Patternmakers 9/8/22 Patternmakers 9/8/22

Patternmakers' Privacy Policy

Privacy is important to us. This page sets out our Privacy Policy.

Introduction

Patternmakers Pty Ltd (ABN 97 627 469 649) respects and upholds your rights under the Australian Privacy Principles contained in the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) ("Privacy Act"). Patternmakers Pty Ltd also adheres to the Privacy (Market and Social Research) Code 2014 (“Code”). For more information about the Privacy Act, the Australian Privacy Principles and the Code click here.

This Privacy Policy for Patternmakers Pty Ltd (“Patternmakers”) lets you know what personal information of yours we hold, what we do with it, who we will disclose it to and how you can access the personal information we hold about you. You can also find out here how to change inaccurate personal information and how to opt out of receiving communications from us.

What personal information about you does Patternmakers collect and hold?

The information Patternmakers collect could include name, email address, IP address, age, gender, postcode, household income, opinions and feedback in relation to cultural experiences. When providing personal information you have the option of remaining anonymous or to use a pseudonym to be identified by. However, in certain circumstances, such as where we receive your contact details from a third party or where the research data itself may potentially allow for identification, this may not be practicable.

Depending on the nature of the research we conduct, we may also collect sensitive information from you, including country of birth, health and family information. Sensitive information will only be collected with your prior consent, and only if it is directly related to, or reasonably necessary for, the research we conduct. Sensitive information will only be collected in anonymous surveys, so that your information remains confidential.

How does Patternmakers collect and hold your personal information?

Patternmakers will generally collect your personal information directly from you in the course of you participating in our research and/or online surveys. However, we may also from time to time collect personal information about you from third parties, such as supporting partners. If so, we will inform you as soon as practicable of this collection and the circumstances of this collection.

If you are a respondent to a survey, Patternmakers will generally collect your personal information via Checkbox Survey at www.checkbox.com , Web Survey Creator at www.websurveycreator.com or via Alchemer (formerly SurveyGizmo) at www.alchemer.com. The information collected is only for research purposes, and no personally identifiable information will ever be used for marketing.

Checkbox Survey data is stored securely on servers hosted in Australia. You can read more about Checkbox Privacy Policy here: www.checkbox.com/privacy_policy/ and their data hosting in AWS centres here.

Web Survey Creator data is stored securely on servers hosted in Australia. You can read more about Web Survey Creator Privacy Policy here: www.websurveycreator.com/privacy_policy.aspx.

Alchemer survey data is stored securely on servers hosted in the USA. Alchemer is committed to complying with international regulations including GDRP. You can read more about Alchemer’s Privacy Policy here: www.alchemer.com/privacy/.

We may also collect personal information in Sendinblue at www.sendinblue.com and MailChimp at www.mailchimp.com if you opt-in to join our database of research participants or if you subscribe to a newsletter from our website, www.thepatternmakers.com.au.

You can read more about Sendinblue’s Privacy Policy here: https://www.sendinblue.com/legal/privacypolicy/. Sendinblue uphold your privacy rights and comply with privacy regulations under the GDPR.

You can read more about MailChimp’s Privacy Policy here: www.mailchimp.com/legal/privacy/. MailChimp complies with Australian Privacy Law (Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) for its storage of customer data.

If you register to attend a Patternmakers event your information would be collected via EventBrite, www.eventbrite.com.au.

What are the purposes for which Patternmakers use, handle and disclose your personal information?

We will only use and disclose your personal information for the purpose of conducting our research and in accordance with this Privacy Policy. We will not use or disclose your personally identifiable information provided for research for the purpose of advertising, promotions or direct marketing activities. If you declined to participate in our research, there are limited circumstances where we may use your personal information to re-contact you for a research purpose, but only if we have valid reasons to believe a genuine research concern warrants such re-contact. If you have participated in our research, we will only re-contact you if you were informed of this, opt-ed in, or we have valid reasons to believe a genuine research concern warrants such re-contact.

Patternmakers may also collect personal information (name, email address or postal address) when you provide it to receive specific services, such as contracting us to deliver research services, or buying a ticket to an event. This information is stored in secure databases. As a customer of Patternmakers, your email address may be added to a mailing list, as purchasing from us is an indication that you want to hear about our services. However, you can unsubscribe at any time. The information you provide will not be used for any other purpose without your consent. You can choose not to receive such information.

Who will Patternmakers disclose your personal information to?

We will not disclose any personally identifiable research information we collect from you unless we have your express prior consent and will only report the information you provide in an aggregate form that will not personally identify you. We will not disclose any personal information or personally identifiable research information to a third party for a purpose other than conducting our research unless we have your express prior consent or are required to do so by an Australian law or court/tribunal order.

In the course of conducting our research we may rely on third party service providers to host or store the data we collect who are located overseas. The names and locations of those suppliers are:

Checkbox Survey Inc., based in the U.S., data stored on servers hosted in Australia.

Alchemer LLC, based in the U.S.

WolfBrown LLC, based in the U.S.

SendinBlue Inc, based in Europe.

MailChimp, The Rocket Science Group LLC, based in the U.S.

Microsoft, based in the U.S.

