Your site team visited a school. That was social value — did you record it?

Construction firms go into schools all the time. A site manager gives a careers talk to Year 10. An apprentice goes back to their old school to show what the trade gave them. The company sponsors a mock-interview day, hosts a site visit in hi-vis two sizes too big, judges a bridge-building contest with lolly sticks.

Ask the firm why, and the answers are good ones: the skills shortage, the local pipeline, giving something back. Ask the firm what that activity was worth, and the room goes quiet.

It's worth more than you think

Recognised social value frameworks — the kind public buyers use to score bids — assign monetary proxy values to exactly this activity: education engagement, careers support, staff volunteering hours, apprenticeship support. A single afternoon in a school, done by two members of staff with travel and prep counted, is a real, defensible figure in pounds. Across a year of visits, it adds up to a number that belongs in your tenders.

Since this spring, that number matters more in Wales than ever: public bodies are now legally required to report the social value their procurement delivers — and on construction contracts over £2m, social value clauses flow down into subcontracts. Your school visits are no longer just goodwill. They're contract currency.

Why it never gets recorded

Because the person who did the visit went back to their day job, and nobody's job is the spreadsheet. The activity happens; the evidence doesn't. Then a tender asks "describe the social value your organisation has delivered, with supporting evidence" — and a year of genuine community work collapses into one vague paragraph.

The two-minute fix

Log it when it happens. Owl Impact's logging form takes about two minutes — who went, where, how long, how many young people — and the social value is calculated automatically, with a costed report emailed to you instantly. Our Owl Build pack was built for construction firms in schools, with every Welsh school already loaded. Do it after each visit and the evidence builds itself.