Social Value Toolkit

What is social value?

Building on the Social Value Act of 2012, the Procurement Act 2023 places a greater emphasis on the delivery of social value.

Social value means creating positive social, economic, and environmental outcomes for the communities we serve. It’s about going beyond core services to help build thriving and resilient places.

We’re committed to building strong, collaborative relationships across the public, private, and voluntary sectors. By working together, we can deliver innovative solutions and long-term improvements that make a real difference to local lives.

Why we care about social value

As a housing association, our core purpose is to provide safe, secure, and affordable homes. A good home is the foundation on which people can thrive-supporting a health and wellbeing, education, employment and skills, and a vibrant and positive environment.

For us, this is a matter of social justice. But thriving communities need more than bricks and mortar. Our investment is about enabling people and places to flourish in the broadest sense. Social value helps us maximise every pound we spend – ensuring our procurement, partnerships, and programmes deliver benefits that go beyond the contract and strengthen the communities where our customers live.

Our place-based approach means we focus on what matters locally, but we also connect this work to the UN Sustainable Development Goals, contributing to wider ambitions for fairness, sustainability, and opportunity.

We know we can’t do this alone. That’s why we work in partnership with suppliers, local authorities, central government, colleagues, and the wider charity and community sector to add value for our customers and deliver lasting impact.

What are we looking for from suppliers?

We believe that the contracts we award are not just transactions, they are opportunities to create meaningful, lasting change.

That’s why social value is a core part of our procurement process. We ask our suppliers and contractors to think about the added benefits they can bring when working with us, benefits that support people, places, and the planet.

Social value is a significant consideration in our procurement process

When bidding for work with us, we'll ask you to show how your organisation can deliver social value alongside your contract. This includes both your direct actions, such as employment opportunities or donations and indirect impacts, like supporting community wellbeing or improving local green spaces.

To support this, all contracts over the value of £214,094 include a minimum 10% weighting for social value within the overall tender evaluation.

We encourage innovation and welcome collaboration

We’re committed to working collaboratively with our supply chain to design and deliver solutions that reflect the needs and aspirations of the communities we serve, and this toolkit is designed to help guide you through the proposal process. We’ve outlined a number of considerations that we’d like to see you include but we haven’t been proscriptive. We want you to share your ideas, your innovation, and your passion. If it delivers social value to people within our communities, we want to hear about it.

Many providers that we partner with already have an approach to social value. We welcome a variety of contributions such as supporting community projects, shaping the natural environment, offering staff volunteering time, providing free expert advice, or helping individuals into employment and training.

Our approach will continue to evolve as we learn from community feedback, mature our data measurement and analysis, and lean into our place-based ways of working. We’re delighted that you’ll be supporting us on this journey and welcome a conversation regarding any of the topics shared in this toolkit.

How to shape your proposal

Key Principles for Social Value Proposal Design

Your social value proposal should:

• Be ambitious in both scale and impact – tell us how this responds to community needs and aspirations and play to your strengths, highlight where your skills, expertise, or focus areas, for example ending hunger, restoring nature, social inclusion can create the greatest impact
• Be specific - set out the activities you will deliver
• Align with priorities - consider how the work complements our Thriving Places themes and the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
• Focus locally - deliver within our operating area 
• Be measurable - set SMART KPI's and include both quantitative and qualitative measures for example local jobs, volunteering hours, monetary value if in kind contributions, outcomes for individuals or groups. Express the overall offer in monetary terms or the percentage of the contract.
• Be accountable - explain how and when progress will be monitored and reported throughout the contract
• Be additional - show how your offer goes beyond core delivery and existing CSR commitments

Be ambitious in both scale and impact

Our ambition is always to help our customers and communities thrive. Homes are at the heart of what we do, and we are proud of the difference we make through our core business. But thriving communities need more than homes alone, they need opportunities, strong relationships, and places where people feel they belong. 

That’s why we particularly welcome social value proposals that align with our mission and strategy:

• Place-Based Working – delivering services that respond to the specific needs of our customers and local communities
• Thriving Places (detailed below) – we use a Customer Thrive Index based on Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs to measure progress across key wellbeing, economic, and environmental outcomes.
• Community Empowerment – enabling people to take ownership of their future and thrive
• Relationship-Driven Services – building trust and long-term partnerships that deliver lasting impact 

We know every supplier brings unique strengths, expertise, and passions.

