Swap fear for action: How to create a solid foundation for social values

Mary-Kathryn Adams is Managing Director at Simetrica-Jacobs

Creating meaningful, valuable and actionable social value strategies can be overwhelming and frustrating. Working with most of our clients, we increasingly see first-hand how difficult it can be to navigate this space.

The main reason for the collective frustration is that there are so many definitions and interpretations of social value. At the same time, the operational side can rely on several different frameworks – for example, environmental, social and governance (ESG) requirements or the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). In addition, there are Dozens of possible models, tools, frameworks and methods for measuring and reporting social value.

In some cases, social value and social justice overlap with the traditional responsibilities of corporate social responsibility (CSR) on the economic side and net zero and sustainability goals on the environmental side. Add to this pressure from shareholders and investors and this can create great anxiety among executives and decision-makers at the senior levels in both the private and public sectors, sometimes leading to decision paralysis, inertia or even apathy. These reactions are justified because although customers start with the best intentions, this is an increasingly nebulous area.

At Simetrica-Jacobs, we know that these terminologies are complementary and multifaceted. That’s why we focus on helping companies, firms and regions define what social value means to them. We explore what matters to them and why, and what evidence they need to make important decisions and inform key stakeholders. We know how and when to measure what their company is doing to demonstrate its impact.

As part of this process, we are asked some important questions when clients are just getting started or looking to update their current approach.

What does a good strategy look like?

Although there is no overarching regulatory framework or established definition, may Use guiding principles to define and manage societal value, whether for public or private companies, organisations or authorities. All decisions must be geared towards improving society. In practice, this may take the form of a range of different projects, programmes or initiatives aimed at reducing inequality, improving access or inclusion and/or achieving wider benefits for people, the environment and the economy.

A social value strategy should also be tailored to the context – whether it applies to a company, a community, a project, or even an entire country. While it makes sense for an institution or organization to use a broad framework to conceptualize social value (such as the SDGs), a strategy is only truly strategic if we are clear about creating and applying an appropriate definition, combined with a thoughtful approach to measurement. (And there are frameworks that can help us do this.)

Choose two or three focus areas that are directly linked to your commercial and strategic objectives. However, your business objectives and KPIs are set and social value can and should be integrated into these to fit into the core strategy of the business. Social value cannot be isolated, so the more your social value objectives align with your vision and mission, the better. This will make it much easier to codify social value, making it tangible while also allowing for clearer measurement that aligns with what is important to the business – and that is crucial.

What should we measure?

As soon as we know What we want to achieve How And Where Let’s start with measurements and evidence? I’m a big believer in Ashe’s seminal quote: “Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.” This is especially true for clients who are early in their social value journey – it’s all about proportionality and pragmatism.

It can be helpful to think about point B: What story does your company want to tell about social value in five years? What do you want to be able to communicate? Who is the audience? What will you do with the evidence you’ve collected? What decisions do you want to be able to make? With that vision in mind, define specific areas that will have the greatest impact in the first and second years. Aim for consistency in a carefully selected number of areas: Measuring a few things well (and for the right reasons) is much more effective than measuring 100 things poorly.

When you run before you can walk when measuring social value, you end up chasing a lot of data and consuming resources trying to measure everything at once. There’s no getting around it: good measurement is resource intensive. While measurement is necessary for long-term success, you need to build those resources proportionally to reflect the growth and maturity of your company’s social value efforts.

You need to build your internal capacity, expertise and confidence in proportion to your ambitions. What is crucial here is that your efforts are proportionate to the audit effort and the risks associated with the decisions you have to make.

To use a real-world example, if you also consider societal benefits when evaluating options for a multi-year £15 million ($19 million) regeneration project, the burden of proof is much higher than if you were making decisions about the benefits of a £100,000 ($126,000) investment.

To be clear, you should make your decisions based on evidence regardless. But just as scrutiny and risk thresholds increase with the size of the investment, so does the level of rigor and evidence required in measuring social value. In other words, you don’t need to do a randomized control trial for everything; you Do You must be clear from the outset about what level of evidence is appropriate in relation to the decision you are agreeing to and what test the evidence must withstand.

Track your progress, reflect on your learnings, apply your findings to the rest of the organization, and then gradually increase the scope of your measurement efforts.

How do we anchor and operationalize social value?

Once you have a coherent strategy that clearly defines what social value means to the business, links it concretely to corporate strategy, and includes a tactical and appropriate approach to measurement, the final piece of the puzzle you need is to ensure these elements are underpinned by a strong culture that values ​​people-centered decision-making.

Operationalizing social value requires more than a strategy written on paper or goals visibly printed at corporate headquarters. I am an anthropologist by profession, so I cannot help but emphasize the commitment to cultural change required to embed and operationalize social value.

Whether in society or business, we must recognise that our culture is the inherent ‘code of conduct’ – it shapes our behaviour and is particularly evident in the decisions we make. It is how we act when no one is watching. With a strong culture guiding and underpinning our behaviour, we can trust that individuals and organisations are making the right decisions and, crucially, that they understand the social, economic and environmental impacts of those decisions.

Make a start, but remember that it is an iterative process

The secret to a solid foundation for developing and implementing a social value strategy is to focus on people and culture. Perhaps most importantly, real, lasting change is possible when culture, behavior and strategy are aligned to support people-centered decision-making.

Your social value strategy should (by definition) be an iterative, living guide that adapts to your capabilities and ambitions, the needs of the local community, and local and wider policy-making. None of this is static. A strategy should actively anticipate these changes, with a willingness to refocus and enough agility to continue to have people at its core, rather than focusing on reporting the ‘best’ outcome.

Ready to learn what not What to do when developing social value strategies? Look out for the second article in our series on social value.

• Mary-Kathryn Adams is Managing Director at Simetrica-Jacobs

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