Measuring your social impact: 3 reasons to ditch the manual processes once and for all

Go back a few years and manually tracking your social value efforts made sense. When your impact on the environment and society was just a nice-to-have addition to your reports, the stakes were relatively low. And without much data to manage, using spreadsheets and manual calculations did the job well enough. But fast forward ten or so years and it’s a different story altogether. 

Now you have a whole, multilayered social value strategy to keep track of. You also have to analyse data from more sources. This might include different departments within your own organisation, as well as from your wider supply chain. 

So if you’ve been holding off on investing in software to automate your social value process, let this blog serve as a reminder of how much greener the grass can be on the other side. Here are three big reasons to rid yourself of the tedious manual processes once and for all.

Free up time

One of the biggest flaws of manual processes is the fact that every stage needs human intervention. And this leads to sizable time and resource costs to the business.

Between chasing data, logging it in spreadsheets, performing calculations according to your chosen framework, and compiling it into reports, that’s a lot of paid hours wasted on draining admin tasks. Tasks that you could easily automate with technology. 

Many companies have added these responsibilities to their staff’s already busy schedules. Meaning that’s precious time you’re taking away each week from communicating with beneficiaries, planning future initiatives, completing tenders, and funding applications. Or whatever else keeps your staff busy when they’re not knee-deep in an ever-growing, chaotic spreadsheet. 

Imagine where you could better spend all those hours dedicated to data admin. Rather than tied up in data entry, your social value teams can be on the ground, making a real difference to people’s lives and the future of your business.

Real-time decision making

Manual processes force you to move at a much slower pace than you’d like. Once one department compiles their staff volunteering data, for example, you might be waiting days or even weeks for it to reach the department responsible for analysing it. By this point, it’s not even an accurate depiction of the hours being logged. And, when it comes to reporting, you might end up sharing month-old data with stakeholders.

To keep your finger on the pulse, you need a constant, real-time flow of social value data. To be able to log on at any given moment and see an accurate snapshot of your progress.

This way, you can make quicker decisions, maximising your time and resources to ensure the greatest impact. No more time wasted on initiatives or strategies that don’t deliver. And no more using outdated data to support your future plans. It will still require some manual input, but it’s the slick reporting that you benefit from.

Increase consistency

No matter how careful we are, us humans aren’t a reliable way to handle social value data. By doing data entry and calculations manually, you’re only asking for errors and inconsistent data to dilute your progress.

Automating your social value data management significantly reduces your risk of inconsistent, inaccurate results. Instead, you can approach every decision and board meeting confident you’ve got all the (right) information.

Do you really want a few mistyped cells in an Excel spreadsheet to be the reason you’re accused of inflating your sustainability claims? It’s not even worth the risk. Plus, it’s a lot of pressure to be putting on your staff – especially if data entry isn’t their usual job role.

There are a few reasons you might have put off investing in software for your social value. It requires an upfront investment and requires staff to get used to a new way of working. But the reality is that manual processes like spreadsheets are no longer fit for purpose. As social value has evolved, they haven’t. And they’ll only be holding your organisation back from reaching new heights.

Impact is an intelligent, intuitive tool for capturing, evaluating, and reporting your social value. Putting the process on autopilot, we’re easy to use, and can free up your team’s time and resources for the core tasks only they can do. To find out more, schedule a demo or get in touch with the team on 0161 532 4752.