Planning for social performance

Social performance is easier to manage when project design, budgets, responsibilities and evidence requirements develop together. Early planning gives the assessment team an opportunity to influence location, access, workforce arrangements, land requirements and service provision while alternatives remain feasible.

The starting questions are practical: who may experience change, what outcome is sought, which choices affect it, and what would demonstrate that the agreed measures work? Record the assumptions and constraints alongside the proposed response. Revisit them as feasibility studies, consultation and baseline research produce better evidence.

Connect assessment to design decisions

Prepare a decision schedule covering site selection, route alignment, land acquisition, contractor mobilisation, recruitment, construction and closure. Identify the social evidence required before each decision and the person authorised to act on it. Prioritise research that could change a consequential choice.

Compare technically feasible options using their environmental, social and financial implications. Include lifecycle costs, implementation capacity, effects on different groups and uncertainty about mitigation. A lower initial construction cost may involve recurring access, compensation or service costs that deserve explicit consideration in the financial model.

Consultation findings should reach engineering, procurement, health and safety, workforce and financial planning teams. Record whether a suggestion was incorporated and explain the decision to affected stakeholders. IFC's 2007 handbook provides practical guidance on this integration during feasibility and project planning. Stakeholder Engagement, pages 119–125.

Where recruitment may attract population movement, examine logistics bases, hiring arrangements, accommodation and service capacity early. IFC's project-induced in-migration handbook discusses how these decisions influence settlement patterns and management options. Projects and People, 2009, part four.

Specify the intended result

A short results chain helps articulate how resources and activities are expected to produce outputs and improve outcomes. Identify the assumptions connecting each step, including market demand, access to services and the capacity of implementing partners. Gertler and colleagues describe this approach in Impact Evaluation in Practice, chapter 2.

For example, a livelihood programme might fund training, deliver courses and support access to employment. Course completion measures delivery. Sustained employment and earnings measure subsequent outcomes. Record the period over which each is expected and the conditions needed for participants to benefit.

For each priority outcome, specify:

Keep legal and financing requirements identifiable in the commitment register. Programme targets should be reviewed against those requirements, the evidence and the intended result. Agree how proposed changes to commitments will be assessed, authorised and communicated.

Design the evidence before implementation

Choose an evaluation approach proportionate to the decision. Routine monitoring can establish whether activities occurred, participants received support and outcomes changed. Estimating the project's causal contribution requires an explicit comparison strategy and defensible assumptions; a change between baseline and follow-up can also reflect other influences. Gertler and colleagues, chapter 3.

Collect essential pre-intervention measures in time. Plan consistent follow-up definitions, seasonality, participant tracking, attrition checks and appropriate data protection. Record major contextual changes and delivery differences so findings can inform management. The baseline guide and sampling and quantitative analysis explain these choices in greater detail.

Fund implementation and learning

Include staffing, contractor obligations, surveys, grievance handling, corrective action and monitoring in the implementation budget. Confirm who will operate and finance shared services over time. Where government or community organisations are partners, agree responsibilities and assess their capacity with them.

Set review points around material project changes and emerging evidence. A review should compare commitments, delivery, outcomes and unresolved concerns, then assign any corrective action. Retain the earlier plan and the reason for revision so that improvements in performance can be assessed consistently.

See the social risk methodology, impact analysis, dataset curation and methods references.