Top tips to create the right Social Value strategy for YOUR organisation

A robust and well-implemented Social Value strategy will give you the tools and roadmap to drive positive impact at scale.

But research has shown that a staggering 60-90% of strategies fail.

We don't want your Social Value programme to become one of these casualties. That’s why our latest webinar tackled the why, what and how of creating a Social Value strategy with a panel of experts:

• Hannah Winter, Social Value Manager at CACI
• Sheena Singla, General Counsel and Head of ESG at Logicor
• James Jenkins (Host) and Kate Clarfelt, Senior Consultants at Social Value Portal

Here we’re sharing key insights you can take away and apply to develop your own Social Value strategy.

Why do Social Value strategies fail?

At Social Value Portal, we’ve noted four common pitfalls which undermine success – and the best ways to avoid them.

Problem 1: A disconnect from reality​

It’s exciting to start mapping out the initiatives you want to undertake as part of your Social Value programme. But many organisations make the mistake of committing to Social Value interventions without fully exploring:

• The impact customers and stakeholders want to have
• The challenges local areas are facing
• Their capabilities as an organisation to deliver Social Value

Solution: Understand your context

Start by thinking about your organisation as part of the wider economic, social, and environmental systems in which it operates. From there, assess the Social Value priorities that are most relevant to your customers and communities, and consider the levers you can pull to address them.

Problem 2: Not understanding the problem

Many Social Value strategies fail because they don’t recognise the real factors holding the organisation back from consistently creating measurable impact.

These might be challenges around measuring Social Value, internal knowledge of creating Social Value, gaining buy-in from leadership, and many other considerations.

Solution: Be honest about the real challenges

This means being curious about how your colleagues across the organisation understand and interact with Social Value. What's getting in the way for them, and what's working?

We also recommend conducting a ‘gap analysis’ to identify potential blockers. For instance, if you want to spend more with local businesses, are you able to measure your current local spend as a baseline? If not, that’s a gap to fill.

Problem 3: Change is hard

There are volumes of research showing how difficult change management is – and Social Value often represents change for your employees and your partners.

Solution: Build shared ownership

Bring colleagues together to agree which issues the organisation must address as a part of its Social Value strategy. Maybe it’s not clear who owns Social Value; perhaps there are too many initiatives, or insufficient coordination between them.

The important thing is to open the door for a constructive conversation to generate ideas.

Problem 4: Trying to boil the ocean

We’ve often seen ‘wish list’ Social Value strategies, with unrealistic targets and too much to do. This leads to frustration, inefficiency, and few meaningful outcomes.

Solution: Be bold about prioritisation

If you have an exciting set of ideas – great. The next step is to be ambitious but realistic about which you can achieve and when.

Start by identifying low-effort/high-impact actions to get the ball rolling. For example, organising a Social Value in bids training session could quickly upskill the relevant teams and give you something to build on.

Which Social Value initiatives are right for your organisation?

From volunteering to charitable donations to using zero emission vehicles, there are countless potential Social Value initiatives. But which ones are right for your organisation?

The answer to this will depend on:

• The needs of your stakeholders and communities
• Your core organisational activities

Finding this ‘Social Value sweet spot’ will help you move from conducting one-off activities to creating positive outcomes at scale.

For instance, CACI (a multinational technology and professional services business), is focused on two impact themes that reflect the business’s identity, and the experiences of its people:

• Using data to drive better outcomes for individuals and communities
• Removing barriers to careers in STEM

CACI is working to make data and digital career paths more accessible by partnering with organisations like DigData and First Lego League to stimulate interest among young people in engineering and technology careers.

We want to reflect society as an organisation – to do that authentically, you have to work with HR, recruitment, learning and development, all those that are involved with bringing people into the business. Equally, you need to have a culture that people want to come into.

Hannah Winter, Social Value Manager, CACI

Real estate logistics business Logicor, on the other hand, is evolving its focus to areas particularly relevant to its work in the built environment, including:

• Improving access to real estate careers for women, young people, and those from underprivileged backgrounds
• Collaborating with our partners on developments and refurbishments to meet local needs
• Improving biodiversity and the environmental landscape around sites

One of our big priorities is moving from a broad range of Social Value initiatives across the business, to making Social Value a component of our main business activities.

Sheena Singla, General Counsel and Head of ESG at Logicor

Gaining buy-in for your Social Value strategy

Engaging the wider organisation on Social Value is a critical step for embedding your strategy. Social Value Portal’s Kate Clarfelt shared some top tips:

Create a ‘steering group’ for Social Value

Ideally this should be a microcosmic representation of your organisation. Although organisations often prioritise senior stakeholders and decision-makers in these groups, we would suggest including representatives from multiple levels and functions, as they will have unique perspectives and on-the-ground insights.

Build knowledge and awareness

Aim to upskill everyone in the organisation on Social Value, covering at least the basics of the concept and what it means to your organisation. Our Social Value Academy, used by organisations like Equans, is a great starting place for this.

Get cross-functional input

Social Value should not be sequestered in a single team or role – all functions have a part to play – for instance:

• HR can support with inclusive recruitment and volunteering policies
• Procurement can create better spend distribution
• Bid teams can integrate Social Value into bid responses
• Marketing can pull Social Value data into customer-facing reports

We also encourage our clients to put in place departmental and role-level Social Value KPIs and include Social Value in job descriptions. This will ensure that accountability for the success of your Social Value strategy will sit acrossthe whole business.

Diving deeper into Social Value

To learn more about how you can successfully implement a Social Value strategy, download our quick guide to Social Value strategy.