We will also take reasonable steps to ensure any service providers (and their employees and contractors) comply with relevant privacy regulations in their jurisdiction, as well as this Privacy Policy.

Openness

You have the right to request access to any personal information we hold about you. You can request this information by contacting the Privacy Officer at the details listed below. Where we hold information that you are entitled to access, we will respond to your request in a reasonable time and endeavour to provide you with a suitable range of choices as to how access is provided (e.g, emailing or mailing it to you). A fee may be charged to cover the cost of retrieval. However this fee will not be excessive and will only apply to the facilitation of your request.

If at any time you believe that personal information we hold about you is incorrect, incomplete or inaccurate, then you may request amendment of it and we will either amend the information or make a record of your comment, as we think appropriate.

Questions and complaints

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy or believe that we have at any time failed to keep one of our commitments to you to handle your personal information in the manner required by the Privacy Act, the APPs or the Code, then we ask that you contact us immediately using the following email: info@thepatternmakers.com.au

We will respond and advise whether we agree with your complaint or not. If we do not agree, we will provide reasons. If we do agree, we will advise what (if any) action we consider it appropriate to take in response. If you are still not satisfied after having contacted us and given us a reasonable time to respond, then we suggest that you contact the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner by:

Phone: 1300 363 992 (local call cost, but calls from mobile and pay phones may incur higher charges). If calling from overseas:+61 2 9284 9749

TTY: 1800 620 241 (this number is dedicated to the hearing impaired only, no voice calls)

TIS: Translating and Interpreting Service: 131 450 (If you don’t speak English or English is your second language and you need assistance and ask for the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner)

Post: GPO Box 2999 Canberra ACT 2601

Fax: +61 2 9284 9666

Email: enquiries@oaic.gov.au

Patternmakers Website

When visiting Patternmakers’ web site, the site server makes a record of the visit and logs the following information for statistical and administrative purposes:

the user’s server address – to consider the users who use the site regularly and tailor the site to their interests and requirements;
the date and time of the visit to the site – this is important for identifying the website’s busy times and ensuring maintenance on the site is conducted outside these periods;
pages accessed and documents downloaded – this indicates to Patternmakers which pages or documents are most important to users and also helps identify important information that may be difficult to find;
duration of the visit – this indicates to us how interesting and informative Patternmakers site is to candidates; the type of browser used – this is important for browser specific coding
In order to optimise Patternmakers web site and better understand it’s usage, we collect the visiting domain name or IP address, Computer Operating System, Browser Type and Screen Resolution

A cookie is a piece of information that an Internet web site sends to your browser when you access information at that site. Cookies are either stored in memory (session cookies) or placed on your hard disk (persistent cookies). The Patternmakers web site does not use persistent cookies. Upon closing your browser the session cookie set by this web site is destroyed and no Personal Information is maintained which might identify you should you visit our web site at a later date.

Be in the loop

Patternmakers 28/4/22 Patternmakers 28/4/22

A manifesto on the power of evidence

Without evidence, we are flying blind. In this post we share the Patternmakers manifesto on the power of evidence.

We believe that the difference between those who are serious about their cause, and those who aren’t, is evidence.

When we take the time to examine the evidence, and rigorously reflect, we see more clearly what we need to do. We understand opportunities with greater clarity, we prioritise more effectively. We prioritise based on what truly matters - not whim. And we build consensus with stakeholders more quickly.

Without evidence, we are flying blind.

I believe that the difference between those who are serious about their cause, and those who aren’t, is evidence.

If we don’t marshall evidence behind our vision, we are missing a trick, because evidence makes everything easier.

It makes our arguments stronger, it proves why we are needed and it makes the case for what we want to do.

When we take the time to examine the evidence, and rigorously reflect, we see more clearly what we need to do.

We understand opportunities with greater clarity, we prioritise more effectively. We prioritise based on what truly matters - not whim.

We create products that aren’t good - they are great. And we know they’re great because we have the evidence.

In fact, having the evidence means it’s not just us with the knowledge we are great, it’s our stakeholders, our funders, our partners and future partners.

In this day and age, it’s not enough to do good work. The story of that work needs to be told to the people that matter.

It needs to be shared, so its influence can spread. So others can learn from us, and so we can make a difference in a bigger way.

Good evidence helps us reduce subjective views of our work.

Mitigate risk.

Build consensus.

If a good idea is tested, examined, piloted, it’s not just a good idea any more, it’s a great cause ready for investment.

Examining evidence is how we keep improving, growing, learning.

It’s how we future-proof our organisations.

If we’re working on something we really believe in, I believe it’s our duty to take it seriously and give ourselves the best chance of success.

Without an evidence base around our work, we’re flying blind.

Taking pot shots in the dark and hoping we hit something.

As we look around the world at the issues we face, it’s clear the stakes are high. Too high to do nothing.

I’m passionate about this because I’ve seen the difference evidence can make (read more about our backstory) and at Patternmakers it’s what we do every day.

I’d love to know what you see as the power of evidence!

About the Author

Tandi Palmer Williams
Managing Director

Head geek and leader of Patternmakers.

Patternmakers' Privacy Policy (2021)

Privacy is important to us. This page sets out our Privacy Policy.

