Category: Events

Our second private sector conference started by discussing what sustainable development is and what it means for people. With the image and personal story of a grandfather in Zimbabwe who only wished for the best future possible for his grandsons, our co-CEO Crispen Sachikonye, brought the understanding of a sustainable future to life through our personal experiences of our lives and those of the future generations we are connected to.

He went on to explain how the shared agenda for a better future was developed through consultation with 10 million people that resulted in the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). His grandfather had not been one of these people consulted, but many voices like his had been heard as a plan of action was put together. This is the plan that the UK is acting to as well, as the Social Value Model links to the SDGs and the Model’s Themes, such as COVID recovery and wellbeing, reflection on UK stakeholders’ challenges. Seeing the wider picture and understanding where you fit in that context, is also what the Social Value International backed SDG Impact Standards are about and to help us make better decisions.

Crispen’s opening also pointed out we need to bring this into our conversations and language. How do we link all of the important topics and agendas together – and more precisely – How do we link the social value agenda to the SDGs?

We were honoured to out of many fantastic speakers have Jeremy Nicholls, Assurance Framework Lead for SDG Impact Standards at UNDP delivering a thought-provoking keynote with an eye-opening insights to the challenges in the world, with issues such as gender equality being over 100 years off and assurance missing in carbon trading. But with John Lennon’s words of “imagine” he also shared news and developments (e.g. SDG Impact Standards) that can support enterprises to act.

Panel 1: Another Acronym?

With the four panellists Oliver Kempton, Partner at Envoy Partnership, Sarah Fasey, Social Value Lead at Microsoft, Bonnie Chiu, TSIC and Ed Gemmell, Leader of Climate Party & Scientist Warning Europe and a discussion facilitated by our Private Sector Lead Charlotte, this discussion that started with reference to the Linking the SDG and SVI approaches paper; quickly dived into the debate around what to prioritise (e.g. climate change compared to inequality) which so clearly showed the importance of understanding the interconnectedness between the many SDGs. The SDGs can help bind things that are important to organisation, as Sarah explained. Bonnie made a good point around how debating about what Goal to focus on missed the core point of being an approach (and acronym) that different to many other acronyms resonates with a wider range of stakeholders across sectors and countries.

But we’re still far off to achieve all of the Goals, so what’s next, when we reached 2030? The panel provided everything from doom day perspective to kick us into action, but as Oliver also pointed out, we should not forget that we’ve also made great strides globally on areas such as reducing extreme poverty. There’s still hope, was the flavour our panelists left the audience with as the first panel finished.

Presentations

The first panel was followed by two presentations. One by David Connor, Founder of The 2030 Hub, who talked about Local Action and Private Sector, giving real grass route examples of the importance to speak the (cultural) language of your stakeholders and how to make this relevant for …a kebab shop! No one should be left behind and this agenda is wide and inclusive enough to make that happen.

This was followed by Sarah Ottaway, Sustainability and Social Value Lead for Suez, who provided a crash-course on the Climate Crisis and then very elegantly linked real business related challenges with how the Principles of Social Value can help to tackle these.

In the informal networking that followed, the attendees took the opportunity to continue the discuss if our democratic systems are fit for purpose and to support the SDGs, SME support and some general reflections from the day.

Panel 2: The business practice and opportunity

The second half of the conference started mid-morning with presentations by Jessica Lobo, Global Goals and Climate Programme Manager at UN Global Compact Network UK, James Williams, Head of Social Impact at HACT, Ellie Jenkins, Partner of Akerlof & Rab Campbell, Growth Manager at The Social Value Engine and a panel facilitated by our Operations Director Catherine Manning. The speakers clearly showed how their different solutions helped businesses understand and take actions towards the SDGs, but it was also recognised that it is a complex reality we’re facing that can feel really hard. That’s why many need help to navigate through this, and Jess emphasised the value of the SDGs to give the problems we’re trying to solve attention and to help translating these global challenges into what’s relevant locally.

