Skating Panda impact report…
Skating Panda is a social and environmental impact consultancy. We are pioneers in this space and launched over a decade ago with the deliberate and determined focus to find solutions to the biggest issues of our time. Delivering tangible change for the good of people and the planet is at the heart of everything we do.
Over the last decade, Skating Panda has delivered a deep and broad range of work that has contributed to systemic change across gender, health, and the planet. Our work has included: bringing Stand Up to Cancer to UK screens for Cancer Research UK; rebranding an association of charities to NHS Charities Together, which became the go-to charity and a household name during the COVID 19 pandemic; conceiving and launching Sky Ocean Rescue which put single-use plastic on the agenda, and introducing menopause to the national and international conversation last year.
Our work is all about creating ‘real impact’. ‘Real impact’ is evidence of the difference we make on the issues and challenges that face us all in society. It is an enduring change in the status quo, caused by an organisation, which contributes to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.
Skating Panda frames, communicates, and sustains real impact through a combination of critical thinking, creativity, and storytelling to nurture people and organisations towards changes in perspectives and behaviour – whether that’s through advising our clients on their purpose, culture and values or helping newly formed, purposeful businesses achieve scale.
Since Skating Panda’s launch, we have seen a positive change in how organisations are run; many are taking steps towards choosing profit through purpose as opposed to profit as purpose. However, this has also brought the challenge of green- and purpose-washing – where organisations want to look good rather than be good.
The need for positive change is urgent and there’s no time for just paying lip service to ‘being good’. That’s why we at Skating Panda continue to put all our efforts into accelerating creating meaningful and sustained change.
Snapshot of our impact
Because real impact needs to be driven by organisations across the whole system, we work with partners from all sectors to ensure that change is joined up and enduring.
All Skating Panda’s work aligns to our outcomes of:
Healthier society
Fairer society
Thriving planet
Impactful organisations
Working together
Fairer society
Thriving planet
Impactful organisations
Working together
Who we partnered with in 2022:
Charities including SMEs Government58% 33% 9%
The 2022 outcomes we partnered on:
Healthier Society Fairer Society Thriving Planet Impactful Organisations38% 26% 24% 12%
100% of our clients would partner with Skating Panda again
What our partners say we help them deliver:
Overview of our impact framework
Skating Panda’s mission: “to work with, unlock and empower ambitious, like-minded organisations and individuals to create the impact we want to see for our planet, society and people.”
Skating Panda’s vision: “a world where every business and organisation is acting for a thriving planet and a healthier, fairer society.”
Social and environmental impact has been at the heart of what we do from the very start. We have long challenged our clients – and ourselves – to go beyond the outputs of our work (the numbers and deliverables) and think about the outcomes (the changes our work brings about).
Our Theory of Change is guided by our mission and vision. It focuses on the key changes we want to make to and with organisations and systems to bring about a thriving planet and a healthier, fairer society. By concentrating on our outcomes, we deliver impact on a larger scale.
Skating Panda copyright 2023
Skating Panda’s outcomes are underpinned by our three drivers for systemic change. These are unique to Skating Panda and represent the change that we can bring about in the world as a consulting agency:
- Awareness – helping tell better stories to improve knowledge and understanding.
- Action – taking practical steps through strategic planning and decision-making.
- Acceleration – building unstoppable momentum for tangible and enduring change to the status quo.
The drivers work independently and in conjunction with our projects. In the following sections we showcase how these drivers frame Skating Panda’s work with our clients, all with the end goal of delivering lasting, positive change.
Awareness
All our work increases awareness around how we can bring about a thriving planet and a healthier, fairer society. We highlight issues ahead of their tipping point, such as preventative health steps or planetary boundaries balance contributors; and we tell compelling stories that reach the right audiences who are inspired by them. A key part of our work is not only asking whether we are telling the right story but also understanding whether the overall story can be better told as part of a partnership or coalition.
Facilitating partnerships, such as our work with World Cancer Research Fund, creates a collaborative approach that allows multiple parties to build a shared audience and disseminate strategically important messages. Building coalitions, which we do with clients like the International Center for Research on Women, is more about creating self-sustaining ecosystems for change.
Whatever shape building awareness takes, we always map stakeholders across the system so that we maximise our reach and create a better understanding of different social and environmental issues to drive action.
“Cancer prevention is on the agenda more than it was three years ago.”
“Skating Panda have made a difference to the storytelling element and have hooked the media in.”
“Awareness is absolutely there – now we need to build on it.”
Action
We work together with internal teams to build the blueprint that will enable them to have a bigger impact inside and outside their organisation. Practical frameworks like purpose and values architecture, as well as materiality assessments, are key components in shifting companies’ priorities. These frameworks also catalyse action by providing the roadmap for ongoing organisational and business change.
It’s critical for organisations and business in particular to have a shared understanding of their mission. Although this can be time-consuming it always pays dividends in the long run by laying the foundations for real, sustained impact. Skating Panda’s unique strategic frameworks are designed to be enduring and encourage a variety of stakeholders to contribute and add their perspectives and insights. Our methodology is ever-evolving as the world changes and, at its core, delivers positive organisational change.
“Our values framework and materiality assessment have become part of who we are.”
“The first partner workshop was the first time presenting the framework. The response from our partners was “Wow, this makes sense, feels credible, and is something we can get investment for.” It was the first time there were synergies across all of our partners, and they were really excited to work with us on it.”
Acceleration
Acceleration is all about creating meaningful and sustained change – from preventative health care measures that lead to a healthier society, through to more inclusive policies that benefit employees across a whole workplace or underrepresented groups in other settings in the long-term. Acceleration is the culmination of our other drivers of awareness and action, and requires the right support from people and systems to be achieved.
A seemingly modest change, like delivering an inaugural strategic framework that is underpinned by strong governance, can alter an organisation’s trajectory. This momentum can also be catalysed by working with other organisations, bringing about the spark that leads to a step change in the way we approach societal and environmental challenges. As such, acceleration is all about leveraging innovation and collaboration to take impact to the next level.
“Skating Panda was challenging us to be innovative throughout. We’ve thought outside the box and now we have an open approach.”
“I’m proud that we haven’t rushed the process – as an organisation we want to get to solutions very quickly. This was our chance to try something different – the health crisis isn’t going away; it’s only getting worse.”
Our commitments as a B Corp and how we’re improving our impact
We’re proud of the B Corp certification we received in 2022, as it enables us to measure our impact across the B Corp standards, which we can use to evaluate and self-improve. We’re also proud that our company outcomes align with B Corp’s global strategies to engage businesses in improving impact and developing a network of local, regional, and global communities for change. And so, for us, being a B Corp is the perfect fit to be a greater force for good.
In 2022, our B Corp impact score was 94.7 out of 200 and we are committed to pushing that score even higher in 2023 and beyond. For example, in the past year, we have updated our workplace policies and employee handbook, taking a consultative approach to reflect the different lifestyles and professional and personal needs of our employees. Our employee handbook now includes, amongst other things, enhanced parental benefits, improved mental health policies, and ongoing hybrid working practices.
At Skating Panda, we pride ourselves on our already inclusive and healthy workplace culture but in an ever-changing society we will continue to review and evolve our practices in line with our values to meet new needs and pave the way towards more progressive policies where we can lead by example.
Furthermore, as a social and environmental impact agency, we are deliberate about monitoring and assessing our impact. In 2023, we are recalibrating our impact measurement metrics to ensure we’re even more targeted when it comes to tracking and achieving the outcomes that will help us build a thriving planet and a healthier, fairer society.