Introduction

What personal information about you does Patternmakers collect and hold?

How does Patternmakers collect and hold your personal information?

If you are a respondent to a survey, Patternmakers will generally collect your personal information via Checkbox Survey at www.checkbox.com or via Alchemer (formerly SurveyGizmo) at www.alchemer.com. The information collected is only for research purposes, and no personally identifiable information will ever be used for marketing.

We may also collect personal information in MailChimp at www.mailchimp.com if you opt-in to join our database of research participants or if you subscribe to a newsletter from our website, www.thepatternmakers.com.au. You can read more about MailChimp’s Privacy Policy here: www.mailchimp.com/legal/privacy/. MailChimp complies with Australian Privacy Law (Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) for its storage of customer data.

If you register to attend a Patternmakers event your information would be collected via EventBrite, www.eventbrite.com.au.

What are the purposes for which Patternmakers use, handle and disclose your personal information?

Who will Patternmakers disclose your personal information to?

In the course of conducting our research we may rely on third party service providers to host or store the data we collect who are located overseas. The names and locations of those suppliers are:

Checkbox Survey Inc., based in the U.S., data stored on servers hosted in Australia.

Alchemer LLC, based in the U.S.

WolfBrown LLC, based in the U.S.

MailChimp, The Rocket Science Group LLC, based in the U.S.

Microsoft, based in the U.S.

Openness

Questions and complaints

Jodie Bombardier, Operations Manager: info@thepatternmakers.com.au

Phone: 1300 363 992 (local call cost, but calls from mobile and pay phones may incur higher charges). If calling from overseas:+61 2 9284 9749

TTY: 1800 620 241 (this number is dedicated to the hearing impaired only, no voice calls)

Post: GPO Box 2999 Canberra ACT 2601

Fax: +61 2 9284 9666

Email: enquiries@oaic.gov.au

Patternmakers Website

When visiting Patternmakers’ web site, the site server makes a record of the visit and logs the following information for statistical and administrative purposes:

the user’s server address – to consider the users who use the site regularly and tailor the site to their interests and requirements;
the date and time of the visit to the site – this is important for identifying the website’s busy times and ensuring maintenance on the site is conducted outside these periods;
pages accessed and documents downloaded – this indicates to Patternmakers which pages or documents are most important to users and also helps identify important information that may be difficult to find;
duration of the visit – this indicates to us how interesting and informative Patternmakers site is to candidates; the type of browser used – this is important for browser specific coding
In order to optimise Patternmakers web site and better understand it’s usage, we collect the visiting domain name or IP address, Computer Operating System, Browser Type and Screen Resolution

Be in the loop

Patternmakers 3/5/19 Patternmakers 3/5/19

Why every program manager needs a research toolkit

From 2017 to 2019, Patternmakers developed an Audience Research Toolkit in collaboration with Creative Victoria, Thirst Creative, and almost 300 stakeholders from the Victorian creative arts sector.

In this post, MD Tandi Palmer Williams shares some of the process, and her tips for people using the toolkit to conduct research.

In the past 10 years, audience research has become an essential tool for arts managers.

If you want to reach new people, develop audiences and deepen engagement, then research is part of your core business.

Why we care

Even though we make a living from consulting, I firmly believe that every arts officer, manager and director should have the ability to run their own research processes in-house.

When I first started working in the arts, after seven years in finance and economics, I was amazed at all the powerful, high quality work taking place; programs literally changing people’s lives for the better. But I was also horrified at a dearth of evidence.

Compared to other sectors, the arts has not embraced evidence-based practices (for reasons I recently discussed on LinkedIn) and in 2016 I established Patternmakers with a mission to help build a strong, vibrant, creative ‘data culture’ in the Australian creative industries.

I believed then (and still do) that we need to become proficient in use of data analysis, research and evaluation - and do it in a way that aligns with our values. Research, if done well, should support the creative process, not undermine it. It should be ethical and responsible - and creative!

Which is why, in 2016, that I was thrilled to be the successful tenderer to work with Creative Victoria to develop an Audience Research Toolkit for the small to medium creative arts sector in Victoria.

How it worked

From the outset, it was an ambitious project. Over the following two years, we would undertake a multi-stage development process that included:

Research with stakeholders in the creative arts sector, including a series of interviews and a survey of 225 representatives from the small to medium sector
Co-design workshops with representatives from regional Victorian galleries, festivals, producers, presenters, Creative Victoria staff and digital agency Thirst Creative
Development of tools, templates and guidelines (i.e. long hours workshopping, drafting, editing, proofing)
Testing of the tools with eight creative arts organisations from regional Victoria.

Once the tools had been reviewed, revised and signed-off, Creative Victoria worked with Thirst Creative and its own in-house marketing and communications teams to upload all the content online. And, voila!

What we learned

We found through the process that many creative arts organisations want to conduct research, but lack either the time, money, or specialist skills to actually deliver it.

The co-design process showed that the toolkit needed to be accessible, engaging, and dynamic - helping people on their journey. For some, it might be their first ever experience of research, while others would need help to improve the quality of their research activity.

