SOCIAL ENTERPRISES IMPACT ASSESSMENT: EXPLORING ALTERNATIVE MEASURING FRAMEWORKS

Abstract

Improved assessments can help to increase the awareness of the successes or failures of the contribution made by social enterprises and events. The challenge is that there is no common standard for social impact assessment. This article aims to contribute to this contemporary discussion on impact measurement of social enterprises and events, proposing a measuring framework. The framework offers utility for inclusive stakeholder collaboration and the incorporation of diverse developmental theories. It highlights the systematic link between contextual insight on states of disequilibrium, opportunities and developmental ideas. As a diagnostic tool, the social-economic impact framework offers utility to stakeholders as it coordinates and guides the processes to identify and communicate a contextual theory of change. It promotes inclusive collaboration reflective processes, offering guidance to stakeholders as they explore insight into the contextual disequilibrium and the opportunity tension it creates, aligned with a theory of change that offers progressive developmental impact.