SROI

Social Return on Investment (SROI) assessment

Social Return on Investment is a methodology that converts the social outcomes of a project into financial value you can communicate and decide on.

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Illustration: from outcome value to an SROI ratio

Total outcome value
Would have happened anyway
Due to others
Fades over time
Net value
Investment

3.2 : 1Social value per 1 baht invested

Illustrative figures

Social Return on Investment (SROI) is a method that converts a programme's social, environmental and economic outcomes into financial value and compares it with the investment. The result is a ratio: 3.2 : 1 means every 1 baht invested creates about 3.2 baht of social value.

Read the full summary

NXT Consulting Group carries out SROI assessments following Social Value International principles for government agencies, social enterprises, universities and organizations running CSR and ESG programmes. Each assessment defines the scope and stakeholders, builds an outcome map linking activities to the outcomes that actually occur, values outcomes with referenced financial proxies, adjusts for deadweight, attribution, displacement and drop-off, discounts to present value, and tests how sensitive the result is to key assumptions. Data comes from stakeholder surveys and interviews. NXT is registered as a juristic-person consultant with the Ministry of Finance Consultant Database Center in the Research and Evaluation (RE) field, and NXT's own work includes an SROI assessment of a unit under the Faculty of Engineering, Chulalongkorn University.

SVI: Following Social Value International principles
4 steps: Scope, outcome map, valuation and calculation
4 adjustments: Deadweight, attribution, displacement and drop-off
RE: Registered consultant, Ministry of Finance, research and evaluation

How SROI works

How an SROI assessment works

01
Scope & stakeholders
Identify who is affected and which outcomes matter to the decision.
02
Map the outcomes
Link activities to the outcomes they actually produce, with supporting evidence.
03
Monetise the value
Use defensible financial proxies to convert social outcomes into numbers.
04
Adjust for impact & calculate
Net out deadweight, attribution, displacement and drop-off, discount to present value, then compute the SROI ratio with a sensitivity analysis.

Impact adjustments

What is adjusted before the ratio is calculated

The value reported should be the part the programme actually caused, so these four parts are taken out first.

Deadweight

What would have happened even without the programme

Attribution

The share due to other organizations or factors

Displacement

Effects that only moved from one place to another

Drop-off

How much the effect fades each year after the programme

Free tool

Estimate your project's SROI ratio in two minutes.

Open the SROI calculator

Who it's for

Who SROI is for, and when to use it

Public agencies

Needing to report a project's value to leadership, budget holders, or the public in concrete, comparable terms.

Social enterprises

Wanting to show social impact to investors or funders with numbers that can be checked.

Corporates / ESG

Corporates & ESG

Measuring the return of CSR/ESG programs systematically, to guide investment and communicate to stakeholders.

What you receive

What we deliver

The previews below are mock-ups of the formats, not client work.

Mock-up

Outcome map

Activities, outputs and outcomes linked, with evidence

Mock-up

Valuation table

Financial proxies, sources and every adjustment, line by line

Mock-up

Sensitivity analysis

The range of the SROI ratio when key assumptions change

Mock-up

Executive report

Results, limitations and recommendations for boards and funders

Our work

SROI work NXT has delivered

Examples of NXT's own engagements.

SROI

SROI evaluation of a unit's performance

A unit under the Faculty of Engineering, Chulalongkorn University

The unit gained a defensible SROI figure and evidence base for reporting and future investment planning.

Our team also evaluated government programmes with SROI in earlier roles; details are on the team profiles.

See all our work

Common questions

How is SROI different from ROI? ROI measures pure financial return; SROI brings social and environmental outcomes, normally hard to value, into the equation too.

How long does it take? It depends on scope and the number of stakeholders, usually a few weeks to a few months. We scope and time it clearly upfront.

What do we get? A defensible SROI ratio with an outcome map, transparent calculations, and a sensitivity analysis you can use to decide and communicate.

Insights