Tim Roebuck, our Social Policy and Research Officer, announces our open source social impact methodology .
Our service has a positive impact on people's lives and, in the long run, on the economic situation of the country. Working to support people into employment, the economic question naturally arises. When someone, with the help of our service, achieves a qualification, employment, or even improved mental wellbeing, it is our belief that this has a positive economic impact. Money makes the world go round – we hope this isn’t controversial. It is a language most of us speak fluently. This being the case, Offploy deems it only appropriate to communicate the same way, though in true Offploy fashion, for the benefit of people with criminal convictions seeking meaningful, mentored, sustainable employment.
With this, we endeavour to henceforth provide honest estimations of the pound-value saved by society as a result of our service. We will assign pound-values to each instance of an avoided re-conviction, certain employment, education and training outcomes, and improved mental wellbeing. All these values are gathered from existing and well-respected sources. Once the pound-values are worked out per each instance we have achieved, we mitigate the value by discounting according to approved social impact methodological standards and, being Offploy, opt to report the lowest estimation possible. How we do all this is outlined in this document in much more detail.
Now here’s the most important bit: The linked document outlining our social impact methodology spares no detail and is available to all to use, criticise and suggest improvements. This is an open source social impact methodology. All past and future iterations will be available with comments giving the changes made and the reasons for them. We want you to suggest these changes.
In our previous blog we gave our three principles or ideals for all our research. No, not liberté, égalité, fraternité. We hold ourselves to transparency, evidence-based practice and improving the sector. Offploy firmly believes publishing an opensource social impact methodology is the highest achievement in transparency, in developing an evidence-base and in improving the sector.
Together, we can create the best social impact methodology possible. Vive la révolution!
Send Tim any thoughts, criticisms, suggestions (or even congratulations!) via email at tim@offploy.org or tweet him @T_Roebs.
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