Stories of Change, a decade-long initiative of the Sundance Institute and the Skoll Foundation, marries the power of storytelling with the impact of social entrepreneurship. This initiative connects and engages independent storytellers with renowned social entrepreneurs, cultivates story skills and networks among these communities, and supports the creation of compelling narratives about solutions to urgent social issues.

We recently sat down with Sandy Herz, Skoll Foundation’s Director of Global Partnerships, to hear more about the evolution of this collaboration with the Sundance Institute, now celebrating its tenth year, and what she sees on the horizon.

Q: How do you measure the impact of this kind of storytelling?

Sandy: Think of a funnel with three phases: the wide end is trying to reach broad audiences—that’s all about awareness. For that I measure the number of people reached, the quality of the story, cost per person reached with that story. But are they the right people? Is it the right story?

The middle of the funnel is more about targeted engagement. That’s where a lot of these projects sit, where they have a particular agenda, a particular audience, and specific goals. So, you look to see how those needles moved.

At the narrow end of the funnel is impact. Did something materially change? Collisions ended up being in a tremendous number of backrooms in the nuclear conversation of the last 24 months. A number of people at the UN viewed it before it passed its first resolution against nuclear proliferation. Or think about the Minister of Health in Rwanda seeing Open Heart and committing to eradicating rheumatic heart disease. That is beautifully measurable and concrete. Most things in life aren’t that concrete.

Read the full interview with Sandy Herz about the power of documentary storytelling by Zachary Slobig at Skoll.