Members discussion

Seeing a trend in language, we need our community to speak in a way that resonates with people: Stakeholders that can sometimes be a grandad in Zimbabwe or a Kebab shop in Liverpool, Crispen started the last part of this conference with. “And here we do have work to do”, he said, before opening up the conversations with attendees on they thought needed? What’s next? To which the attendees’ thoughts and suggestions for action flew through the chat:

• “Bring Procurement Officers into the family”
• “Help smaller business develop their sustainability goals”
• “Share guidance, case studies etc on how organisations of all sizes can engage with SDGs through their Social Value policy/framework/agenda.”
• “Sharing good practice and educating companies on how to identify risks and impacts in their operations and, very importantly, in their supply chain. I also think that reporting is crucial for this”
• “[…] introduce a conversation around how SDGs and social value to other existing frameworks [where it’s currently not mentioned]”
• Support to influence leaders
• There is a role for SVUK and members in advocating for interconnected nature of people and planet, and the need for us to collectively be developing measurement and management practice that integrates both

On the first one, we’ve already taken the action to bring this up with the Contract for Change Thought Leadership Group which is a multi-stakeholder initiative to influence the future of procurement. But now we’re inviting your action and ideas to push the other points forward. Please get in touch with Charlotte at charlotte.osterman@sv-test.wp-support.team if you would like to co-lead on what could be our network’s answer to these raised SDGs challenges.

On reflection, this event created a lot more discussions and debate than what we had anticipated. It was fantastic to see the passionate speakers and active attendees getting involved, but one thing was clear: There are more questions to be answered and work to be done to better implement the organisational systems, actions and assurances needed to link the social value agenda to the SDGs. And our last sentence today is a shout out to our network to join us and get in touch if you’d like to get involved.

If you missed this conference, it’s still not too late to watch it. The recordings are now available for purchase, please contact info@sv-test.wp-support.team to gain access

The following blog was written by our Private Sector Lead, Charlotte Osterman

On 24 – 25 October, Social Value Italia organised and hosted with Social Value International and Torino Social Impact the Social Value Matters 2022 Europe. 

The conference that builds on the previous success of the Social Value International’s Social Value Matters conferences, set out to bring together practitioners of social value to share learnings, challenges and discuss across nations. Social Value UK’s Catherine Manning and Charlotte Österman were there and report: 

The energy was buzzing as familiar and new faces gathered at UniCredit’s events space in central Turin on Monday last week. For many this was the first-time meeting in person after the last years’ pandemic and there was excitement in the air. Despite the conference setting out to be a European one, attendees had travelled as far as from South Africa, New Zealand, the US and Canada to take part in the discussion. 

Day one kicked off with an Italian late start, and a Davide Dal Maso (Social Value Italia) and Ben Carpenter (Social Value International) were amongst the speakers setting the scene. Davide reflected on how far we come and how the Italian market had seen a real shift in understanding and demand for impact assessments, meaning that it had now become significantly easier to convince clients, whilst it only 10-20 years ago was a tough game. But we’re not there yet, he said, making the point that despite us talking more about social value, we don’t practice it enough. Which in our opinion also has a link to Principle 8: Be Responsive – or as it was also referred to by other speakers – the “Do Something!” Principle.   

Turin is considered an impact and start-up hub of Italy and it was fascinating to hear about the piloting of a Social Stock Exchange, experiencing site visits to social housing estates and listen to speakers from the OECD how tools for a new social economy can be used. 

But we weren’t just listening in to the conversations, Social Value UK also had the pleasure of co-delivering two workshops. 

Workshop: Discussions around Wellbeing 

In this session with Giuseppe Dellerba (Fondazione Cottino), Maria Giulia Marini (ISTUD) and Paola Chesi (ISTUD), Charlotte gave an overarching perspective to how different frameworks explain wellbeing and most importantly why it is so core and intertwined to what is social value. This was followed by national insights from the Social Value Act of England and Wales, but also the frameworks of Scotland and Wales – two Wellbeing Government Economies – and Northern Ireland’s Social Value Policy, as SVUK gave an overview of things that are happening in the UK. 

