Measuring Social Value

Building and expanding a venture that creates social value involves assessing impact. How do you measure how your project has improved the quality of life of your constituents? What has been the "value" added?

The Research Initiative on Social Entrepreneurship (RISE) published a report in March 2004 titled "Double Bottom Line project report: Assessing social impact in double bottom line ventures". Essentially prescribed as a methods catalogue, the project and report have analyzed currently existing approaches to measuring social value.

The report has important implications on the autonomy of social enterprise, since improving and expanding services in the face of concentrated economic and a technological changes requires acute accountability of value-add.

The report has been compiled by Catherine Clark (Columbia Business School), William Rosenzweig (Haas School of Business), David Long (Abt Associates), and Sara Olsen (SVT Consulting).

Access:
The RISE webpage
PDF report: "Double Line project report: Assessing social impact in double bottom line ventures"