SOCIAL VALUE TRAINING & CWANA™ CERTIFICATION
Two ways to build genuine social value capability.
Social Value Training
A practical half-day course for professionals who want to understand social value properly.
Find out moreCWaNA™ Practitioner Certification
A six-session CPD-accredited programme for practitioners who want to master the methodology.
Explore the programmeSocial Value Training
A practical half-day course for professionals who want to go beyond volunteering and charity donations when it comes to social value. Through insights and practical exercises, you'll learn how to create or redefine your social value approach, understand supply chain opportunities, and stay current as requirements evolve in social value.
Whether you're new to social value or need to sharpen your team's understanding, this course gives you a clear, practical picture of what genuine social value looks like — and how to start delivering it.
Who It's For
- Professionals new to social value who need a practical grounding
- SME teams building a social value approach from scratch
- Anyone whose Tier 1, 2 or 3 principals are asking them to demonstrate social value capability
- Local authority officers and NHS procurement teams wanting to understand what good looks like
Led by Christian Sait
Enquire About Social Value TrainingCWaNA™ Practitioner Certification
The practitioners who win on social value aren't guessing. They have a methodology. They know how to go into a community, gather real evidence, and build a bid response — or a delivery plan — around what they actually found.
That's what this programme teaches. Six sessions covering the full social value landscape — legislation, stakeholder mapping, socioeconomic research, community engagement, impact measurement, and report writing. Not theory. Not generic best practice. The actual methodology that Sonar uses on the ground, built around your real-world practice, and accredited by a recognised CPD body.
Complete the programme and you'll receive your CWaNA™ Practitioner Certificate — the credential that demonstrates genuine community engagement methodology capability.
Is This For You?
Who's this training for?
It's for bid writers and social value leads who want a structured, repeatable methodology for gathering community evidence — instead of writing what sounds good and hoping it holds up.
It's for SME sub-contractors whose Tier 1 principals are cascading social value obligations down the supply chain — and who need a credential that demonstrates genuine capability.
It's for social value managers at Tier 1 contractors who want to train entire teams against a consistent, PPN 002-aligned standard — building internal capability rather than outsourcing it project by project.
It's for sustainability and ESG leads who want community engagement methodology built into their group-wide social value approach.
It's for local authority officers and NHS procurement teams who want to understand what genuine community co-design looks like, and how to require it from their suppliers.
If you want to learn how to game the system — score the highest social value points in the easiest possible way without changing anything — this isn't the training for you.
If you want to understand how to engage communities to leave a lasting legacy, make social value the golden thread in your business, and grow by genuinely understanding the communities you work in — then this programme is for you.
The Programme
Six sessions. One complete methodology.
Introduction to Social Value & CWaNA™
How we got here. The Social Value Act 2012. PPN 06/20. PPN 002. The Social Value Road Map to 2032. Why generic pledges are failing and what genuine engagement actually requires. And an introduction to the CWaNA™ wheel — the framework you'll be working with for the rest of the programme.
Political Makeup & Stakeholder Mapping
You can't engage effectively in a place you don't understand. This session covers how to map the political landscape — tiers of government, local councillor interests, LEPs, and anchor agencies. How to build a stakeholder influence map that identifies not just who matters, but why and how much.
Socioeconomic Research & Deprivation Analysis
The data layer. Demographics, economy, employment, skills, education, health, crime, housing. Lower Super Output Areas (LSOAs). How to use OCSI data and identify the top 10% most deprived areas. The Pride in Place initiative. How to turn numbers into a useable picture of a community's real pressures and priorities.
Stakeholder Engagement Methods
The fieldwork session. Stakeholder mapping and prioritisation. One-to-ones, workshops, focus groups, surveys. How to conduct genuinely inclusive engagement — reaching the groups who don't attend public meetings, don't fill in surveys, and have good reasons not to trust the process.
Social Value Measurement & Optioneering
How to measure social value impact. Introduction to MeasureUp. The KNoRT framework (Knowledge, Opportunity, Resource, Time). Optioneering with evidence anchoring — how to assess and compare social value options based on what communities actually said, rather than what's convenient to deliver.
Writing Your CWaNA™
The culmination. By the end of this session, you'll have produced a completed CWaNA™ assessment — for a live project or a location of your choice. Report structure. Facilitation skills. How to present findings to a client. Monitoring and review.
Certification
Two pathways to certification
CWaNA™ Practitioner
Complete the six-session programme and produce your own CWaNA™ assessment. Personal CPD-accredited certificate and the right to state 'CWaNA™ Trained' in bids, proposals, and professional profiles.
Individual bid writers, social value leads, consultants
CWaNA™ Certified Organisation
Team training, organisational audit, right to use CWaNA™ branding and methodology in client delivery, with annual review. Build consistent internal capability across your social value team.
Tier 1, 2 & 3 contractors, SMEs, consultancies
Formats & Pricing
Ways to access the training
Individual Practitioner
Online, self-paced with cohort sessions. CPD accredited. CWaNA™ Practitioner certificate on completion.
Group Training (2–10)
Online or in-person. Pathway to CWaNA™ Certified Organisation status.
Bespoke In-House Delivery
Delivered on-site for Tier 1 contractors, aligned to your framework geography and specific client requirements. Day-rate basis.
Public Sector Rate
Reduced pricing available for local authorities and NHS procurement teams.
What You Get
What comes with the programme
- CPD-accredited certificate
- Right to state 'CWaNA™ Trained' in bids, proposals, and professional profiles
- A complete CWaNA™ assessment you produced yourself
- Access to cohort peer network
- Foundation for CWaNA™ Certified Organisation status
- A methodology you can use on your next project
CWaNA™ Practitioner
CPD-accredited certification on completion
Not sure which programme is right for you?
The Social Value course is the practical starting point for professionals building their understanding. The CWaNA™ Practitioner programme is for practitioners who want a structured, repeatable methodology they can use on every project. If you're unsure, get in touch and we'll point you in the right direction.
Get in touch