B Impact Assessment

The B Impact Assessment evaluates how your company’s operations and business model impact your workers, community, environment, and customers.

B Impact Assessment

How it works

To obtain the B Corporation certification, a company first needs to complete the B Impact Assessment, which measures the positive impact of the company in areas of governance, workers, community, the environment. Companies that earn a minimum score of 80 out of 200 points undergo an assessment review process, essentially a conference call verifying the claims made in their assessment.

Step 1: Assess

Get started by answering a series of questions on the B Impact Assessment.

Step 2: Compare

See where your business is outperforming others, and where there’s room for improvement.

Step 3: Improve

Identify, track, and learn about improvement opportunities and best practices thanks to our free tools.

Writing B Corp requirements

How the BIA is developed

Writing B Corp requirements

The B Impact Assessment is independently governed by a Standards Advisory Council, but its content is informed by and references many other social and environmental reporting and performance standards and certifications.

The B Impact Assessment is updated approximately every three years in order to improve the clarity, consistency, and insight of the assessment and its scoring, stay up to date with best practices and innovations in impact measurement, and accommodate ongoing user and stakeholder feedback. The first version of the BIA was released in 2007. Its current version, Version 6, was launched in January 2019.

A free, confidential impact management tool

The free B Impact Assessment enables companies to measure, manage, and improve their impact by answering a series of questions about business practices and outputs. You don’t have to be a B Corp to use this free and confidential tool, nor do you have to be a C-suite executive or seasoned sustainability professional.

  • > 65 K
    Total European BIA Users
  • > 250 K
    Global BIA Users

BIA Sample Questions

B Impact Assessment Structure

The B Impact Assessment is divided into five stakeholder-focused “Impact Areas” — Governance, Workers, Community, Environment, and Customers.

Each impact area is organized by “Impact Topics” that describe the specific dimensions of impact relevant to that  stakeholder.

There are impact topics that relate to the impact of a company’s day-to-day operations (those illustrated in white), as well as topics related to the impact of a company’s overall business model (those illustrated in color). You can learn more about how the B Impact Assessment distinguishes between operational impact and impact business models here.

Frequently Asked Questions

Ready to start measuring your impact?

Together, we are shifting our economic system from profiting only the few to benefiting all, from concentrating wealth and power to ensuring equity, from extraction to regeneration, and from prioritizing individualism to embracing interdependence. Start your journey by taking our B Impact Assessment!

european b corp summit 2019

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