Outcome Categories and reflective exercise tool

Blog - 7 August 2025

We’ve developed our Outcome Categories model with local Healthwatch to help the network identify and describe the full range of outcomes achieved and where and how this happens.

Impact Programme Manager Jon Turner introduces this one-off exercise you can complete to help strengthen how you report your impact and develop a business case for future opportunities.
Impact program manager Jon Turner

We know that local stakeholders understand that Healthwatch contributes to positive change for residents. But do they understand the full breadth of what our statutory activity achieves? Sometimes, the focus can be mainly on the ‘service change’ outcomes or wins from individual information and signposting enquiries, which can be easier to describe.

Reflective exercise tool  

This exercise tool has been created to enable individual Healthwatch leaders and teams to reflect on where your organisation achieves outcomes. It can help you to: 

  • Report impact across areas that are sometimes overlooked 
  • Think about how you verbalise what you achieve to maximise support 
  • Consider any gaps in outcomes you might have achieved but not identified 
  • Decide whether changing how you are currently prioritising your time and resources might be productive. 

The tool is presented in an Excel spreadsheet. The first tab contains full instructions for completing the one-off exercise. There are no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ answers. Use it in whatever way best suits your current needs and circumstances. 

Downloads

Outcome categories reflective exercise tool (please save the file first and then open it with Excel for it to work)
Download (LSX 40 KB)

Full outcome categories discussion document 

This document details the full version of our Outcomes Categories model. It summarises our combined thinking based on initial conversations with fifteen lead officers, reflection on the types of outcomes and impact found in annual reports and elsewhere, and further discussions with several local Healthwatch leaders. It was the basis on which the reflective tool was developed. 

My thanks for invaluable input most recently go to Healthwatch Derby, Healthwatch Richmond upon Thames, Healthwatch Southend, Healthwatch Warwickshire, Healthwatch Essex, Healthwatch Newcastle and Gateshead, Healthwatch Southwark, Healthwatch Rotherham, Healthwatch Liverpool, and Healthwatch Milton Keynes. 

For further information about this or the wider impact programme then please feel free to contact jon.turner@healthwatch.co.uk