Impact

We define impact as the short-, medium-, and long-term effects of a company's products, services, or activities on society, the environment, and the economy. Impact is characterized by direction (positive or negative) and magnitude (amount of change).

Impact measurement is the process of quantitatively and qualitatively grasping the "social and environmental changes, both short and long term," resulting from the activities, products or services of a company or organization, and making value judgments about its business and activities. The basic idea of impact measurement is to compare the situation in which a project was implemented or a new product or service was provided to the market with the situation in which the project or product or service was not implemented or not provided, and the amount of change is the impact.

Impact Thinking is to think logically about the impact of one's actions or the activities of a company or organization and beyond, as shown in the figure below. Based on the following definition, we create an impact pathway (logic model) by logically connecting multiple medium-term social and environmental changes (impact), outcomes for stakeholders (outcome), and outputs generated by corporate activities, and conduct impact measurement.

The purpose of impact measurement is not to evaluate impact. It is important for companies to use the results of impact evaluations to make decisions on how to "maximize change" from the current situation to increase positive impact or reduce negative impact. As a financial institution, we provide support for companies to use impact evaluation to improve their business and maximize their impact by correctly positioning it in the PDCA cycle.

We believe that when a company publicly discloses its impact-related action plans and results, it not only fulfills its accountability to its stakeholders, but also promotes the environmental and social value that the company generates, which in turn leads to increased corporate value. The Business Call to Action (BCtA), an initiative for inclusive development by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), which issues guidelines for sustainability reporting, have collaborated to issue the report "Measuring Impact: How Business Accelerates the Sustainable Development Goals", which summarizes non-financial disclosure (sustainability reporting) and impact assessment as follows. In other words, UNDP and GRI argue that impact measurement is necessary if companies are to relate their activities, products and services to the SDGs.