Anecdotally, we had observed that many organisations were already using Survey Monkey to send out surveys. But very few were getting meaningful results. We worked backwards to identify the issues and built tools and guidance to help people do it well, even on a tight budget.

We learned that technical talk would instantly put people off. We had to find ways to talk about technical issues without the jargon. It was a great exercise in simplifying things down to key principles.

How to use the toolkit

My advice for anyone planning audience research is to:

Start small. Select an achievable goal (e.g. running a single focus group or a one-off survey) and do it well. You don’t need to survey after every workshop or performance, you just don’t.
Incentivise participation. Use a carefully designed cash-equivalent incentive to make sure you get a good response rate. If your results aren’t reliable, it can be a time-waster.
Apply insights. Set aside time to analyse, interpret, report and action the results. If you think it’s about collecting data, you’ve missed the point.
Communicate. Share your plans with your community. Say thank you to those who participated, and make sure you share what you’ve learned and actioned before you embark on the next thing. People get tired of doing surveys if they don’t see it being actioned.

Feedback

I’m looking forward to seeing how the toolkit is used throughout the sector.

One of my favourite features of the toolkit is the feedback functionality, which allows you to mark helpful and unhelpful tools, and ask questions.

If we can work together to continue refining the tools, the result will be a valuable asset that will benefit us all.

We firmly believe that creative arts organisations that build a strong, creative, vibrant ‘data culture’ are those that will change the world for the better. And we’re already well on the way!

About the Author

Tandi Palmer Williams
Managing Director

Patternmakers’ Founder and Managing Director Tandi Palmer Williams is an experienced consultant and arts and culture research specialist.

Between 2013 and 2015, she was Research Manager for the Digital R&D Fund for the Arts, based at Nesta in London.

Be in the loop

5 signs you're ready to benefit from research and evaluation

Our team has decades of experience delivering research and evaluation projects. And there are a few things that we’ve noticed about ‘research readiness’. Here are five signs that organisations are primed to get maximum value from research and evaluation projects.

After a 15 year career as an analyst and consultant, I’ve seen how some organisations get exceptional value from research and evaluation projects. I’ve also seen organisations evaluating for the wrong reasons, and Managers who just aren’t ready to embrace the process.

Here are the five readiness factors:

Capacity

Successfully project-managing a research project takes time and effort. At Patternmakers we ask our clients appoint a project manager to shepherd projects from kick-off to completion and implementation. It’s best that the project manager sets aside a half day each week through the duration of the project. This means they can coordinate meetings, provide feedback on deliverables, and help communicate the right messages about the project to stakeholders.

Creating capacity, and building it into your workplan, ensures that you can manage the project effectively and engage stakeholders to get the maximum benefit from the process.

Curiosity

At its essence, research is about asking questions, and seeking robust evidence to answer them with accuracy. Evaluation is all of those things, plus making a judgment or drawing a conclusion at the end of it. One of my mentors, Professor Roberta Ryan, taught me early in my career that if you already know the answer, it’s not actually research.

We’re looking to work with people that are thirsty for new insight, that don’t know it all already, and they are ready to open their minds to discovering new insights and learning new ideas. This is where the magic happens.

Candour

I believe that those who openly share their learnings with others are leaders. It can be scary to put our hands up and tell others about things that didn’t work. But for our organisations to progress, we need to cultivate a culture of openness, learning and reflection.

I believe that every program manager and director has something valuable to share. I also firmly believe that we all need a ‘critical friend’, who can tell it to you straight, while practicing deep empathy.

At Patternmakers we’re honoured to play that role for our clients and partners. And there’s nothing more refreshing than simply telling it like it is.

Commitment

If you think it’s about collecting data, you’ve missed the point. Research isn’t really about the data, it isn’t even about analysis or findings. The value comes from identifying actionable insight - and implementing it. This requires enormous commitment. It also delivers enormous value. That’s why our projects don’t end with a report on key findings. We work with our clients to identify opportunities, prioritise the most important actions and develop implementation plans. We also follow up to help see it through, and reflect on the impact, which to be honest is often extraordinary. But it starts with commitment to continuous improvement.

Care

There’s a reason Patternmakers established a specialism in culture, creativity and community. It’s because we care deeply about the arts, cultural expression, recreation and bringing people together.

I left the professional services world having worked with people and organisations with dubious ethics. Today, I’m very deliberate in selecting clients and partners that demonstrate exceptionally high standards of integrity and care for others.

We develop respectful, warm, long-term relationships with our clients, who we care for, and who care for us. It makes us want to jump out of bed each morning and bring extraordinary energy to our work.

If these factors resonate with you, you might be ready to embark on something extraordinary. Good luck!

About the Author

Tandi Palmer Williams
Managing Director

Patternmakers’ Founder and Managing Director Tandi Palmer Williams is an experienced consultant and arts and culture research specialist.

Between 2013 and 2015, she was Research Manager for the Digital R&D Fund for the Arts, based at Nesta in London.

Be in the loop

Patternmakers 20/4/19 Patternmakers 20/4/19

What career advice would you give your younger self?

In March 2019, our Founder Tandi Palmer Williams joined a panel at a KYHO Networking event called ‘Breaking the Mould’, held at UTS Startups. In this post, she shares her experience of imposter syndrome, burnout and entrepreneur lessons, in case it helps anyone out there embarking on a journey of their own.

