Improving the good in good organizations: the potential value of social impact assessment for social enterprises

Purpose: Social enterprises are not generally aware that they might create negative social impacts on local communities. This paper aims to inform social enterprise scholars and practitioners about the potential value of the field of Social Impact Assessment in managing the negative impacts of social enterprises on beneficiaries, local communities and other rightsholders and stakeholders. Design/methodology/approach: This is a conceptual paper. Findings: The authors discuss the key things that could assist social entrepreneurs in assessing their social impacts, negative as well as positive, unintended as well as intended. Social enterprises might: use a human rights-based approach and undertake due diligence; implement a grievance redress mechanism; obtain free, prior and informed consent; consider their ongoing social licence to operate; and implement benefit sharing programs. Doing all this would improve the social outcomes from their activities and contribute to socially sustainable development. Originality/value: Although social enterprises seek sustainable solutions to social problems and are described as “do good organizations”, there is an assumption (myth) that social enterprises only have positive impacts. This paper argues that social enterprises can also cause negative social impacts, especially where processes to consider potential for harm are absent. Therefore, social enterprises need a way to assess and manage potential negative social impacts and enhance the social outcomes from their activities. The authors argue that learnings from the field of Social Impact Assessment (as codified by the International Association for Impact Assessment) should be brought into the social entrepreneurship discourse.