You might already know what you want to measure, based on the outcomes you have mapped. However, it’s important to think about what you want to measure and how you will do this. What indicators will help you know if a change has occurred?

What is an indicator?

An indicator is information that allows us to measure whether you are achieving your desired outcomes. They show whether the outcome has happened or not. When you look at your Change Pathway, the outcome itself might not be what you measure but you might measure something that indicates that the change has taken place. Each outcome could have one or more indicators associated with it.

A good question to ask yourself when thinking about setting indicators is: what kind of ‘proof’ do you want to have before you can claim something has changed as a consequence of your activities?

Indicators can be measured in the short-term, medium-term or long-term, and you might also emerge with indicators for your impact.

Subjective and objective indicators

There are two types of indicators. Ideally, you will achieve a balance of objective and subjective indicators. For example, a museum has more visitors to its digital site (objective) but visitors don’t feel that they connect personally to the theme (subjective).

Objective indicators represent facts - for example, income or visits to a museum.

Some examples include:

• Number of researchers who would recommend Europeana Pro to a colleague or friend (short - long term, quantitative)

• Number of times Europeana resources are referenced in published research since 2010 (long term, quantitative)

Subjective indicators represent opinions or perceptions - for example, enjoyment or quality of life. 

Such as:

• Researchers in the Europeana Research Community who report that access to Europeana enables them to complete high quality research (short and/or long term, qualitative)

• Pupils are more active or enthusiastic after working with an immersive heritage application (short term, qualitative)

Learn from others

There may not be one gold list of indicators for us to use, but this doesn’t mean you have to reinvent the wheel. Standard indicators are commonly developed and used in cultural research and in other sectors, as well as in global cross-sector strategic initiatives such as the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. Some may not be directly relevant for your work but it’s good practice to see if the data you collect can be comparable or benefit from following others' practices. 

You might also want to look at literature, case studies, or similar work that other organisations similar to yours have done. This will help you to further focus on what still needs to be measured.

Take a look at examples of commonly-used indicators used in the cultural sector for inspiration

Prioritisation

It’s not realistic to try to measure every outcome for every stakeholder. In Phase one, you will have prioritised the stakeholders for whom you think you have the greatest impact, or for whom you need to measure the impact of your work. Now, we have the opportunity to think of the outcomes that are most important for these stakeholders and which indicators best help you evidence whether or not these outcomes have occurred. Your goal is to agree which outcomes are your priority to measure, and which you can live without.

We have two ways of thinking of how to prioritise which together helps you to focus on which outcomes are more important to support your vision of impact.

Materiality	Accountability
Is the outcome significant enough for the stakeholder for you to measure it? Is it a big or a small change? How important is this change? For whom, and why? Why is it valuable to better understand?	If you had done nothing, how much of this change would have been realised anyway? This is a subjective assessment, but ask yourself: Which outcomes are you responsible for? What do you not need to be responsible for? What does your accountability line tell you? Does it have to change?

Next step

• Creating your indicators

• Creating your data collection plan