I recently had the honour of speaking at a KYHO Networking event called ‘Breaking the Mould’, held at UTS Startups. It was a great conversation, covering imposter syndrome, mentoring, burnout and entrepreneur lessons. I thought I’d share my responses to some of the facilitators questions, in case this helps anyone out there embarking on a journey of their own.

Can you describe what your career path has looked like from graduating university to where you are now?

I spent the first seven years of my career at professional services firm PricewaterhouseCoopers. Firstly graduating as a Chartered Accountant, I then retrained as an Economics and Policy consultant and helped organisations conduct economic analysis to inform their strategy. It was a real thrill seeing my work leading to regulatory change, major investment and international partnerships - and I learned a lot from some talented economists.

But in all honesty, I was miserable. I was working late into the night, sometimes on jobs not aligned with my values, and my health was starting to be affected.

I could see that some things that we innately know are important, like cultural expression, sense of community and social bonding – aren’t easily measured in dollars and cents. I was working my butt off, but it wasn’t for what I believed really mattered.

I became fascinated with fields like cultural economics, triple bottom line accounting and social return on investment, and eventually followed my passion into the cultural sector and worked for three years in Research & Strategic Analysis at the Australia Council, the Australian Government’s arts funding and advisory body.

After falling in love with my (now) husband, I moved to the UK and worked for two years at Nesta, managing the research elements of the $5m Digital R&D Fund for the Arts. I’m grateful for that experience seeing the inside of an innovation lab and having opportunities to work with some of the world’s most iconic institutions like the Royal Opera House.

I started Patternmakers back in Australia in 2016 after I had been freelancing for one year full time. Today I lead our brilliant team of four researchers, and a network of contractors and advisors across Australia and internationally.

At what moment did you decide it was right for you to start Patternmakers? What has the reception been like, and how did that feel?

From Covent Garden to Colac (VIC), I began to realise that many arts organisations and cultural institutions were experiencing similar issues: trying to grow audiences, secure funding and deliver greater impact.

I’ve now worked with organisations of all different structures and sizes and I’ve seen how some organisations grow and really make a difference, even in hard times when there’s an economic downturn, or public funding is declining.

They do it by becoming insightful institutions. It’s not about counting dollars and cents. If you’re an impact-driven organisation you need to be adopting the practises of research and insight to reach more people, secure funding and deliver even more good in the world.

Today, Patternmakers supports cultural organisations to become more insightful and impactful. With my team of researchers and strategists, we help cultural leaders collect data, create experiences people love, evaluate their impact, build compelling business cases and share their knowledge to grow the sector and change the world.

We’ve now been operating for two and a half years, and demand for our services has led to us to grow really strongly. It’s been a real rollercoaster.

But my reasons were also somewhat selfish… When my husband and I started planning a family, I started thinking about how I could grow a great business that could allow me to work flexibly.

I’m really pleased that I can now support other parents the same opportunity to balance work and family.

Have you ever felt imposter syndrome? If so, how have you broken out of that thinking?

Of course. We all live in fear that someone will find out that we’re not good enough to be doing what we do.

But I try and channel it into self improvement and professional development. I can recommend the book ‘Feel the fear and do it anyway’.

Do not let imposter syndrome stop you doing things. Just make a commitment to yourself that fear and self doubt and insecurity is not going to be the driver of what you do & don’t do.

What advice would you have to young women who are entering the workforce and are feeling like a fraud or an imposter?

What I’m learning about tackling imposter syndrome is that it can help to identify and articulate the value that we bring to any conversation. Saying ‘I’m only this’ or ‘I’m just that...’ is not helping anyone. Even the youngest person in the room has something that no one else has: the perspective of youth and everyone wants to tap into that.

A colleague of mine Kathryn Geels, who now leads the Engaged Journalism Accelerator, recently shared with me the value of taking time out to reflect on your work, roles, track record and really articulate what your unique perspective is.

So for me, it’s that I understand the language of both art and maths. And it’s not until my 30s that I could see the patterns and connections and the narrative of my career, but looking back, it was always there.

How should a young person starting out go about accessing mentorship or acquiring a mentor?

Getting good guidance is critical. And there are actually three types of mentors I have accessed at different times: a great boss, a coach, and several mentors.

I’ve been lucky to have several great bosses in my journey, such as Bridget Jones, who taught me about the value of quality research closely linked with strategy. We were joint recipients of the Award for Collaboration at the Australia Council which was a great honour.

It definitely pays to seek out jobs with someone amazing to report to. You can even do reverse checks on them!

A great coach is also gold. I’ve worked with Monica Davidson from Creative Plus Business for the past three years and it has been partially subsidised by the NSW Government through Business Connect. So valuable.

A mentor, or in my opinion several mentors also play an important role. And as my co-panellist, career coach Rebecca McFarland, pointed out. It’s perfectly fine to have mentors that don’t know you are their mentor!

What has been the biggest challenge in your career to date?