Maria Giulia and Paula then deep dived into two case studies of how wellbeing had been defined in studies of migraine and epilepsy. It was fascinating to hear how health already in 1948 was defined as more than just “physical health” and how important it is to understand what outcomes and changes in wellbeing occurs as a result of an illness or treatment to be able to most effectively help the patients and those around them. 

But there was also another wellbeing workshop running, which we just have to share some insights from and to some incredible practice in New Zealand. The country that has for long had wellbeing high on the political agenda, had case studies from the indiginous Māori community showcased. Awerangi Tamihere explained how they created a true bottom-up understanding of wellbeing and value for these indiginous communities, where the families’ definition of what matters to them leads programme design, measurement and even reporting up to regional and national level. It was inspiring to hear both about this outstanding practice of involving stakeholders and being responsive to reduce inequality and support in a way that works for them, but also refreshing to hear very transparently of challenges they have had and how these were overcome. 

For our SVUK membership, we will compile our workshop and international case studies into a Wellbeing Workshop. Please contact info@sv-test.wp-support.team if you’d like to know more. 

Workshop: Accreditation and Certification 

In this session with Sophie Robin (EsImpact and Stone Soup) and Jeremy Nicholls (UNDP and Capitals Coalition, Catherine moderated a discussion around what are the next steps for accreditation, certification, assurance and verification within the social value and impact management profession. Especially the session spoke to outline how best further professionalisation of the sector can be achieved through assurance, accreditation and certification of process, people, practice, and data, whilst the discussion also dived into the topics of how assurance can be decreasing risk and support better decision-making. 

In the final panel Jeremy Nicholls (UNDP), Bonnie Chui (The Social Impact Investment Consultancy) and Filippo (Human Foundation & Social Value Italia) discuss sustainable development and how we go from here? As a last take-away and to reply to the question on what we can personally do now to achieve our movement’s mission and ideally within the timeline of the SDGs? The three panellists answered: 

• Don’t go back again and again and again to get better data. Use the data you have to make decisions 
• Call out impact washing, even when you’re finding it within your own organisation 
• Support businesses to implement the SDG Impact Standards 

We hope that this has provided a few nuggets and thoughts to spark our future discussions, work and practice.  

If you have any questions or comments on above, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.  

If you’re also in conference mood, please don’t miss our two sectoral conferences coming up:

8 Nov Private Sector Conference: How do we link the social value agenda to the SDGs?

29 Nov Civil Society Sectoral Conference: Social Value – Lever for Change or Lost Opportunity? 

How wonderful it was to be joined by you all (both in-person and online)!

It was great to see so many new faces, as well as catching up with our long-standing members. Thank you all for your keen interest and engagement, we had lots of excellent feedback and comments to take forward.

We have more to come in terms of follow up, but for now we just wanted to share the thoughts of some of our attendees…

“Fantastic day at Social Value UK’s #MemEx conference. It’s been great to hear from different perspectives and I have met some great people and organisations. Looking forward to future work and conversations.” – Becky Lythgoe, SVI Accredited Freelance Consultant

“Still buzzing & inspired from Social Value UK’s MemEx event! So good to be part of a movement that is changing the world for the better! So many amazing people were here! Together we are breaking through, now for acceleration.” – Natasha Jolob, Kai-zen Change for good CIC

“Attending the Social Value UK MemEx conference today. Some really interesting discussions around where Social Value is on the development journey & general awareness levels. It’s come a long way, but still lots to do. Measurement is only part of the story about people & place.” – Jane Thomson, Harworth Group PLC

We asked you.. what is the future of social value?

The theme of this year’s event was ‘What is the future of social value?’, so we wanted to share a brief roundup of thoughts on this.

