SALFORD SOCIAL VALUE ALLIANCE

STRATEGIC FRAMEWORK AND ACTION PLAN v3

Vision

The vision of the Salford Social Value Allianceis that Salford will be a Social Value City. We will work towards a cultural shift in Salford where an integral part of how we do business is consideration of: happiness; well-being; health; inclusion; empowerment; growth; and environment.

Mission

Our mission is to look for relevant social, environmental and economic value from everything that we do, in our business, in service delivery, commissioning and procurement; and we aim to use the purchasing power of the ‘Salford pound’ to obtain the greatest benefit for local citizens.

Aim

The Salford Social Value Alliance’s aim is to create a social movement that encourages Salford citizens and organisations to connect with, reconnect with, or value their pre-existing drive to make a difference.

The Alliance uses its collective membership and associated networks to encourage and aid behaviours and practices in keeping with Social Value.

Enablers

Social Value organisations are characterised by a deep-rooted cultural impetus to ‘make a difference’. Strong, inclusive leadership recruits, develops and instils a cultural drive to ‘do good’ for local people.

The common features of the culture and practice of Social Value organisations are:

  • Leadership– recognisingthe importance and value of every individual’s voice, creating a democratic and empowering approach to delivery.
  • Energy – authenticityand passion in the way work is done.
  • Involvement – withoutany requirement, people become involved in local social life and neighbourhood networks in order to support their local community, or shape their personal lifestyle to reflect the organisation’s ethos.
  • Engagement – people understand the pressures, needs and challenges that other individuals face, and adapt their approach accordingly.
  • Openness, accessibility and flexibility - constantly changing and developing, according to continuous feedback from a wide range of people.
  • Natural respect – towardslocal people as individuals who are able to contribute to both their own and their community’s development.

Priority outcomes

Salford City Partnership agreed in April 2015 that the three priority Social Value outcomes are:

  • Social: increased community strength and resilience
  • Environmental: improved impact of the local environment on people’s wellbeing
  • Economic: increased number of quality employment opportunities and reduced poverty for local citizens

Principles

We will be guided by the following 6 principles to ensure that we secure the Social Value priority outcomes for the City of Salford;

  • optimising the social, environmental and economic well-being of Salford and its people in everything that we do
  • thinking long-term – turning investment into long-lasting outcomes
  • working together across sectors to provide Social Value outcomes
  • having values including inclusion, openness, honesty, social responsibility and caring for others
  • having a clear and current understanding of how Social Value can make Salford a better place to live
  • working together to measure, evaluate and understand Social Value, as well as reporting publicly to the people of Salford about the Social Value that we create

Objectives

The Social Value Alliance will achieve its mission through the following objectives:

  1. Supporting Leadership – this means actively helping others to lead a social value approach in their own organisation or community through the alliance website, events, peer mentoring or training
  2. Networking and getting people involved – using Alliance meetings and website to engage with new people and organisations both within and outside of Salford
  3. Promoting social value – helping everyone to understand social value and its potential benefits, and influencing major projects which will generate social value for Salford and its people
  4. Getting the ‘nuts and bolts’ right in Salford – including:

Helping to shape public sector arrangements – particularly commissioning and procurement

Building understanding and ability to articulate social value in the voluntary, community and social enterprise sector (VCSE)

It is intended that each year the Social Value Alliance will agree an action plan to implement these objectives as follows:

Social Value Strategic Framework – Action Plan 2016/17

By when / Lead
  1. Supporting Leadership

  • Use the Social Value Alliance website to grow the number of leaders across and within different organisations that display excellent leadership qualities: inclusive; non-hierarchical; passionate; committed to ‘doing good’ above everything else; and actively demonstrated the behaviours it encourages in others.

  • Host leadership skill sharing activities / workshops, themed to draw out excellent leadership qualities.

  • Actively reach out to leaders from the types of organisations that are currently underrepresented, such as small community groups and private businesses, particularly if they undertake socially valuable practices, enabling them to share experience.

  1. Networking and getting people involved

  • Review the composition of the Social Value Alliance to ensure that that its membership includes a cross-section of individuals from different organisational sizes and sectors. [This should include ‘unusual suspects’].

  • Develop a programme of Alliance meetings which enables networking and learning, with at least 1 expert guest speaker at each meeting

  • Publish information at the Alliance website which encourages people to link with work within and outside of Salford, including other Social Value networks across the country

  1. Promoting Social Value

  • Developing the 10% more campaign in Salford

  • Working with the RHS, Social Value UK and local partners to generate the maximum social value from this project.

  • Promote and carry out marketing of social value in Salford, using examples of social value organisations of different sizes and sectors.

  • Promote businesses that demonstrate they are, as far as possible, committed to social value in Salford and genuinely create social, economic and environmental outcomes.

  • Develop with known socially valuable businesses a set of appropriate criteria that characterise a ‘socially valuable business’ and develop and promote a comprehensive directory of socially valuable businesses in Salford

  • Support socially valuable businesses to develop their marketing skills to promote their social value impact.

  1. Getting the ‘nuts and bolts’ right in Salford

Public sector
  • Encourage Public Sector members to publish their policy on social value, including their approach to commissioning, procurement and measuring social value, as well as their own contribution towards generating social value in the City as a local employer.

VCSE
  • Continue existing programmes which seek to raise awareness of social value across local VCSE organisations

  • Continue training programmes around the reporting and measurement of social value by VCSE organisations

All
  • Work across all sectors to develop standards and targets for generating more social value in Salford