In the early part of my career it was managing burnout and navigating organisational dynamics. As an ambitious, self-motivated employee there are times when bureaucracy can slow things down and it can grate when you hit certain roadblock. But there are many things to be learned in such situations too.

Since starting Patternmakers, the challenges are many, but so are the rewards! Producing work that is very high quality, while balancing the books does lead to many late nights, very few true holidays and worryingly blurred boundaries between work and everything else.

They say the entrepreneurs journey is a financial one and I tend to agree. There is a lot to learn about managing cash flow, assessing profitability and getting to know your business model inside out, and with every recruit, it can change. There have been months when I’ve wondered how we will make payroll, but it is a great discipline in becoming very, very resourceful.

In the next five years an area that will be demanding for me is HR and recruitment. Because for a business at this particular stage (and frankly, life generally) it’s all about surrounding yourself with the right people.

Did you receive a piece of advice when you were starting out that was particularly influential?

Don’t hesitate to put yourself forward. A good friend of mine, Morwenna Collett, encouraged me to apply for the Australia Council’s Arts Leaders Program. At the last minute, I put in an application. It was successful and it ended up being a pivotal experience that has shaped my world ever since.

If someone asks for a volunteer, put your hand up. If you see an award category that’s relevant to you, put an application in! You’ll be surprised how often you get further than you think. And building a great track record is the best thing you can do for your career.

What advice would you have liked to have heard?

Trust your instincts. I’ve taken on projects that I knew weren’t the right fit - and learned my lesson the hard way. More and more, I want to be selective about the people, projects and ideas that I let into my life.

And enjoy the journey! Research is the most exciting, enriching, fulfilling career. Being in the field, meeting people, hearing about their lives is such an honour and it’s so important to love what you do each day.

About the Author

Tandi Palmer Williams
Managing Director

Patternmakers’ Founder and Managing Director Tandi Palmer Williams is an experienced consultant and arts and culture research specialist.

Between 2013 and 2015, she was Research Manager for the Digital R&D Fund for the Arts, based at Nesta in London.

Be in the loop

How research can help you shape new products & services

Research processes that can help project managers shape products, reduce risk and optimise around user needs. This article covers three relatively simple research methods that can be done at your desk, and don’t require big budgets or advanced technical skills.

I’m often asked how research can be applied in organisations to shape new products and services, particularly technology projects. During my time as Research Manager for the Digital R&D Fund for the Arts at Nesta, I wrote about research processes that can help project managers shape products, reduce risk and optimise around user needs.

Below are three relatively simple research methods that can be done at your desk, and don’t require big budgets or advanced technical skills. You can make these as big or small as you need to, but it’s important to have a plan, be systematic, and maintain an open mind as you go.

Following these three steps can help you ensure your project is innovating on current practice. They can also help you to set achievable objectives and a realistic budget, and align your work with key communities and potential partners.

1. Analyse the competition

Ask yourself: What is already out there? How are we different?

Analysing the current ‘state of the art’ is a critical first step in determining if an idea has legs, and how it can innovate on what’s already out there. Before starting any development work, have a close look at what others are doing in this space - and how existing platforms could be repurposed. Take a look at organisations like yours in other countries, ask around, and try and identify comparable products or services in other industries.

It can be interesting to identify what ‘the competition’ are doing right – and what they could do better. Once again, it’s good to be systematic, and to try and get as much of the ‘inside scoop’ as possible (How much did it cost? What is their ‘niche’? How many people are actively using it?)

For example, the Royal Opera House conducted a ‘competitor audit’ to help them prioritise features for their mobile project, and what they liked about existing offerings that they wanted to build on.

Scanning the competition can help you refine and mould your concept, and identify exciting windows of opportunity. It can also help you identify useful platforms, software or channels that you could use, and people you could partner with.

2. Measure the potential

Ask yourself: Just how big is the opportunity? What can we realistically hope to achieve?

Before you start to work on detailed plans and budgets, it’s worth taking a step back to measure the potential, or if you are exploring a new business model, ‘size the market’.

From experience, I know how easy it is to over-estimate the potential user-base for a product or service, which can lead to disappointing project outcomes. If you’re building an app to promote concerts to young people in London, work out how many young people there are in London, what handsets they use and what disposable incomes they have. If you’re going to promote it through the e-newsletter, work out how many people open the newsletter to give a sense of how many people you could reach.

For instance, artsdepot are segmenting the 65+ market in particular catchment areas, and making assumptions about conversion rates and sales potential to estimate the market for their ‘Silver Service’ membership scheme.

Remember that apps require someone to be aware of them, want them, have the right phone, know how to download them, actually download them, create an account, etc.

By measuring the range of potential, you can then set achievable targets and work out how much you can afford to invest in development, and in acquiring customers. It can also help you make technical decisions that suit your target market, such as prioritising operating systems and designing key features.

3. Review the literature

Ask yourself: Has someone tried this before? Did it work? If not, why not?

By understanding other research in the field, you can clarify the key issues for your project and navigate through obstacles that others have stumbled on. It can also help you to build your credibility as an expert and innovator in the sector, which can be helpful when trying to attract partners, funding and media coverage.

Reviewing the literature helped Marcus Winter identify the key features of game design for the Museum of Design in Plastics, and enabled Roma Patel to quickly structure their user evaluation.

