Social Value Is Winning Contracts. Is Yours Good Enough?
Approximately, £385 billion of public contracts in England now require social value commitments. Up to 20% of your bid score can make or break the success of winning the overall bid. Despite this, many built environment organisations are still getting their approach wrong.
If your social value section sounds anything like "we are committed to supporting local employment and promoting health and wellbeing throughout the project" – you're leaving scores, credibility, and contracts on the table.
The gap is widening
Social value has travelled fast – from a voluntary consideration under the Social Value Act 2012, to a mandatory scored element of central government procurement under PPN 06/20, to a decisive factor in pre-qualification and planning consent today. The Procurement Act 2023 has pushed things further still.
Why is this important
Your competitors have noticed. Leading contractors now have dedicated social value managers. Top performers track delivery in real time and feed evidence straight into future bids. As such, organisations without a strong track record aren't even making the longlist.
Where most organisations lose out
The problems are consistent and rectifiable:
Vague commitments with no targets, no measurable outcomes, no framework referenced
Last-minute bolt-ons that have no connection to how the project actually delivers
Generic statements copy-pasted across bids with no reference to the specific needs of a community or region
A lack of evidence of past social value delivered – which undermines credibility with procurement panels
Social value siloed in the bid team rather than embedded across operations and delivery
The result: scores in the bottom third, weaker stakeholder relationships, and missed planning consents.
What competitive approaches looks like
The organisations winning on social value do three things differently.
They're specific – measurable commitments tied to real project outputs, mapped to the client's own priorities, with community needs identified before the bid is written.
They're evidenced – with a clear track record of delivered outcomes, reported through recognised frameworks like TOMs or PPN 06/20.
And they're embedded – social value is built into project plans from day one, not written in at the last minute.
The difference between a bid that scores in the bottom third and one that's shortlisted on social value alone isn't budget or team size. It's preparation, specificity, and evidence.
Three things you can do in the next 90 days
Audit your social value evidence. Review bids from the past 12 months. If not a bid, review your strategy Where was your narrative generic, unmeasured, or disconnected from delivery? Map the gap.
Map one client's social value priorities. Research exactly what outcomes, frameworks and evidence formats they want. Build a tailored commitment template.
Create a social value impact one-pager. Your three strongest examples of delivered social value – with real data, local outcomes, and community impact. Polished and client-ready.
We covered all of this – and more – in our recent webinar, Turning Social Value from a Policy into a Competitive Advantage. If you want the full picture: the policy backdrop, the frameworks you need to know, and what a competitive social value approach looks like across the full project lifecycle, you can watch it back here. Access the webinar.
Enable Green Partners helps developers, contractors and consultants turn social value into a genuine competitive advantage. Find out more about our services.
