Lecture 5

Question 1

What is impact in the SE perspective?

Answer 1

: results that target

the “root causes” of a soc/env problem

Question 2

What are some methods for assessing social/environmental performance?

Answer 2

• Expected return (e.g. SROI, ERR…)
• Experimental methods (Randomized control trials)
• Strategy performance approach (e.g. Balanced
scorecards)
• Stakeholder approach (e.g. Participatory methods-
beneficiaries)
• Integrative approaches (e.g. system thinking)
• Theory of Change & Logic model

Question 3

What are the purposes of measuring impact?

Answer 3

Diagnosis tool
• What actions work best to achieve outcomes
• What the unintended consequences have been

• Decision-making tool
What needs to be adjusted to improve execution

• Learning tool
How and why they are or are not achieved
Used before scaling-up

Collaboration tool
• Provide partners with evidence & feedback

Question 4

What is the social renturn on investment consisting off?

Answer 4

Stakeholder approach + broader perspective beyond financial items + cost benefit analysis

Question 5

Evaluative SROI

Answer 5

Measuring actual outcomes, a longitudinal,

retrospective approach

Question 6

Forecasting SROI

Answer 6

Setting a range of possible social value to be

created, a predictive approach

Question 7

SROI advantages and disadvantages

Answer 7

+ Useful supplementary tool to communicate value creation
+ Information on inputs of resources
+ Enables broad predictions

• No evidence of financial performance
• No information how the resources are used to create SV
• Arbitrary estimation on costs and outputs
• Approximate range of impact (upper and lower bound)
• Only partial outcomes known/measured