Alliance magazine

Speaking on the day of the Social Impact Investment Taskforce launch, UnLtd CEO Cliff Prior referred to a new business model that could mark ‘the threshold of a social business revolution’:

‘ The new Profit-with-Purpose business model allows start up and rapidly growing social businesses access to the equity investment they need, and at the same time allows them to be social, stay social, and prove it by showing their results.’

The new Profit-with-Purpose Business model has been created by the Taskforce’s Mission Alignment Working Group, chaired by Cliff Prior, with input from an international panel of experts and practitioners. The Group’s report, Profit with Purpose Businesses, is published today alongside the main Taskforce report, and sets out the three pillars of the new approach:

• Intent: committing to a social purpose
• Duties: creating duties for directors and officers to strive for and deliver the social purpose
• Reporting: measuring and reporting on social impact – both directly on the intended social purpose and being transparent more broadly

The report draws on legal innovations in various countries, including the Benefit Corporation model from the United States and market mechanisms such as the B Lab accreditation system. The report includes a full draft of legislation for countries wishing to adopt the new model.

Click here to read the full press release and here to download the report.

The launch of the Profit with Purpose Businesses report was part of a wider launch. A group of leading experts in social investment from the UK have set out their vision for the next stages of development of the social impact investment market in the UK. The report Building a social impact investment market: The UK experience is part of the culmination of a year’s work, following the launch of the Social Impact Investment Taskforce, led by Sir Ronald Cohen, and established under the UK’s presidency of the G8 in 2013.

The UK Advisory Board published its final report yesterday and three working group papers. See http://www.socialimpactinvestment.org and http://www.bigsocietycapital.com/social-investment-research-library

In response to the challenges identified in the report, the Centre for Charity Effectiveness at London’s Cass Business School has announced the recruitment of Mark Salway as Director of Social Impact Investing.