Impact or transformation — which word brings us closer to the world we want?

Social

21 January 2025 5 min read

Both words point in the same direction, but to achieve a world in which everyone can live with dignity, we must consider the nuances.

Josep F. Mària, SJ

The word "impact" has become so popular in the management world that it is losing its meaning. This article seeks to clarify its definition and compare it with "transformation", exploring whether these terms help us understand and address complex social realities in ways that promote well-being.

"Impact" is used as a synonym for "changing reality" or "producing visible results". The word contrasts with actions that consume time and resources but fail to yield tangible results. For this reason, the term is frequently paired with phrases like "impact measurement" and is often used alongside economic concepts such as "effectiveness" and "efficiency."

Measuring social impact poses a complex management challenge

When we add the word "social" to "impact," the phrase "social impact" highlights actions for improving social reality. This marks an advance over management concepts focused on achieving results for an organization, without considering broader social benefits.

The expression "social impact measurement" is doubly complex. The challenge posed by social impact measurement is to quantify the degree to which an action changes reality or produces results for the people involved. This is because an action affects people it is intended to help (in sociological terms: direct beneficiaries), as well as people it was not intended to help (indirect beneficiaries or indirectly harmed). For example, helping somebody impacts the person who is helped, but it also has a beneficial impact on the helper, because it reinforces their values, convictions, and "sense of virtue". An action that aims to help or benefit a certain group of people can unintentionally harm another group (the indirectly harmed). For example, spending €20,000 to help families who need housing may mean fewer resources are available for educationally supporting children at risk of failing in school. This example leads to the traditional economic term of "opportunity cost".

Impact limitations

The idea behind impact has problems. Two issues stand out:

Firstly, the abstract term "impact" implies a certain amount of violence. Indeed, it can mean "shock, blow, collision". Bullets and shells are fired to achieve an impact. In a military action, when the artillery officer decides that initial ranging rounds have landed on the target area, he will call for all guns to open fire with the words: “Fire for effect.” As a former artillery officer, I cannot forget the violence implicit in the idea of effective impact.
Secondly, the idea of impact can make us forget that social problems are complex and have structural dimensions. Helping individuals and families obtain decent housing is more than helping them pay rent. Public policies are also needed to transform housing and labor markets so that families can live in decent homes and make ends meet without assistance. Some authors, such as Esade professor Guillermo Casasnovas, who work with the idea of social impact, encompass the complexity and structural dimension of such problems with the term "systemic impact.”

Transformation as an alternative

Given the problems with the word "impact", we might consider an alternative: "transformation". The word comes from the Latin transformare, meaning to change form. Its synonyms – replace, alter, modify, evolve, and affect – convey change without implying violence or destruction. In contrast, an impact does not change a form – it destroys a form.

The term "social transformation" refers to changes in the people and social groups who are affected by a problem. In the example we are developing, the lives of those affected by a housing crisis (the direct or indirect beneficiaries, and the directly or indirectly harmed), as well as the functioning of housing and labor markets, must be addressed so that the problem is reduced or eliminated.

However, "social transformation" also has problems.

Firstly, it does not necessarily mean an improvement in the living conditions of the people or social groups concerned. We must ask: in which direction is a social transformation taking us? For example, today there are forces pushing for a transformation of the welfare state – but in a direction that undermines social justice and equal opportunities.
Secondly, social transformation is a more complicated process than it may seem. We may imagine a scenario such as: "There is a problem, the government designs a public policy according to a plan that connects means and ends. The problem improves and social transformation takes place". Reality, however, is more complex. The philosopher Daniel Innerarity distinguishes between planning and transformation:
“Unlike planning, transformation is a process with an open-ended outcome. How society will accommodate government action towards a given end is not entirely predictable. Digital and ecological transformations are good examples. The social transformations triggered by digital hyperconnectivity are not predetermined by those technologies – but emerge from the ways those technologies and the practices that develop around them are culturally understood, socially organized, and legally regulated. Transitions often fail due to a mechanical and vertical application of new requirements that fails to consider the diversity of the target subjects and fails to include them in the process. Farmer protests about ecological transition show how difficult it is to reconcile what needs to be done with the involvement of a deeply affected sector. Transformation failures are due to not sufficiently developing a negotiation process that leads to a satisfactory and sustainable solution for everyone. Resistance to change should not be interpreted as a perverse refusal to adapt because it is often evidence that the person encouraging the change has been unable to facilitate, negotiate, or make its advantages credible for everyone.”