What Is Social Return On Investment (SROI) and How Do You Apply It?

What is SROI?
&and how do you apply it?
June 2008
Authored by: Rizwan Tayabali
Contact: rizwan.tayabali@gmail.com
Website / Blog: www.urbansurvivalproject.org
OVERVIEW : For many of us who are looking to start up a social enterprise, the framework
of Social Return on Investment (SROI) could prove to be crucial in both understanding
and presenting our social impacts in economic terms. Anything that helps us raise
funding and support has to be worth taking seriously, so here's a short overview of
SROI.
Table of Contents
W HAT IS SROI? ..................................................................................................... 2

VALUE CREATION .................................................................................................... 2
W HY SHOULD YOU CARE? ........................................................................................ 2
SROI ANALYSIS...................................................................................................... 3
BENEFITS ............................................................................................................... 3
REFERENCES.......................................................................................................... 3
Social Return on Investment | June 2008
1
What is SROI?
SROI ?
According to the SROI-UK Network, Social Return on Investment (SROI) is an approach
to understanding and managing the impacts of a project, organisation or policy. It is
based on important impacts that stakeholders identify and puts financial value on
outcomes that do not have market values. SROI therefore is a framework. It’s a story,
not just a number.
The story should show how you:
• Understand the value created
• Manage it
• Can prove it
It was developed in the early 1990s, by a non-profit social enterprise called The Roberts
Enterprise Development Fund [REDF] who began to analyse its SROI to help illustrate
in monetary terms the value generated through an investment in its social programmes.
Value Creation
For social entrepreneurs there are 3 avenues of value creation:
1. Economic
Creating services or products that have greater market value than their inputs
e.g. any commercial business
2. Social
Creating services or products that have a provably beneficial impact on society
e.g. anti-racism initiatives
3. Socio-Economic Social Return on Investment | June 2008
Creating services or products that increase the market value of inputs but also
generate cost savings for the public system or environment
e.g. employment programs
Why should you care?

The key point to note is that the SROI analysis is essentially a robust argument for your
non-profit or social enterprise to be at least partially compensated or credited for the
value it creates in the marketplace. This could be either through public funding or CSR
investment.
2
SROI Analysis
To create your SROI analysis you need to do the following:
1. Examine your social service activity over a given time frame (usually 5 to 10 yrs)
2. Calculate the amount of "investment" required to support that activity and
analyze the capital structure in place to support that social activity
3. Identify the various cost savings, reductions in spending and related benefits that
accrue to your public system as a result of what you're doing
4. Calculate the economic value of those cost savings and related benefits
5. Discount those savings back to the beginning of the investment time frame using
a net present value (NPV) and/or discounted cash flow analysis
6. Finally present the Socio-Economic Value created during the investment time
frame, by expressing that value in terms of NPV and SROI rates and ratios.
And yes, it clearly points towards needing a decent accountant!
Benefits
Still, the benefits of having an SROI framework are clear. It will help you
• Understand the real value of what your enterprise/organisation does
• Raise finance more easily
• Get public sector support more easily
• Improve reporting on positive changes caused by your organisation

Social Return on Investment | June 2008
• Develop a better organisational structure, with improved strategies, systems and

accountability
• Improve your ability to manage risks and identify opportunities required to

achieve your mission
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
References
• Harvard Business School Overview: http://hbswk.hbs.edu/archive/1957.html
• London Business School SROI Primer: http://sroi.london.edu/
• SROI-UK Network: http://www.sroi-uk.org/

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What is SROI?

&and how do you apply it?

W HAT IS SROI? ..................................................................................................... 2

• Understand the value created

Why should you care?

• Understand the real value of what your enterprise/organisation does

• Raise finance more easily

• Get public sector support more easily

• Improve reporting on positive changes caused by your organisation

• Develop a better organisational structure, with improved strategies, systems and

• Improve your ability to manage risks and identify opportunities required to

• London Business School SROI Primer: http://sroi.london.edu/

• SROI-UK Network: http://www.sroi-uk.org/

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