What UK funders actually scan in an outcome figure
Panel members rarely rebuild your spreadsheet. They look for a denominator, a time window, and a caption that does not outrun the bars.
When a research council or a large charity panel opens an outcomes annex, they are not hunting for decorative charts. They are checking whether the figure can survive a sceptical question from someone who has sat on the same programme in another institution.
Start with the denominator. If the bar shows ‘participants completing the follow-up’, write that in the caption, not ‘people helped’. A mismatch here is the most common reason a handsome figure is quietly ignored.
Give the time window in the same sentence as the measure. ‘During year three of the award’ is clearer than a footnote the panel will skip. If the monitoring year does not match the academic year, say so once, beside the axis, not in an appendix.
Resist dual axes unless the funder template forces them. Two scales on one frame invite a reading the table does not support. Two simple figures beat one clever one when the claim is modest.
Finally, leave a gap for what you do not know. A short caption line — ‘no outcome interview in site B’ — does more for trust than a footnote buried under a logo. Service Trailline’s briefing packs treat that line as part of the figure, not an apology after it.