How to accelerate social investment – my interview/ podcast for Cambridge University, Judge Business School

Discussing the opportunities and challenges of bringing together finance and social investment. Social investment is still a small market segment but has tremendous potential. There are more investors who are looking for projects that can deliver both social impact and financial returns, while organisations that historically relied on grants look for alternative sources of funding without losing sight of their social purpose.

Read More »

The fancy names aren’t helping – let’s call it investment and get on with doing it properly

20130526-143545.jpg

The extent of debate (and often disagreement) about the definition of social impact investment is fascinating – exploring in great depth the nuances and prerequisite principles for investing in a way that seeks both positive social outcomes and financial returns. But this discourse risks being divisive and self-defeating. Does this complexity actually attract or repel new investors from engaging in this exciting market?

Read More »

World’s first financial index for impact investing unveiled

Press release: 11 December 2012, London (reblogged here 12 Dec)

Logo9-FINAL_Engaged_X_medresEngaged Investment has launched a pilot to test the creation of the world’s first investment index for the growing emerging market of social investment (‘impact investing’, as it is called globally). This is an important next step forward towards creating the infrastructure needed for the global expansion of social finance.

Read More »

Impact Measurement – A conceptual framework

347484441Tomorrow (5 Dec) in Brussels I will be presenting my views on the impact measurement discourse at a conference on “Measuring the Social Impact of Social Enterprises”. My approach will be to explore how to frame the discussion in the context of a market centric perspective as part of developing EngagedX – the world’s first financial index for impact investing. For the purposes of compiling an index, we are agnostic about specific metrics used and instead seek to determine a meta-framework approach for how to map and categorise the data of all metrics in use.

Read More »

Press release: Making Good in Social Impact Investment

Thursday 6th October 2011

UK at watershed moment for social impact investing with potential to be global leader

Social impact investment has the potential to evolve from being an emerging market to a very large, mature investment market attracting mainstream investors, according to a report published today. Making Good in Social Impact Investment: Opportunities in an Emerging Asset Class argues that the UK is well placed to be a global leader in the field, as social impact investment builds on our record as home to a well-developed, not-for-profit, charitable and voluntary sector and our historic strengths in financial services.

Available for download:

Adobe PDF (Free)

Amazon Kindle (£0.77)

Apple iTunes (Free)

Read More »