The University of Leicester has this great guide to Doing a Literature Review. There are also fantastic resources such as Kings College London’s CultureCase to help you make sense of complex academic papers.

It’s a great idea to document your literature review, but if you are stretched for time, the process can be as simple as sharing knowledge with clever colleagues around the coffee table. Whatever method you choose, try to be systematic, so you don’t miss anything, and ask yourself ‘so what?’ as you go, so you can distil the implications for your project.

Originally published by Nesta as ‘3 research methods to give R&D the best chance of success’

About the Author

Tandi Palmer Williams
Managing Director

Patternmakers’ Founder and Managing Director Tandi Palmer Williams is an experienced consultant and arts and culture research specialist.

Between 2013 and 2015, she was Research Manager for the Digital R&D Fund for the Arts, based at Nesta in London.

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Patternmakers 25/1/19 Patternmakers 25/1/19

Power moves: How evaluation can help you prepare for multi-year funding applications

Are you applying for multi-year funding in 2019? Here are five things you can do to strengthen your work, consolidate impact and improve your chances of success in upcoming funding rounds.

Are you applying for multi-year funding in 2019? Then you need to get your evidence base sorted! And it’s not too late to start.

Here are five things you can do to strengthen your work, consolidate impact and put your best foot forward in upcoming funding rounds.

1. STRUCTURE: Ensure your evaluation framework is up to date

If you don’t already have an evaluation framework in place for the organisation, now is the time to map your program logic or theory of change, and identify some questions relating to your efficiency, effectiveness and ultimate impact. Depending on your size, you might think about this at the project, program or organisation level – or a combination.

There are a bunch of free guides and tools for this out there, but we think the one in the Program planning and evaluation guide from the Australian Institute of Family Studies has just the right amount of detail.

If you’ve already developed this (or there’s something similar buried in your share drive somewhere), dust it off at your next team meeting and do a quick discussion on what aspects might need to be refreshed. Appoint someone to lead the work of getting it up to date, approved and communicated to your board and staff.

2. GATHER: Analyse your reach and impact

Impact evaluations are fast becoming an essential management tool for arts and culture organisations. They assist teams to understand the extent to which they are having an impact in the world, what is working well, and what isn’t, and exactly what factors are delivering the best outcomes. They can also help teams to work out the gaps and opportunities in their current programs and clarify the best future direction.

For instance, the Australia Council’s funding guidelines assessment criteria talk about identifying impact and need, which can be demonstrated through evaluation.

You can evaluate your impact through qualitative, quantitative, or mixed methods research, depending on what is most appropriate to address the priority questions in your evaluation framework.

Some basic qualitative questions to ask are:

What was the best part about Program X?

What could we improve?

What have you taken away from your experience with Program X?

Some quantitative questions to ask are:

On a scale from 1 to 5, how satisfied or dissatisfied are you with Program X?

On a scale from 1 to 5, how likely are you to recommend X to a friend or colleague?

You can also ask this last one on a scale from 0 to 10, and use the results to calculate a Net Promoter Score which can be benchmarked with other programs and events.

3. TEST: Gather evidence about what is needed in future

As a part of the strategic planning process, it can be helpful to gather hard data on what your community, participants and/or stakeholders want to see in future. This could include running a consultation process using interviews or focus groups, or running a survey of your stakeholders.

You can also prompt people with a list of potential new initiatives or priorities, and ask people to select their top three. Doing a temperature check like this can be enormously useful in helping you prioritise limited resources – and it gives you an evidence base to fall back on if people challenge your investments.

For example, Creative Plus Business conducted a survey to find out what people wanted from a creative business conference. Collecting data from their community gave them confidence that their plans were on track and is helping ensure the likelihood of a successful event.

As our colleague Bridget Jones at Wavelength said in a recent post, ‘One of the great things about planning is that it helps managers make the tough decisions about what to do - and what not to do - so they can be more successful.’ She also refers to some useful planning templates from Bridgespan to help you keep it real.

Your questions should partly be open ended, e.g.: ‘What would you like to see from us moving forward?’ or ‘What ideas can you share for our program in the next three years?’

4. SCAN: Analyse the case for investment

Before you lock down your strategic priorities, it’s important to conduct a scan of the wider environment. Analysing big picture statistical trends is an important step in prioritising initiatives and working out the case for investment.

You can do this by examining reliable sources such as the Australian Bureau of Statistics, thought leaders like Nesta (check out their predictions for 2019), data aggregators like Google Trends and academic research news articles like The Conversation.

Patternmakers also offer a series of short talks, designed for staff meetings, board meetings and strategic planning days (contact info@thepatternmakers.com.au for more information).

Your goal here is to look for alignment (or otherwise) between your plans, and where the world is heading in the next 1-5 years. For instance, topics like mental health are rising in importance, whereas some retail industries are under threat.

According to the Australia Council’s Strategic Plan Framework, you can consider producing a strategic/context analysis which summarises the strategic issues you expect your organisation to face over the next 3 years. This is often based on an assessment of your internal and external environments to identify the organisations strengths and weaknesses, opportunities and challenges. It is a distillation of analysis and research undertaken by your organisation to underpin the artistic choices you have made and the goals you have set.

