Resources

An empathy map is a strategic tool used to deeply understand the unique motivations, barriers, and goals of social entrepreneurs. It maps out what founders say, think, do, and feel as they balance financial sustainability with social impact.

Learn our development approach towards the Skills Monitor

Discover a flexible, co-created framework that outlines key roles and competencies in social innovation, and supports the validation and accreditation of skills across Europe.

A sectoral strategy outlining essential skills for social innovation, employability, and sustainable impact.

The Double Diamond is a design-thinking framework that represents a creative process in four phases: Discover, Define, Develop, and Deliver. It emphasises alternating between divergent thinking (exploring many possibilities) and convergent thinking (narrowing down to the best solutions). This model helps teams systematically understand problems and craft effective, user-centered outcomes.

A service blueprint is a visual map that outlines all the components involved in delivering a service, including customer actions, frontstage interactions, backstage processes, and supporting systems. It helps teams understand how different elements work together to create the customer experience. By revealing dependencies, inefficiencies, and pain points, a service blueprint guides improvements to service quality and operational effectiveness.

A social innovation overview explains how new ideas, services, or models are developed to address social or environmental challenges more effectively than existing solutions. It highlights the processes, stakeholders, and contexts that enable these innovations to emerge and grow. By summarising key trends and approaches, it helps organisations understand how to create meaningful and sustainable social impact.

A Theory of Change is a strategic framework that explains how and why a desired social impact is expected to happen in a specific context. It maps the logical pathway from activities to outcomes and long-term impact, including the assumptions that must hold true. By making these connections explicit, it helps organisations plan, evaluate, and communicate their mission more effectively.

The Social Business Model Canvas is a planning tool that helps social enterprises map out how they create social and environmental value alongside financial sustainability. It adapts the traditional Business Model Canvas by adding elements such as social impact, beneficiaries, and measurable outcomes. By visualizing these components, it helps organizations align their mission with practical operations and strategy.

A research-based methodology defining key skills and approaches for social innovation education across Europe.