Emancipation from the need to prove…. how social accounting can break the shackles of burdensome reporting

A couple of weeks ago I attended the first ever National Social Prescribing Network Research Conference at the University of Salford. Currently engaged in attempting to understand the nature of social prescribing across Greater Manchester, I found the conference both informative and inspirational.

I didn’t expect to be struck with a need to speak out about the obvious link (well it’s obvious to me…) between social prescribing and another of my ‘social’ interests – social accounting.

Social prescribing is a means of enabling GPs, nurses and other healthcare professionals to refer people to a range of local, non-clinical services. This approach is gaining momentum as an alternative to clinical care and prescribed medicines.

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Caught in a spin – can impact unlock a contract?

I have recently had the honour of being involved in the Investment and Commissioning Panel for the Impact Management Programme (IMP). Examining a range of exciting submissions from across the country, I have read how enterprising organisations are seeking funding from the Impact for Growth strand of the IMP to raise investment for their work or write successful tenders, and in many cases to seek contracts with the Public Sector.

A healthy number of these organisations have also secured previous ‘social investment’ to help with their contract readiness.

But experience leads me to query why an ability to manage their impact will make these charities, social enterprises and ‘ventures’ more likely to secure a contract with the Public Sector?

As Adrian Hornsby wrote in an article for the same programme in October 2017:

“ventures and commissioners ‘pass like ships in the night’; and with commissioners showing hesitancy around impact, and social investors inevitably following revenues back to commissioners, the question arises as to where the essential driver for impact management can be found.”

Adrian’s article added to my questioning; what would be the motivation for managing and explaining your social impact if social investors and commissioners pass the buck back and forth between them?

Having been involved in commissioning services from voluntary, community and social enterprise (VCSE) providers for many years, I wonder if the problem for commissioners goes deeper than just a ‘hesitancy around impact’…

Perhaps it is a wilful misunderstanding caused by austerity and the need to make financial savings and efficiencies caused by pressures on the public purse?

In their desperation to raise income to replace lost government money, public agencies are courting partners who they think will bring in additional funds, and not necessarily giving social impact the proper consideration that it should be given.

Essentially, they see social impact as a means to draw in money without fully understanding what social impact means.

Furthermore, we could be heading for a situation where the Public Sector descends into simply becoming a ‘regulator’, diminishing their commissioning role completely. With the reduced strategic contracting capacity of a local and independent organisation with responsibility for public benefit, who will encourage social impact when all society’s ills have to be addressed purely by free markets?

Back in the days of plenty when I worked for Salford’s New Deal for Communities programme, we could afford to work with our providers to understand their impact and the outcomes that they were generating for us. We could even afford to provide training in the tools and techniques which are now part of the IMP.

Now we live in a vastly different world. With the increasing squeeze on public budgets, I am witnessing an appeal from the Public Sector to charities, social enterprises and ventures to bring in other money – grant funding and social investment – for services and activities which were previously fully funded by the Public Sector.  But why would people with money invest in these services – unless there is something for them in it?

In Salford, the amount of money flowing from the Council to the VCSE sector through contracts and grants has reduced by over 40% in the last 5 years. Our research shows that the middle is falling out of the sector – small community groups which rely on volunteers continue to thrive, their members driven by a shared interest in tackling unfairness, poverty and inequality in today’s society; and the larger ‘enterprises’, many of whom are national organisations or Public Sector spinouts, continue to succeed in contracting.

This leaves small and medium-sized ‘ventures’ caught in a spin between the Public Sector pushing them towards grants and ‘social investment’ as means of enhancing dwindling budgets; and social investment providers offering support for them to be ready to contract with the Public Sector.

I believe that the Public Sector doesn’t really understand that ‘social investment’ must get a return, just like any other form of borrowing, and social investors don’t really understand the state of panic in the Public Sector.

So, should this be where impact management fits in?

Public Sector commissioners want services, and they want outcomes. They want people to have better wellbeing, better lives; and ultimately, they need people not to need public services so much.

Social investors want many of the same things, but these outcomes must be measurable and accountable. They need to understand the financial and the social return, they may need to see financial growth, but ultimately the investment should be repayable in both social, and often also financial, impact one way or another.

So, a better understanding and management of the impact that a charity, social enterprise or venture is creating will help bridge the gap between the investors and commissioners.

And, I believe that it is also essential for their survival.

The NeuroMuscular Centre (NMC) in Cheshire has been part of the GSK Impact programme for several years. Over a 10-year period, NMC has kept social accounts, covering both the impact that the Centre is having for service users, their families and other stakeholders, and how it is managing the organisation in financial terms to maximise that impact.

NMC has a greater understanding of outcomes and impact; continuous dialogue with service users, funders and commissioners which takes places to prepare the social accounts; and the ability to accurately describe their impact in tenders, funding bids, and publicity. All this has helped this organisation triple its turnover and move from a position of uncertainty to one of a secure and rosy future.

By embedding social accounting and audit as a means of impact management, NMC has broadened its financial base, grown in size, and secured its position as the leading provider of services for people with neuromuscular disease in the country.

