Community Investment

BCS’s community investment services enable companies to respond to society’s expectations that companies invest sufficiently to benefit communities. Our CCA process ensures that investment is consistent with community and donor priorities, builds positive relationships and creates trust. A consistent finding across countries is that corporate charity is not a priority for communities. Priorities are transparency of activities and plans, employment, sourcing and procurement, siting of facilities and financial investment in local priorities. Our community investment services cover the full range of an investment cycle from thinking through a conceptual framework and approach that is relevant to the context to achieving net mutual benefits for community and companies.

Core Community Investment Services

Developing the right approach for your company

BCS helps you to identify an approach for community investment that takes into consideration the culture and priorities of the donor, balanced against the priorities and perspectives of the intended beneficiaries, the communities. We draw from case studies across many industries and adapt from a variety of frameworks and tools to enable you to develop the right conceptual framework and approach for each client.

Identifying the right investments

BCS recommends investments that build capacity and enable communities to benefit from business operations. While we do recommend charitable donations when appropriate, our reviews of community development projects indicate that they are not sustainable and fuel dependency. People are more satisfied over time when they are able to access jobs or other livelihood opportunities through which they can support themselves.

Periodic reviews

BCS uses participatory monitoring and evaluation methods to conduct its reviews and assessments. These methods are proven for their power not only providing reliable data and analysis, but also for their capacity to bring about change based on increased ownership of investments by both communities and donors.

Special studies and evaluations

BCS carries out studies and analyses that answer client questions about the effectiveness of different models of investment, that seek out potential leveraging opportunities with other donors, or that simply require a review of a study carried out by another company.