Comments suggested the future lies in connecting community to organisational wellbeing. As well as continuing to empower the voice of the vulnerable and underrepresented groups. Finally, the was lots of talk surrounding collaboration as a means in bringing the term “social value” into public sphere.

For attendees interested in watching the conference back or getting in touch with other attendees, please reach out to info@sv-test.wp-support.team and we will be happy to get this sorted for you!

Posted 27th October 2022

Join our CEO Isabelle Parasram, on Thursday 29th September, 2022 from 12pm-1:30pm (drop in and out whenever suits you) as she chairs a panel discussion dissecting the question – what is next step for climate justice in the UK?

COP26 in Glasgow could be seen as a step forward in global efforts to address climate change, including a material increase in ambitions to reduce emissions across the world, finalisation of rules on reporting emissions and international carbon trading, and the launch of a range of new initiatives and sector deals.

But how far this could be considered a success depended entirely on follow-up actions over this last year.

At Social Value UK we follow 8 Key Principles (read here).These Principles of Social Value provide the basic building blocks for anyone who wants to make decisions that take this wider definition of value into account, in order to increase equality, improve wellbeing and increase environmental sustainability.

As such, we believe the concept of accountability is central to making real and meaningful change.

Ahead of COP27 we pose the questions to our supporters:

• Who should be held to account for the progress (or lack of) made since the COP26 meet?
• How can we ensure that social and environmental considerations are hard wired into decision making?
• Who are the stakeholders impacted by the decisions that will be made at COP27 and how can we give them a voice?

Meet our Speakers:

Rebecca Willis

Professor in Energy and Climate Governance

Rebecca Willis was one of the driving forces behind Climate Assembly UK, which brings together over 100 people from across the country and all walks of life to discuss their thoughts on how we could reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. A researcher with over 20 years’ experience in environment and sustainability practice, she also researched how MPs understand climate issues, later using those results to inform the Climate Leadership Programme.

For her remarkable efforts in this arena, in 2020 Rebecca made BBC Radio 4 Women’s Hour Power List!

Rebecca is also a Professor in Practice at Lancaster Environment Centre. She is working hard to make climate solutions open to everyone, and include them in creating policy.

Benali Hamdache

Migration and Refugee Support

Benali Hamdache is a Green Councillor on Islington Council, representing Highbury ward. He serves as a national spokesperson for the party, covering migration and refugee support. 

Professionally Benali is a campaigner, having worked for a variety of causes. He worked for the official Remain campaign during the EU referendum and was the Campaign Manager for Sian Berry’s most recent campaign for Mayor of London, delivering the best result in the Green’s history. He currently works for an international development charity.

Shaun Spiers

Executive Director, Green Alliance

Shaun became executive director of Green Alliance in June 2017. He was chief executive of CPRE, the countryside charity, for 13 years. Previously he led ABCUL, the credit union trade association.

From 1994 to 1999, he was MEP for London South East, serving on the European Parliament’s Agriculture and Rural Affairs Committee.

Shaun chairs the board of Greener UK, a coalition of 12 environmental groups set up in the immediate aftermath of the Brexit referendum. As chair of Greener UK, he sits on the government’s Strategic Trade Advisory Group.

His book, How to build houses and save the countryside, was published by Policy Press in March 2018.

Posted 19th July 2022

Do you think that Universities and business schools could play more of a role in creating value for society? We are hosting an event with Liverpool John Moores University, and the Liverpool Business school to discuss just this. We want to hear from anyone that’s interested or has something to say on this, individuals, community groups, and public sector organisations for example, as well researchers, students and university staff.

There are two events taking place.

On Monday 18^th July we will talk broadly about universities in general; what are they doing? what is working? what more could they do and how can we turn that into action? On this day we are also excited to be launching the Social Value Academic Thought Leadership group so come along if you think you’d like to join.

On Tuesday 19^th July the conversation will draw into the outcomes of business school education, how can we build social value into this, embedding the principles at point of education and entry to their careers.

