Shape and Artsadmin commissioned Tandi Williams and Morwenna Collett to evaluate the impact of Unlimited, a three-year commissioning and support programme for disabled artists. They wanted to explore how the programme was helping to shift perceptions about disabled artists, and find out whether they were making a difference in the cultural sector and beyond.  

We conducted fieldwork at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, in Northern Ireland and in London, interviewing 35 disabled artists, producers and presenters from across the arts sector. Our findings helped identify important new opportunities for the program, and the partners went on to secure new funding for the next phase of Unlimited. 

Jo said, ‘THANK YOU for your exceptional hard work on this. It’s great, everything we asked for. Tight, concise and clean, provocative, helpful and evidenced. We are delighted!’

Following the project, Unlimited was successful in securing additional funding for international expansion. Morwenna and Tandi developed an Access Statement for Researchers and Consultants, and were selected to present at Arts Activated and the ACSPRI Social Science Methodology Conference. Read more about their recommendations in their paper, 'Is Evaluation Truly Accessible?' 

Bridget Jones, Research and Analysis Manager at the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences wanted to squeeze more insight from visitor data for the Powerhouse Museum and Sydney Observatory.

Working on-site two to three days a week over six months, we rolled up our sleeves to develop visitor insight packs, analyse postcode data, run visitor surveys and create useful new dashboards. We also designed a new reporting system for off-site visitation, which is making life a whole lot easier for annual reporting.

Our work was presented in an all-staff business planning day, and is currently informing marketing and programming at the museum. 

Bridget said, 'Tandi takes the time to understand what I want and always comes up with some great suggestions about how we can make a project better.  She is really outcome oriented in her work and always looking to find the connections between projects and organisations.  Her work is very thoughtful and she is great at identifying key insights and posing the hard questions in the most diplomatic way.  Tandi is totally reliable and has always delivered on time and within budget.'

Karilyn Brown, CEO of Performing Lines, wanted to evaluate a pilot of a new Indigenous Community Engagement Coordinator position, designed to help touring theatre productions connect with local Indigenous communities. She wanted a framework to guide data collection, so they could measure their impact at the end of the project.

We worked collaboratively with the Coordinator Denise Wilson to gather feedback from regional communities and presenters across Australia.

After workshopping the results, we developed a case study to share the outcomes and lessons from the pilot. Performing Lines secured support for two subsequent phases of work, and was invited to present this work at the Australian Performing Arts Centres Association conference.

Karilyn said, ‘You brought insightful perspective, rigour and focus to the evaluation and always showed a preparedness to work alongside the team to get the intent and nuance of the findings articulated.  We appreciated your approach, genuine interest and commitment to seeing it through.'