I have visited all of Women’s Breakout’s member organisations and seen for myself the amazing job that you all do. I see an incredible range of organisational diversity, but I also see an incredible amount of similarity in the services that you offer to vulnerable women with complex needs. And that is because understanding that you share of what it means to offer a service where the woman has been put at the heart of design, delivery and evaluation. It is because your interest is in what works for each and every individual woman who has need of you.

That is not always easy to capture in your conversations with commissioners and funders. It is sometimes a challenge to evidence the impact you have made. With that in mind Women’s Breakout has developed a model for you to assess your service against and this model is based in a body of academic theory that is hard to ignore. We had the input of eight organisations and two academics and I think we have produced a common sense approach to capturing what really works and why. I hope that you will assess your organisation against this standard (the Word document can be downloaded from this webpage) at some point when you’ve got a quiet week (I know!!) and let me know how you get on.

‘Quality is about learning what you are doing well and striving to do it better. It also means discovering what you need to change to make sure you meet your users’ needs. A quality assurance system is a formal management system that you can use to strengthen your organisation. It is intended to raise standards of work and help you to do everything consistently.’
Your Guide to Quality Assurance

Jackie Russell, Director of Women’s Breakout