It is therefore important for us to know what change we actually reach together with our partners from the civil sector and the business, our grantees, experts and volunteers.
Tulip Foundation and the international Social Impact Analysts Association (SIAA) in cooperation with the Bulgarian Centre for Non-profit Law and the Bulgarian Donor’s Forum and the support of Arena di Serdica Hotel organised a meeting about “Social Impact Analysis” on 5 June in Sofia. The event brought together representatives of donor and civil organisations in Bulgaria, experts and professionals from business and government. The aim of the meeting was to provide a forum for organisations and professionals interested in measuring the social impact in Bulgaria. The agenda included presentations and discussions about the necessity and the benefits from social impact analysis and sharing of experience and ideas.
Galia Markova from New Bulgarian University and Know How Centre for Alternative Care, Georgi Genchev from Foundation Programme and Analytical Centre for European Law and Nadia Shabani from Bulgarian Centre for Non-profit Law spoke about the current status of Social Impact Analysis in Bulgaria. They presented their experience and their thoughts about the current situation and main challenges and opportunities.
Andreas Rickert from Phineo, Germany and a board member of SIAA, presented his experience as а social impact analysts in Germany. He spoke about the importance and the benefits of measuring the social impact in today’s world and shared with the participants his experience and impressions from the current situation in other countries and presented various interesting cases. Mr. Rickert told about the establishment and the activities of SIAA as well as in what way the association could support the social impact analysis development in Bulgaria.
The participants discussed their experiences, challenges and possible next steps in Bulgaria in three main directions:
Sustainability of the NGO sector in Bulgaria
What do we gain from a social impact analysis? How it can contribute to the credibility, the effectiveness and the position of civil organisations in Bulgaria? How can NGOs better dem-onstrate their impact? What are the expectations of donors?
How do we involve target groups and communities in social impact analysis and how do we communicate social impact with them?
What are the difficulties you face when measuring your impact or the impact of entities in the field? What are the internal – organizational barriers and/or the contextual ones? What are the benefits of involving target groups and communities in analysis the social impact? How do we communicate impact with them?
How do we use social impact analysis - next steps?
What type of actions should we take as a network of professionals to strengthen the social impact field in Bulgaria? Which are the key issues to be addressed? How shall we structure / organise a group to jointly address these? What are the current needs – information, materials, training, networking, opportunities for ongoing group meetings etc?
Organisations and specialists interested in social impact analysis in Bulgaria who want to join an informal group for discussions and sharing are invited to send a letter with their name, organisation and contact information toinfo@tulipfoundation.net . A first meeting of the Bulgarian SIA group is planned for September 2013.
The meeting was organised in a moment when there is a considerable interest in social impact analysis, in the context of increasing competition for statutory funding; of donors becoming more strategic in their grantmaking and of social and impact investment increasingly going mainstream.
Social impact analysis builds on existing traditions of data capture and M&E within the public, private and civil sectors. However convincing many of the key players of the benefits of outcomes-focused evaluation and impact assessment, in order to ensure better strategic decision making and resource allocation, remains a challenge.
Social impact is gradually becoming a topic of discussion in Bulgaria. Some players from different fields that are interested in making a positive contribution to the society – donors, not-for-profit organisations, business, academics and others - are increasingly interested in measuring the impact of their programmes, efforts as well as the funds they have used or invested so far. A growing number of people and organisations now understand that simply measuring the output of their activities is not enough to validate the claim that their contribution is, indeed, creating a sustainable positive change.
The economic crisis provoked some people and organisations to rethink the forms of their engagement and the long term change they bring with it. It’s now important on one side for key players in social field to demonstrate and on another side for the society to see that the societal needs are being faced in the most financially effective and efficient way with the limited available resources.
Two main concern that are currently discussed – financial sustainability of non-for-profit organisations and the on-going process of reforming the child care system in Bulgaria – can benefit from social impact analysis along with other topics like culture, environment etc.
Social impact is becoming increasingly important for different stakeholders including donors and business companies that are investing in social causes. Some are now interested to assess the (potential) social returns of their grants and investments. At the same time non-for-profit organisations and experts need it to demonstrate that their theory of change is working in practice. They can use social impact analysis to better demonstrate their credibility to potential funders and to track and improve their performance for the benefit of the society.
However, the impact analysis is still in an early stage and the practical interest in using it to social, cultural, environmental and other initiatives is rather new. Different methodologies are being applied by different professionals and deciding which approach would best fit concrete need is rather sporadic than systematic.
