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Glossary of terms
- Best value
- Capacity building
- Cohesive communities
- Common inspection framework
- Core Costs
- Corporate objectives
- Directorates
- Direct service
- Evaluation
- Infrastructure
- Infrastructure organisation
- Monitoring
- Outcome
- Service level agreements (SLA)
- Skills for life
- Social inclusion
- Sustainability
- Strategic funding
- VCFS (voluntary, community and faith sector)
- Value for money
- Widening participation
Capacity building
Empowering activity that strengthens the ability of voluntary, community and faith organisations to build their structures, systems, people and skills so that they are better able to:
- Define and achieve their objectives
- Engage in consultation and planning
- Manage projects
- Take part in partnerships, social enterprise and service delivery*
* Source: (‘Building Community Strengths’ by Steve Skinner 1977)
Cohesive communities
Communities where there are healthy and positive relationships between and within different sections of the population; raised awareness and understanding of different cultures and lifestyles; and a willingness to break down barriers in order to develop shared understanding, mutual respect and trust.
Corporate objectives
The county council’s broad aims in delivering its services to the people of Lancashire. They are described on the eligibility section of the website.
Evaluation
The process of looking at information and making a judgement or series of judgements on the quality of progress and work and its success against expectations and stated aims. It looks at outputs or results – what has been done. It is qualitative, assessing outcomes in terms of their impact on the original problem.
Outcome
Outcomes are changes, results, benefits or impacts – generally focused on people, participants. There are many ways to gather the information necessary for measuring the progress of an outcome, both quantitative and qualitative e.g. participant surveys, questionnaires/evaluation forms (both pre and post activity) interviews, focus groups, data collection, observation etc.
Social inclusion
'The process by which efforts are made to ensure that everyone, regardless of their experiences and circumstances, can achieve their potential in life. To achieve inclusion income and employment are necessary but not sufficient. An inclusive society is also characterised by a striving for reduced inequality, a balance between individuals’ rights and duties and increased social cohesion.'*
*Source: Centre for Economic & Social Inclusion, 2002.