Ted Jackson and Karim Harji, Senior Research Fellow and Senior Research Associate, respectively, with 3ci, participated in the Sustainable Finance and Impact Investing Conference at the Saiid Business School at the University of Oxford on April 23-24, 2015 (see http://www.acrn.eu/ssfii). They presented a well-received paper entitled “Family Value: Evaluating How the Household Converts New Income from Investee Businesses into Social Gains.”
The Abstract for the presentation reads as follows (see the full presentation here):
Over the past half-decade, important insights and tools on social impact measurement have been generated by the impact investing industry. These have centred primarily on two levels: that of investee firms and of the individuals who own, work for or buy the products and services of those firms, which may be for-profit, non-profit, or hybrid. This logic stream is depicted in the impact value chain, a theory of change for impact investing that is attracting attention in the field. However, as useful as this model is proving to be, it is missing an important component: the household. Households convert, or fail to convert, new revenue from employment or ownership in investee businesses into concrete social gains in, among other things, housing, health, nutrition and education. The impact investing field must better understand and document the nature and results of this conversion process, and integrate the household into the impact value chain deployed for social impact measurement. Further, in studying this process, one important dimension in particular should be interrogated: the gender dynamics and consequences of household decisions on the utilization of incremental income. Looking ahead, a technology-enhanced, mixed-methods approach to evaluating the household conversion process should yield useful insights for the impact investing industry.