Come to one or both, either in-person in Liverpool or from anywhere in the world online!

Free lunch for those attending in person. We have limited spaces available, so please book you place as soon as possible.

Posted 10th June 2022

We are alarmed at the devastation the cost of living crisis is creating and wonder…

1: What is and will be the real cost to individuals, families and communities?

2: If social value is understood through listening to people’s experiences – what does the government need to hear?

3: Who should be responding to what we’re hearing about the real cost of this crisis? And how?

We’re hosting a free lunch time event to explore these three questions. The space is open to anyone and everyone to contribute so please join us!

After the event we will gather what we’ve heard from you and submit our own paper to government. This will add our voice to the many reports and calls for action that have gone before it.

Meet Our Panel:

Lord Prem Sikka

Member of the UK House of lords and Emeritus Professor of Accounting

Prem Sikka has been a member of the UK House of Lords since October 2020. He is also Emeritus Professor of Accounting at the University of Essex and University of Sheffield. His research on accountancy, auditing, tax avoidance, tax havens, corruption, corporate governance, money laundering, insolvency and business affairs has been published in international scholarly journals, books, newspapers and magazines. He has appeared on domestic and international radio and television programmes to comment on business matters. He has advised and given evidence to a number of UK and EU parliamentary committees, including the UK House of Commons Work and Pensions Committee for its investigation into the collapse of BHS and Carillion. 

Prem holds the Working for Justice Award from Tax Justice Network, Accounting Exemplar Award from the American Accounting Association (AAA), Lifetime Achievement Awards from the British Accounting and Finance Association (BAFA) and PQ Magazine, Personality of the Year Award from Accountancy Age and the inaugural (in 2017) Abraham Briloff Award from The Accountant and International Accounting Bulletin for promoting transparency and public accountability of businesses. In January 2019, he was named by Accountancy Age as one of the 50 most influential individuals in the world of accounting.  

Michel Scholte

Director at Impact Institute and True Price

Michel Scholte is an impact entrepreneur, director and cofounder of True Price and Impact Institute. True Price focuses on calculating and improving the true price of products, including social and environmental costs. Impact Institute provides data, software, (digital) education and advice on impact measurement and management. His businesses focus on tech and impact and employ more than fifty people and work globally, from São Paulo to Singapore, for the world’s largest banks and most disruptive social enterprises. In addition, he is a founding board member of Impact Economy Foundation, that develops the open-source impact accounting method together with Harvard Business School’s Impact Weighted Accounts Initiative.

In the past Michel was steering board member of the Netherlands Food Partnership and a member of the World Economic Forum Global Shapers. He is a frequently asked key-note speaker and publishes daily columns on news and sustainability via LinkedIn. He holds a master’s degree in Sociology from VU University Amsterdam, where he specialised in social research, agent-based modelling and living wages

Jennifer Wallace

Director at Carnegie UK

Jennifer is a public policy analyst and writer. She has held a range of positions in the public and voluntary sector and is currently Director at Carnegie UK, where she applies a wellbeing approach to government policy and promotes wellbeing as a narrative for social change. She has written extensively on this topic and has a specific interest and expertise in the role of wellbeing approaches in small jurisdictions.

Jennifer currently leads the team that produces Gross Domestic Wellbeing: An Alternative Measure for Social Progress and programs on wellbeing in Northern Ireland and the North of Tyne region of England. She is also chair of the What Works Centre for Wellbeing Advisory Panel and was a member of the REF 2021 Main Panel for the Social Sciences.

Call for input…

In the run up to this panel discussion, our team are calling for some input. If you’d like to help us spread the word, we’d be really grateful to hear your thoughts on one or some of the above questions. To do so you could record a short video/audio file, a written quotation or share relevant reports or research.

Make sure to send it over to our Advocacy Officer via madeleine.england@sv-test.wp-support.team

See you on June 16th!

Posted 26th May 2022