The support that we provide is flexible and fit-for-purpose.

As a not-for-profit organisation ourselves, we understand the need to adapt and respond to government priorities and appreciate that there is no one-size-fits-all approach to program development and improvement.

Each project is carefully scoped, based upon your needs and requirements, incorporating our knowledge of the policy landscape and evidence-based research.

Since 2006, CFRE has established itself as a skilled, collaborative and trustworthy of research, evaluation, training and consultancy services.

What makes us different

As part of the Drummond Street Services family, we bring connections with and knowledge from frontline practitioners in the community services sector. We also bring a strong focus on valuing and integrating lived experience and user voices in all the work that we do.

Our work is values-driven. We prioritise making sure what we do (and how we do it) is fit for purpose.

Our team of researchers and consultants have diverse backgrounds, including public health, social work, psychology, human rights, and project and contract management. We are more than just researchers and consultants – our team also includes practitioners and service users. Our experience across government, public sector and universities means we know how to work at the nexus of research, practice and policy and how to bridge the gaps across sectors.

What we do

CFRE has a proven track record – between 2017-2024, we managed over 150 external projects with agencies and organisations across Australia, including in metropolitan, regional and remote settings and across the public, private and community sectors.

Some of our projects have included:

• developing evidence-informed practice tools for domestic and family violence services
• researching the impacts of COVID-19 on community service use and adolescent violence in the home
• working with services and community to build evidence and resources around the prevention of family violence during the transition to parenthood for LGBTIQ+ people
• capacity building in organisations to research, evaluate and co-design with their users
• designing, implementing and embedding evaluation into programs and organisations
• working with multicultural LGBTIQ+ communities to create tailored resources about COVID-19.

Our current work includes collaborative applied research projects relating to family violence during COVID-19 and intersectional practice development.

You can learn more about some of our past and current projects on our Recent Work page.

We are also a member of the Commission for Gender Equality in the Public Sector’s expert panel of providers. You can find out more about how we support defined entities under the Gender Equality Act 2020 on our Gender Equality in the Public Sector page.

How we work

Our approach is collaborative, rigorous and reflective. This includes:

• working closely with agencies and organisations to manage projects in a ‘no surprises’ way
• adapting Drummond Street’s co-production/co-design model to our research, evaluation and consultancy
• using a co-production approach to ensure the knowledge, feedback and participation of communities, practitioners and users are integrated across the project lifecycle
• building trust and ongoing relationships across the various stakeholder cohorts for each project
• sharing knowledge with our stakeholders as part of building capacity across sectors and communities
• openly inviting feedback and reflecting on our own practices.

We know that every project, program and organisation is unique, so we make sure our approach and activities are tailored every time. We take the time with program teams and organisations to identify and build upon their strengths. We also draw from our collective knowledge and experience of qualitative, quantitative and participatory methods to find the best fit for each project.