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General overview

Stage of development: Complete

Policy sector: Employment and training

Date outcomes contract signed: Sep 2018

Start date of service provision: Sep 2018

Anticipated completion date: May 2024

Capital raised (minimum): GBP 450k (USD 600.38k)

Max potential outcome payment: GBP 1.68m

Service users: 358 individuals

Intervention

The programme will be supported within a framework of one-to-one coaching and action planning and will include access to relevant Careers IAG; exposures to the world of work through insight days and work shadowing; volunteering; employability skills training through business mentoring programme, supported work placements and workshops, opportunities to engage in internships through a partnership with Project SEARCH and direct support into full time paid employment

Target population

The programme works with young people aged 14-25 with mild to moderate learning disabilities such as cognitive impairment and communication and interaction difficulties.

Location

Country

  • United Kingdom

Service delivery locations

  • London
  • West Midlands
  • Kent

Involved organisations

Configuration of contracting parties:

  • Intermediated contract with payments made through SPV (members nominated by investor)

Commissioners/outcome payers

Service Providers

Investors

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Outcome metrics

  • Metric 1: Young people are enrolled onto the DFN-MoveForward programme
  • Metric 2: 4+ workplace activities undertaken
  • Metric 3: Attainment of work skills qualification
  • Metric 4: Entry Into Work – trigger will be achieved after 3 months in paid work of more than 16 hours per week

Results

DFN MoveForward started delivering services in September 2018 and finished in May 2024.

Outcome achievements

Overall target is based on the high case scenario defined in the Life Chances Fund Final Award Offer or Variation Agreements.

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The service porvider's comment on the graph:

'The programme initially aimed to enrol 297 young people over five years, but adjustments were made due to age considerations, reducing the target to 272 in the fourth year with agreement from the SIB Governance Committee.

Securing sustained, quality employment for these young people was the programme's ultimate goal. Economic and employment market uncertainties and the pandemic severely impacted outcomes including the suspension of Supported Internships on which job outcome targets had been based, posing challenges for employment placement.

Coaches facilitated work-readiness activities throughout the programme but the pandemic contributed significantly to the level of one to one interventions required just to bring young people back to pre-pandemic levels of confidence and work readiness. This impacted on the speed of work readiness of those young people by extending the work required to support them.

The pandemic disrupted outcome delivery, especially with job-related outcomes becoming notably harder to realise. Despite this, overall outcome targets were unchanged, failing to account for lost time. Expectations of achieving the outcome metrics should have been managed downwards earlier with the SIB governance committee.

For some individuals with special needs, the 16-hour employment target has proved unachievable, especially where there is an impact on the benefit package accessed by the family. This can create a disincentive to be employed. For some, part time work is better suited their capacity, accommodating education pursuits alongside employment.

To support our understanding of the programme’s overall impact, ThinkForward commissioned qualitative research with commissioners, parents, employers, and young people. This included the conclusion that the programme created the best conditions for positive transitions for young people and their families. ThinkForward commissioned a Social Return on Investment model which has defined a promising ratio of £2.75 return for every £1 invested.'

Outcome payments

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The service porvider's comment on the graph:

'The payment per outcome was based on other rate cards in use at the time which included ThinkForward’s original social impact bond. ThinkForward also drew on the results of a cost benefit analysis which assessed programme costs per outcome to maximise delivery efficiency.

Where possible, coaches continued to attempt to deliver outcomes during the pandemic, but commissioners recognised that outcomes would be severely curtailed. The positive result of this was that commissioners agreed for this period to payments for activities, rather than outcomes, providing income which would have otherwise resulted in the closure of the programme. However, as both commissioners’ funding is capped, the result of this was that less funding was then available for outcomes the pandemic was over. The cashflow model had to be revised in the last two years of the programme to make the best use of the funds still available. Reprofiling exercises in 2022 and 2023 reduced all outcomes and especially employment outcomes.'

SyROCCo reports

The following articles are taken from the Systematic Review of Outcomes Contracts Collaboration (SyROCCo) Machine Learning tool.

The tool is a collaboration between the Government Outcomes Lab and machine learning experts from the University of Warwick, that allows you to navigate and explore data extracted from nearly 2000 academic and grey literature publications related to outcomes-based contracting.

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