Social Impact Investing

SOCIAL IMPACT INVESTMENT: BUILDING THE EVIDENCE BASE
that recognise some form of SII-related business structures are already in place, further efforts to create the
appropriate formal enterprise structures are needed (WGMA, 2014).
6.16 An alternative to drawing upon legal form is to conduct demand side surveys, specially designed
to identify the scope for SII demand. Surveys are the most common form of obtaining SII data and are
discussed at length later in the chapter. The Non-profit Finance Fund survey in the United States is an
example of a demand-side survey specifically aimed at understanding the financing needs of social
enterprises. This was also the approach followed by the provincial-level Social Enterprise Sector Surveys
initiative (SESS) in Canada described below in Box 6.1. Close collaboration with local institutions and
organisations was important to ensure a good coverage of the survey. The major drawback is that mapping
SII using this approach can be extremely time consuming and resource intensive.
Purpose
Box 6.1. Social Enterprise Sector Survey
The Social Enterprise Sector Surveys (SESSs) are conducted within a project that aims at highlighting “the size,
scope and impact of social enterprises at a provincial level”. Identifying the demand for SII is not the original purpose of
these surveys. However, by mapping the social enterprise sector along with the financial performance of identified
social enterprises, SESSs can provide an indication of the scope for SII in the surveyed Canadian provinces. The first
surveys were launched in 2010 (British Columbia and Alberta) and by the end of 2014, most Canadian provinces will
have been covered at least by one survey wave. A total of 15 SESSs have either been completed or are currently
being carried out.
Definition of social enterprise and survey approach
In order to conduct the surveys, a social enterprise (SE) were defined as follows:
In terms of function, the enterprise should “provide goods and services in the marketplace, motivated by
a clear social, cultural, environmental or employment mission”.
In terms of legal structure, the enterprise should i) be incorporated as a NPI or ii) be a private company
100% owned by a NPI.
This definition excludes a number of important organisations active in the SII market such as co-operatives,
voluntary associations and, most importantly, social purpose business ventures and other forms of social business
activity by the private sector. Therefore, this approach results in conservative estimates of the scope of the SE sector.
The objective is to survey the population of social enterprises in each Province, using the following steps:
Identify potential social enterprises through a close collaboration with local institutions and
organisations, knowledgeable about the potential scope of the SE sector in each province;
Contact potential social enterprises to screen out those that would not be considered as SE according
to the working definition;
Send the questionnaire to identified SE
Sampling challenges remain, in particular since it is not fully clear what is the representativeness of the sample.
In addition, of those organisations identified as social enterprises, the response rate has, so far, been around 30-40%
and obtaining further information on non-respondents still remains a challenge. Nevertheless, the strength of this
approach is to focus on the local level and engaging with local organisations and institutions involved in the social
enterprise sector, which allows for a better understanding of the potential scope of the sector in each region.
Resulting indicators
Indicators developed include business demographics, sales and revenue, expenditures, employment and
volunteer engagement. These provide a broad overview of the scope of the SE sector as well as key characteristics of
social enterprises across the different Provinces. More importantly, they contain information on the financial
performance of social enterprises.
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