Groote Social Impact Study
What was the issue?
Our work delivering housing on Groote Eylandt was radical in that it placed decision making in the hands of local people.
Long before the Local Decision-Making Agreement was signed, we had been working alongside the community in a process of co-design and co-production. Our role was to provide the community with the opportunity to actively engage in the design process and to make choices and decisions that would influence design outcomes.
Now that the bulk of the work was complete and people were living in their new homes, the Anindilyakwa Housing Aboriginal Corporation (AHAC) was keen to test whether this new approach was worth the effort and investment.
What did we do?
In 2020, TF.A launched a series of evidence-based tools to measure a project’s social impact. Our ‘Social Return on Design Investment’ (SRODI) kit draws on global best practice and allows organisations to understand the impact of their investment on the communities they serve.
Unfortunately, COVID travel restrictions did not permit a full SRODI analysis, and instead, the results were gathered through workshops, video calls and targeted surveys. The results were startling.
What was the impact?
In brief, the Social Impact Study revealed that because of the GAHP Co-Design and Consultation Process:
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100% of participants felt more confident
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100% of participants felt an increased sense of power (agency)
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100% felt happier
In response to the new GAHP designs, the following results were achieved:
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100% of tenants felt more secure and experienced increased wellbeing
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87.5% of tenants felt happier in their new homes
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86% of tenants felt an increase in cultural safety.
Critically, the results of this survey validate the shift towards Local Decision Making and assures AHAC that the positive social impacts experienced by their community are real.
If you’d like to learn more, this short film describes our approach to Social Impact Measurement in more detail: https://vimeo.com/591478403