And who should pay for this impact management? I believe that if commissioners or social investors want evidence of ‘impact’ they should also have to pay for the work evidencing the impact…

In conclusion, there will always be a need for social and community organisations to take the heat out of the public purse – social accounting and impact management are probably the best ways for them to achieve this.

Social investors and Public Sector budgets will come and go, but the people who need support from charities, social enterprises, and other community-based organisations will always be there!

Ultimately, I believe that the essential driver for impact management should, therefore, be to achieve the best possible outcomes for the people (and/or the environment) that an organisation supports, and in doing so making it relevant, investible and successful for the long term.

Anne Lythgoe, Social Audit Network (SAN)
www.socialauditnetwork.org.uk 

Social reporting – a pretty penny or not?

Sharp intake of breath………’that’ll cost you a pretty penny’.

Those of us who have at various times in life owned older cars will appreciate immediately the unwelcome tones of a garage mechanic delivering his verdict on that elusive ‘knocking sound’.

For 10 years I’ve led an organisation committed to annually completing the Social Accounting and Audit cycle. Every year we have published our Social Accounts in an attractive, professionally produced form.

I am a Social Accounting and Audit enthusiast. I make no apology! No sooner does a network colleague or contact from the charitable or social enterprise sector start to reflect on their challenges around funding, outcome measures, and the demanding competitive environment, then they walk straight into my slightly evangelistic pitch!

The responses I get when I’ve waffled on for a while about how brilliant Social Accounting and Audit is and the incredible transformational impact it has had on my own organisation, ranges from; “tell me more, that sounds good”, to; “sharp intake of breath……that must cost a pretty penny?” And if not the latter then something along the lines of; “We’re just so busy at the moment we haven’t got the time to even think about those lovely add-ons like measuring social impact”.

I think most people will realise that over a 10 year period a charity like ours will have had some extremely busy times and have often been tempted to play the “we’re just too busy” card! But we never have. Why?

At the risk of slipping this blog into the style of a Ronnie Corbett monologue and going backwards more than forwards…….I need to set the scene a bit.

The NeuroMuscular Centre (NMC) is the charity I work for. We’re a medium sized charity with a regional focus but national UK-wide reach. We are the Centre of Excellence for People with Muscular Dystrophy and their families. We provide a wide range of treatment, advice, and training services along with carer’s breaks. As well as this, the jewel in our crown, is providing supported employment in a graphic design and print social enterprise.

In 2015 we won the GSK IMPACT Award. This recognises the best small/medium charities working in the Health and Wellbeing sector. We won partly because we so effectively and consistently measure and assess the impact of our work.

Back in 2005 NMC was like so many others in our sector. We relied on case studies and pen pictures to evidence that we made a positive difference to a few people. But we had nothing to show the scale of the impact we made for lots of people.

Meanwhile back at the Car Mechanics with my 1974 Vauxhall Viva and the sharp intake of breath; ”if you want my advice mate, it’ll cost you a pretty penny if you don’t measure Social Impact!” Never mind the couple of person-weeks it takes to produce them and never mind the £1200 Social Audit fee. These are tiny (but significant of course) investments in the life cycle of vibrant small and medium sized charities and social enterprises. The payback from Social Accounting and Audit is huge.

The investment in time? “2 weeks you say?” Yes around 2 person-weeks are spent in total each year to produce the draft of our Social Accounts – the stage at which we’re audited. This investment of time is shared between a number of people in the team and so is not onerous.

This investment gets easier every year as Social Accounting gets increasingly embedded in the soul and culture of the organisation. Things that begin as chores become the normal way of working. The whole team, and indeed our service users, begin to think about measuring impact automatically, NOT because we have to do it for a feedback return for a funder or contract partner, but because we want to do it.

Social Accounting and Audit puts our organisation in the driving seat in the relationships we have with our funders and contract partners. We have powerful feedback and measured impact information instantly to hand. We use it to make our funding applications stronger and more impactful than those who still rely on case studies. We use the analysis and data that we’ve produced to provide updates and feedback.

Here’s my knockout question(s)………….

Do you ever have to go and hurriedly ask people for feedback in order to complete a feedback report for a funder with a tight deadline? How many times a year does this happen? Is that unplanned activity disruptive and mired with duplicated effort?

Does that 2 person-week investment still seem like an onerous commitment that you couldn’t possible justify?

If the mechanic had mentioned a £1200 bill to fix my Viva then I know what I’d have done! But the £1200 fee for the Social Audit is not a reason to consider changing your vehicle.

The Social Audit is a day packed with influencing opportunities, diagnostics, recognition and endorsement that will not only remove that worrying knocking sound but will turn your old Viva into a much more rounded, accomplished, economical and environmentally sensitive organisation.

It will be one of the most important events in the life of your organisation. You and your team will enjoy it, be stimulated and informed by it. The sense of achievement and reflection that will flow from it will outweigh EVEN the pleasure you got from the plushest furry dice you ever bought for your Viva.

Matthew Lanham – Chief Executive – Neuromuscular Centre

matthew.lanham@nmcentre.com