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Data That Does the Work: What Acumen Has Learned About Enterprise Feedback Loops
When it comes to the litany of obstacles keeping enterprises from growing, capital – or lack of it – tends to get the most attention. But access to data from customers, operations and staff may be a close second. The key to addressing data deserts is helping companies build a data-informed culture from the start, writes Chris Bullard, who leads post-investment and value creation strategy for Acumen. Bullard draws lessons from the impact investor’s Lean Data initiative.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment, Investing, Social Enterprise
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Investing’s Final Frontier: Impact Measurement
In general, each type of social return calls for its own metrics to answer this basic question: Is this social impact investment/initiative having the intended effect?
- Categories
- Impact Assessment, Investing
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Big Problem, Small Solution: Can Do-It-Yourself Processing Machines Help Combat Plastic Pollution?
From the viral video of a diver swimming in a sea of plastic, to National Geographic’s major focus on the topic this year, there’s growing public attention on the problem of plastic waste. So there was plenty of excitement when a Dutch engineer’s do-it-yourself plastic recycling machines started gaining traction around the world. Could the devices empower a global army of small entrepreneurs to turn plastic waste into revenue-generating products? The solution sounds appealing, but when Bali-based social enterprise Kopernik assessed its effectiveness, they came across one small problem.
- Categories
- Environment, Impact Assessment, Social Enterprise, Technology
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Girls Empowerment Programs Are Working: Now What?
In spite of the work of countless organizations, progress towards meeting the Sustainable Development Goals for women and girls “remains unacceptably slow,” according to the U.N. Yet a growing body of evidence clearly shows the impact of girls empowerment programs – particularly those that bundle life skills and livelihood training with financial support. The question now is: How can these successful approaches be improved and scaled, while serving the unique needs of different cultures? Sarah Allen at BRAC USA explores some answers.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment
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Mission Impossible? How Large Asset Managers Can Avoid ‘Mission Drift’
In recent years, an increasing number of large asset managers have entered the impact investing arena. But many of them still focus mainly on financial returns, failing to develop a truly “impact first” approach. Florian Kemmerich of Bamboo Capital explores three ways large asset managers can deliver legitimate impact, while reducing the risk of possible mission drift.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment, Investing
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‘Results’ Don’t Equal ‘Impact’: What the Social Business Sector Can Learn from Non-Profits’ Approach to Impact Measurement
It’s common knowledge that non-profits are often beholden to data-hungry donors - hence their focus on long-term impact assessment. But how those organizations measure impact has implications for the rest of the social sector - including for-profits, which often lack a clear assessment strategy. Sarah Sterling of Pomona Impact ponders how impact measurement can be improved across the sector, and discusses a simple tool used by non-profits that could be extremely useful for social business.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment, Social Enterprise
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Climate-Proofing Poverty Graduation Programs: A New Study Explores Solutions
Imagine building a business from the ground up – only to see it literally washed away with every drought and flood due to the effects of climate change. These weather-related cycles, which disproportionately impact women, keep millions in poverty and threaten millions more. Nicole Mills with The BOMA Project and Alex Russell with the Feed the Future Innovation Lab detail a new project pairing poverty graduation programs with livestock insurance – and discuss the randomized control trial designed to see if it actually works.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Education, Impact Assessment
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The State of the Art in Impact Investing: People and Planet Returns in All Asset Classes
The impact investor community Toniic recently released a report on the growing number of Toniic members who have committed to a 100 percent impact portfolio. The 76 portfolios in the report represent $2.8 billion in capital committed to impact – a 9 percent increase from its 2016 survey. Toniic CEO Adam Bendell discusses the trends revealed in the report, and what they suggest about the sector's evolution.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment, Investing, Social Enterprise
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