5. PLAN: Work out how you’ll monitor and evaluate your progress

It’s good practice to set up your evaluation framework and methodology before you start a new funding period, new project or initiative. It doesn’t have to be super detailed, and things will undoubtedly change, but showing the assessment committee that you’ve thought about this in advance is just smart.

The key questions are basically what, when, how, why and who will be monitoring and evaluating your progress. How is the big one here, and specifically, how it will be resourced.

As a rule of thumb, I usually advise leaders in arts and culture organisations to set aside 3-5% of their resources for any given period or program for monitoring and evaluation. This doesn’t mean spending 5% on hiring a consultant, most of the work should be done internally, on things like the steps above. It’s also important to be growing your team’s skills – through things like training in research and evaluation.

___

So there you have it: Structure, Gather, Test, Scan & Plan. The geek’s guide to getting ready for your strongest application yet.

If this all sounds overwhelming, and you think there’s a case to invest in the help of a professional, you can get in touch to schedule your free consultation by emailing info@thepatternmakers.com.au. We can provide resources and templates to help you, recommend training that would suit your team, and scope out where you need professional support.

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Patternmakers 23/9/18 Patternmakers 23/9/18

So, you collect postcodes. Now what?

Converting postcode data into meaningful insight can be complex, due to differing boundaries of postcodes, suburbs, Local Government Areas (LGAs), regions and States/Territories. For instance, one postcode can sit across two, three or more LGAs.

Many organisations collect postcodes from attendees and participants. But turning it into useful insight is not straightforward!

Knowing how many people came from postcode ‘2150’ is not as useful as knowing how many people came from the City of Parramatta Local Government Area, or the Western Sydney region.

But converting postcode data into meaningful insight is tricky, due to differing boundaries of postcodes, suburbs, Local Government Areas (LGAs), regions and States/Territories. For instance, one postcode can sit across two, three or more LGAs.

In this post, we share how you can map your postcode data to LGAs, to access more useful insights. We also share how we can help!

Using the ABS correspondences files

This is where the fun begins! If you’re handy with excel, and have a few days up your sleeve, you can set up your own mapping process in-house.

You can map postcodes to other geographic areas using the ABS correspondences files. These are a set of spreadsheets that list the corresponding LGA for every postcode in Australia. You can also access correspondence files for other geographic categories, like Statistical Areas 1-4.

Remember that the geographic boundaries do change from time to time, so be sure to make sure you have the latest files from the ABS (just give them a call if you’re not sure).

Steps in postcode mapping

Once you’ve located the right correspondences file, follow these steps to turn your postcodes into other geographic categories:

Clean your datafile so you have a list of attendances for each postcode (and check your file for erroneous codes and empty fields)
Download the ABS correspondences file, and insert a new column to the right of each postcode & corresponding LGA.
Use a VLOOKUP formula to add the attendances for each postcode into your correspondences worksheet
Multiply the number of attendances to the % of each postcode in each LGA
In a new sheet, sum the total number of attendances for each LGA (hint: the SUMIF formula can help with this)
Lastly, you can tabulate the total attendances by region (e.g. Western Sydney, West Melbourne) and by State/Territory.

Patternmakers Postcode Analysis package

For those short on time, fear not, we are here to help!

Our Postcode Analysis package delivers meaningful audience and visitor insights by converting postcode data to the regions most important to you and visualising that data using tables, charts and ‘choropleths’ (shaded maps).

This can help you understand your reach and identify ‘blackspots’ where you could grow engagement.

We can also measure how many people travelled from outside your area to experience your work. This can help with reporting your impact in terms of cultural tourism and economic impact.

For example, in 2017, Arts West (an alliance of arts organisations in Melbourne’s West) commissioned Patternmakers to undertake a postcode analysis project. This enabled them to measure their combined reach across Melbourne’s West, and identify opportunities to work together to engage with its diverse communities.

Why postcode mapping is valuable

Packages start at $1,200, depending on how many breakdowns you need, and how frequently you want to report.

This can be a worthwhile investment for some organisations, as it provides:

Provides useful insights for internal and external reporting
Demonstrates your reach across a region of interest, for reporting and advocacy work
Helps to develop campaigns targeted to particular areas and regions
Can free up your time to concentrate on other priorities, if you outsource this work.

You can download a sample report to see how it looks.

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Want to know more?

Click here to request a price list or find out more about DIY mapping.

About the Author

Brooke Boyce
Research Manager

Brooke is experienced in delivering complex quantitative and qualitative research projects, and is our in-house expert on all things methodological.

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Without evidence, we are flying blind.

When we take the time to examine the evidence, and rigorously reflect, we see more clearly what we need to do.

In this day and age, it’s not enough to do good work. The story of that work needs to be told to the people that matter.

Without an evidence base around our work, we’re flying blind.

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What are the purposes for which Patternmakers use, handle and disclose your personal information?

Who will Patternmakers disclose your personal information to?

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1. Analyse the competition

2. Measure the potential

3. Review the literature

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1. STRUCTURE: Ensure your evaluation framework is up to date

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Using the ABS correspondences files

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