What a technology, service, or programme actually changes, for whom, and through what pathway. Measured directly with the people it is meant to serve.
Every study sits inside the same measurement frame, so a one-off study becomes a trajectory over time and a result in one context reads against another.
Who is actually being reached, and who is being missed. Coverage, inclusion, and the gap between the designed-for population and the landing-with population. Distribution is central, not a footnote.
How much things actually change. Magnitude in income, time, health or whatever the intervention aims at, measured in the respondent's terms rather than the funder's logframe.
What it is like to be on the receiving end. Satisfaction, friction, unintended effects, and the qualitative texture numbers can't carry. What would the user change first? What would they never give up?
Reach, depth, and experience read together give a project a picture of impact that a self-report or an output count cannot: whether the intervention landed with the right people, whether it made a material difference, and whether the people on the receiving end would recommend or repeat it. See the in-depth interview guide for how the Lab reaches depth in the qualitative work, and the European impact-tracking template for the shape of a full baseline-to-endline design.
The Lab classifies every finding it reports against a five-tier pyramid, from what was delivered at the base to a causal contribution established at the top. The pyramid answers whether the number in the report is a claim, an observation, or a conclusion.
Most claims made about programmes sit on the bottom two tiers, and most reports present them as if they sat on the top two. This is the reporting-loop pressure we describe in Why funders learn from grantees. Moving a study up the pyramid is a design choice made before the fieldwork, not a rhetorical move made in the write-up: a baseline captured, a second source lined up, a control identified. What you can honestly claim at the end is set by what you built in at the start.
Impact is not one thing. On any given study, we typically measure a mix of the following, calibrated to the specific decision the research is meant to inform.
We start from the decision, not the data. A short design conversation establishes what decision the research must inform, the population that holds the answer, and the specific evidence that would genuinely change the decision. Most research is wasted here, by gathering data that was never going to settle anything. See How It Works for the five-stage method the Lab runs on every engagement.
We build the instrument around the respondent. Short, clear, locally grounded, and structured for repetition and comparison. We use validated instruments where they exist and design bespoke ones where they do not. Every instrument is built for repeat use, so a single study becomes a time series with almost no marginal cost.
We capture a baseline before the intervention. Impact is a change, and a change needs a before. Baselines are captured with the same instrument that will be used again later, so the comparison is valid. Without this, an impact claim can only be asserted, not evidenced.
We reach respondents directly, in-language. Trained local researchers who know the place gather data by phone or in person, with informed, recorded, revocable consent. We reach the people the intervention is meant to serve, not proxies for them. See Field Research for the field methods behind this.
We report the inconvenient finding. Independence is the whole point. We publish what the evidence says, including the parts that contradict a client's hopes.
Every engagement ends in something you can use, in the following forms:
Turnaround is typically measured in weeks. Instruments are designed for repetition, so what starts as a one-off becomes an ongoing measurement capability.
The Lab is most useful at a few specific moments:
If this reads close to a decision you are weighing, we would like to hear about it. A short note is enough to start.
The Lab is an independent research team, not an advocacy organisation. We do not campaign, endorse products, or accept commissions where a finding is expected in advance. Where a partner's own theory of change is what needs testing, that is a legitimate engagement, and the Lab tests it honestly.