Among the six criteria NOVA Awards applies — Enduring Value, Strategic Distinction, Quality of Implementation, Professional Expertise of the Team or Nominee, Measurable Impact and Supporting Evidence and Documentation — two are consistently underused by applicants. They are also, being scored on the same 1–10 scale as the rest, worth exactly as much as the criteria everyone competes hard on.

The first, Enduring Value, asks whether the result persists. The second, Supporting Evidence and Documentation, is unusual in that it makes the quality of the evidence file itself a scored dimension rather than merely a condition of admissibility.

What “enduring” means in practice
Durability is not a synonym for size. A modest change that is still operating three years later demonstrates more than a large one that stopped when the budget did. Jurors are looking for signals of the first kind:

• Adoption that continued after launch, promotion or funding ended
• Retention curves rather than acquisition peaks
• Institutional embedding: the process became policy, the tool entered the standard stack, the method entered a curriculum or guideline
• Transfer to others: replication by peers, licensing, open-sourcing, publication that others cite and use
• Capability left behind: people trained, documentation written, systems maintained without you
• Structural change: a fixed cost removed, a risk permanently reduced, an approval no longer needed

Campaign spike versus durable change

The two-time-point rule
The simplest way to make durability visible is to give every headline metric a second measurement taken later. “Reduced onboarding time from 14 days to 5” becomes materially stronger as “reduced onboarding time from 14 days to 5 (Q3 2023), sustained at 5.4 days as of Q1 2025 with the original team no longer involved”. One extra clause converts a claim about a project into evidence about a change.

If your work is recent and no later data point exists, say so and provide what does exist: the maintenance arrangement, the handover documentation, the contractual commitment, the number of trained staff. Honest structural evidence scores better than an implied permanence the file cannot support.

Documentation as a scored criterion
Because the framework treats supporting evidence and documentation as a dimension of merit, the appendix deserves the same care as the narrative. A juror scoring this criterion is asking: can each material claim be traced to a source, quickly, without ambiguity?

An indexed appendix answers that. Number each claim in the narrative and reference the corresponding exhibit:

The framework assigns the burden of substantiating claims to the applicant, so an unindexed pile of attachments transfers work to a reviewer who has no obligation to do it. Consistency matters as much as completeness: the same figure should appear identically in the form, the narrative and the exhibits.

A short rewrite
Before. “Our sustainability programme was a huge success and has been widely praised across the industry, transforming how the company approaches environmental responsibility.”

After. “The programme cut packaging waste per shipment by 38% between 2022 and 2023 (Exhibit B1, verified in the group’s 2023 assurance statement). The revised specification became mandatory across all five distribution centres in 2024 (Exhibit B2) and was adopted as the reference standard by two suppliers serving other clients (Exhibit B3). Per-shipment waste remained 36% below baseline in 2025, two years after the project team was disbanded (Exhibit B4).”

The second version scores on Enduring Value, Measurable Impact and Supporting Evidence and Documentation simultaneously. The first scores on none of them.

Qualified submissions are independently reviewed by at least three Jury members, and application materials are prepared in English. Confirm current requirements and deadlines on nova-awards.com before you submit.