Just as we are excellent at delivering homes, we invite you to consider: what are you excellent at, and how could that excellence create wider benefits? If you already focus on a particular social or environmental priority whether ending hunger, tackling inequalities, or restoring nature, we want to hear how you can bring that focus into your social value proposals. 

Our approach is rooted locally, but it also connects to the bigger picture. By working together, we can contribute to the UN Sustainable Development Goals, ensuring that the positive impact we make in our communities also supports global ambitions for fairness, sustainability, and opportunity.

Consider aligning to our Thriving Places themes

Our Customer Thrive Index is how we understand what really matters to our customers — things like wellbeing, financial security, housing satisfaction, and aspirations for the future. Every year we check in with customers to see how they’re doing and discuss needs and aspirations within their family and their community. We know what matters, and this shapes our strategy.

Each theme below also links directly to the UN Sustainable Development Goals so by supporting financial wellbeing, skills, community, or sustainability here in our communities, suppliers are also contributing to wider efforts for fairness, equality, and climate action.

By aligning social value proposals to these themes, suppliers can be sure they’re making a direct difference to people’s lives:

Our Thriving Place themes:

Strengthening Social Fabric

Activities that increase connectedness, belonging, and community involvement, for example supplier-facilitated neighbourhood events, community leadership training, support to local clubs, community groups and charities, and enhancement of community centres and spaces

Employment, Education, and Skills

Focus on local economic opportunity and progression for all, not just jobs, but fair pay, skills development, apprenticeships, internships, work experience, inclusive employment for those furthest from the labour market, and young people.

Environmental Impact

Sustainable environments that support wellbeing or investment in nature-based interventions, green infrastructure, and climate resilience, alongside actions that improve waste management, reduce emissions, and prevent pollution. Together these efforts enhance biodiversity, create healthier places, and support both physical and mental health.

Health and Wellbeing 

Supplier involvement in projects that promote physical activity, safe and inclusive play, food sustainability, mental health support, improve quality of life, improve health inequalities, prevention of homelessness and tenancy sustainment.

How do we measure social value?

Once we have awarded a contract with a social value commitment, we will record, measure, and evaluate delivery through the Social Value Engine, aligning outcomes with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. This ensures every partnership creates meaningful, measurable impact that supports both our organisational priorities and the wider global sustainability agenda.

We ask suppliers to:

• set out their own KPIs within proposals, describing the activities, outputs, and outcomes they will deliver.
• use SMART measures, that are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, time-boun) and where possible, quantify in monetary value, percentage value of the contract, or other clear metrics.

When a contract is awarded we will:

• validate and evaluate those KPIs using the financial proxies within the Social Value Engine
• tailor social value reporting requirements to the size and type of each contract, so what we ask for is always realistic and relevant.
• monitor progress jointly with suppliers, combining quantitative and qualitative evidence over the lifetime of the contract.

By embedding the Social Value Engine and the UN SDGs into procurement and performance management, we ensure suppliers retain the flexibility to play to their strengths, while outcomes are consistently measured, comparable, and impactful.

Managing social value delivery

Once a contract is in place, suppliers are expected to provide regular reporting to demonstrate that their Social Value commitments are being met. Reporting will be carried out through engagement with the supplier to track and evaluate progress and performance. The frequency of this reporting will be determined by the scale and size of the social value offer.

The evidence you provide is recorded and evaluated by us through the Social Value Engine, which provides transparent reporting.

Our approach allows us to monitor delivery, ensuring that social value remains a live part of the contract rather than a one-time promise.

We understand there may be valid reasons why a contractor is unable to deliver their full social value offer. In such cases, we will work collaboratively with the supplier to understand and address any barriers to delivery.

From social value proposal to contract award and management

Supplier proposal

• You propose KPIs and activities
• Use SMART measures (jobs, volunteering hours, £ value, outcomes)

Validation and evaluation

• We map KPIs into the Social Value Engine
• Outcomes aligned with Thriving Places themes and UN SDGs
• Financial proxies ensure consistency and comparability

Monitoring and reporting

• Progress tracked jointly over contract life
• Mix of quantitative data and qualitative evidence
• Proportionate to contract size and scope