SROI
Social Return on Investment
Social Return on Investment
Maximize Your Social Impact with Our SROI Consulting Services
In an era where social responsibility and impact measurement are paramount, understanding and demonstrating the social return on investment (SROI) is essential for organizations seeking to create meaningful change. Our consulting services specialize in SROI, providing you with the tools and expertise to measure, manage, and communicate your social impact effectively. Here’s how we can help you harness the power of SROI:
Core Topic Areas:
1. Foundations of SROI
We start by demystifying SROI, explaining what it is and why it matters. Our approach covers the fundamental principles, stakeholder engagement, and the concept of social value. We guide you through the SROI framework basics, including inputs, outputs, outcomes, impact, and attribution, while helping you map stakeholders to identify beneficiaries, partners, and sponsors.
2. Scoping, Governance, and Change Readiness
Defining the scope and boundaries of your SROI assessment is crucial. We assist you in determining what counts as social value, establishing time horizons, and selecting appropriate discount rates. Our governance framework clarifies roles, including SROI champions and data owners, while addressing ethical considerations. We also assess change readiness for measurement, focusing on data availability, stakeholder engagement, and transparency.
3. Theory of Change & Impact Mapping
Developing a credible theory of change is essential for demonstrating your impact. We help you create causal pathways that connect activities to social outcomes, utilizing impact maps and logic models to visualize inputs, activities, outputs, outcomes, and impact. Our expertise includes identifying attribution and contribution, weighing changes caused by external factors against program actions.
4. Data, Metrics, and Valuation
Effective SROI measurement relies on robust data collection design. We guide you in establishing baseline, follow-up, and longitudinal data to measure outcomes relevant to stakeholders. Our valuation techniques include using monetary proxies for social outcomes, such as willingness-to-pay theory, market values, or shadow prices. We also address uncertainty through confidence intervals, sensitivity analysis, and scenario planning.
5. Discounting, Social Value, and Aggregation
Understanding the time value of social benefits is critical. We help you apply discount rates and calculate the net present value of future outcomes. Our approach includes normalizing and aggregating multiple outcomes into a single SROI ratio, providing clarity on what the ratio means for stakeholders and funders.
6. Frameworks, Standards, and Compliance
We ensure that your SROI practices align with social return standards and best practices, including SROI Network/BS OI frameworks and relevant ISO guidelines. Our quality assurance processes involve thorough documentation, stakeholder validation, and audit trails, while addressing ethical considerations such as data privacy and consent.
7. Stakeholder Engagement & Communication
Engaging stakeholders is vital for valuing outcomes accurately. We facilitate stakeholder interviews and participatory valuation processes, ensuring beneficiaries have a voice in the assessment. Our storytelling with data approach translates SROI findings into compelling narratives for funders and leadership, utilizing various reporting formats, including practitioner reports, dashboards, and impact reports.
8. Advanced Methods & Extensions
For organizations looking to deepen their SROI analysis, we offer advanced methods such as activity-based costing and social accounting, linking costs to social outputs. We address attribution, deadweight, and displacement to correct for external influences, and conduct sensitivity analysis and scenario planning to test the robustness of SROI results under different assumptions. Our portfolio SROI approach allows for comparing multiple programs within a portfolio.
9. Sector and Context Adaptations
Our consulting services are adaptable to various sectors, including nonprofit, public sector, and social enterprises, as well as corporate social impact programs. We also assist with ESG integration and reporting alignment with frameworks such as GRI, SASB, and TCFD.
10. Tools, Templates, and Deliverables
We provide a comprehensive suite of tools and templates to support your SROI journey, including SROI plan templates, scoping worksheets, stakeholder mapping guides, data collection templates, valuation worksheets, discounting models, and SROI calculator templates. Our final deliverables include an impact report with an executive summary and case narratives that highlight your social impact.
Why Choose Us?
- Expert Guidance: Our team of SROI experts brings extensive experience and knowledge to help you navigate the complexities of social impact measurement.
- Tailored Solutions: We customize our consulting services to meet the unique needs of your organization, ensuring that your SROI assessment aligns with your strategic goals.
- Measurable Results: We focus on delivering actionable insights and measurable outcomes, helping you demonstrate the value of your social initiatives to stakeholders.
Partner with Us!
Unlock the full potential of your social impact initiatives with our SROI consulting services. Let us help you measure, manage, and communicate your social return on investment effectively. Contact us today to learn more about how we can support your organization in creating meaningful change!