell you what they do. Fewer can tell you the difference they make. In this first episode of The Difference Podcast, Matt and Helen sit down with Frank Fletcher, CEO of the Ellen MacArthur Cancer Trust, the charity that opens Chapter 1 of Matt's book The Difference, to get behind the story in the chapter. The Trust takes young people who've been through cancer treatment on four- and five-day sailing and outdoor adventures, giving them the chance to challenge themselves and build new memories. For years, the team came home with a yacht full of inspiring stories. But when they asked, "Have you had a nice time?", the answer was yes about 99% of the time. Lovely to hear, and almost useless for knowing whether they were actually changing lives. This episode is about what happened next: the shift from a "do" organisation to a "difference" organisation, the honesty it took to get there, and what it feels like to go looking for the gaps in your own impact, and then publish them. Why this one's worth your time ·       "Do" or "difference"? Most organisations talk about activities, sessions delivered, people reached. Difference organisations talk about the change they make. ·       The "So what?" test. "We take 700 young people sailing each year." So what? "It builds their confidence." So what? Keep going until you reach the change that matters - for the Trust, helping young people believe in a brighter future, living through and beyond cancer. ·       Form follows function. Decide the difference you want to make first, then design the activity around it. ·       Honesty is an asset, not a failure. The Trust openly shows how many young people didn't improve their wellbeing, and that honesty makes the successes believable. ·       Its hard to measure a "nice time." A favourable experience and a genuine difference are not the same thing. Go deeper in the book This episode is the behind-the-scenes version of Chapter 1 - "'Do' or 'difference'?" You'll find the full "do" vs "difference" breakdown and a simple test for your own organisation, the Trust's reworked need, vision and purpose statements, the "So what?" diagnostic step by step, and the three golden rules Matt set at Street League: never over-claim; back every percentage with absolute numbers; make every outcome auditable. See the Trust's live impact dashboard: https://www.trst.uk/emct About the guest Frank Fletcher is CEO of the Ellen MacArthur Cancer Trust, which supports young people aged 8–24 to rebuild confidence after cancer treatment through sailing and outdoor adventures across the Isle of Wight and Scotland. He began working with Matt and Trust Impact shortly after the consultancy was founded in 2019. Find out more: https://www.ellenmacarthurcancertrust.org The Difference Podcast goes deeper into the ideas from The Difference: How to Understand, Measure and Maximise Social Impact by Matt - out now. Enjoyed the episode? Follow the show, leave a review, and share it with someone who talks a lot about what they do, and not enough about the difference they make.

  • 5 Episodes

About

Take a deeper dive into the case studies featured in the book 'The Difference: how to understand, measure and maximise social impact' by Matt Stevenson-Dodd. Join Helen and Matt from Trust Impact as they talk to the leaders behind the stories from some of the most impactful social impact organisations in the world.

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  • Creator
    Matt Stevenson-Dodd
  • Years Active
    2026
  • Episodes
    5
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2025 Matt Stevenson-Dodd