Investment & Markets, Socially Responsible Investing (SRI)

This last management practice category focuses on including HIP criteria in every decision-making process.

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Launch is a one-of-a-kind public-private partnership between NASA, USAID, US State Department, and Nike to use the “power of prizes” to encourage startups to develop an innovative solution that addresses the needs of the developing world. Next up: waste issues.

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WWF has created the Water Risk Filter, a tool that helps companies identify their water related risks and develop ways to address them.

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If sustainability encourages decentralized expertise in an organization, then do the Board and C-level suite need to manage it? To get the best results, the answer is apparently yes – or at least a blend of top-down management and bottom-up empowerment.

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In today’s economy, the land’s resources are becoming more stretched, labor is becoming overworked, and capital is seeking more transparency about how it will be used. Therefore, new constraints to our economic system functions are emerging.

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A company’s fiduciary responsibility is to drive profit, but profit is only evident after the fact. To predict the winners, an investor or executive needs to focus on the long-term indicators that are not yet fully embraced in the financial statements.

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A compelling vision is inspirational, measurable, and has a deadline.

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How do leading, well-managed companies consistently deliver top performance and seek ever higher human impact and profit? Five elements of their management systems provide a solid foundation of how a very HIP organization operates:
Vision, Metrics, Financials, Accountability, & Decision-Making

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The top eleven remarkable moments at the Wall Street Journal’s Eco:nomics Conference

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By Elaine Misonzhnik The recent opening of Taubman Centers’ new mall in Salt Lake City might have marked a nice symbolic moment for the retail real estate industry, but it’s not about to usher in a new era of construction abandon. In spite of a slight rebound in retail real estate fundamentals, U.S. developers still feel skittish [...]

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In terms of GDP per capita, Brazil and India’s wealth grew 34% and 120%, respectively, from 1990-2008. According to a new, alternative Inclusive Wealth Indicator developed by UNU-IHDP that measures natural and human, as well as economic capital, Brazil’s wealth actually increased only 3% and India’s 9% over the period.

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SAP is a company that makes its living providing information tools for businesses to better understand their business through quantitative reporting (including sustainability reporting) and enterprise resource planning software. Hence, one would expect their Annual Sustainability Report to be a highly readable and information-rich document, which is exactly what it is.

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In 1905 GE established its financial services business with the launch of a small utility finance company. Now as we face an uncertain 21st century, GE is now a global green business financier.

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Surveying solar PV manufacturers around the world, a non-proift, in conultation with a wide range of experts, establishes environmental, health & safety, and business management best practices for the industry sector while at the same time criticizing current energy policies which favor production of fossil fuels.

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Public companies are increasingly tracking earth-related metrics, from waste to water to carbon and energy. As a HIP investor, you will see improvements in reporting these metrics over time, and will be better prepared to identify leading companies who will have higher profits and shareholder value.

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On Thursday, the U.S. Senate approved legislation that will legalize crowdfunding and allow the general public to make equity investments in start-up companies and small businesses.

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Healthy, wealthy and wise, said Ben Franklin. Leading companies seek out strategies to build wealth and health for employees, typically resulting in higher customer satisfaction and productivity.

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Solving human needs – Health, Wealth, Earth, Equality and Trust – can be profitable. This feature delves into metrics of physical & mental health that can be leading indicators of financial performance.

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By G. Nagesh Rao Social media has transformed the outlook for entrepreneurs and for innovation as a whole. The speed at which knowledge and information is spread around the globe has pulled down barriers and leveled the playing field for would-be entrepreneurs everywhere. At the same time, silos that separate businesses and economies are also [...]

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5 types of metrics – Health, Wealth, Earth, Equality, & Trust – are frequently ignored in financial reports & by traditional stock analysts. These metrics are seen as “soft” when they actually relate to “hard” value.

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In this excerpt, we examine 5 human needs – health, wealth, earth, equality and trust – that have potential to generate high growth of top-line revenue and innovative leadership in billion-person markets.

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For Goldman Sachs’ critics, former vice president Greg Smith’s resignation via a New York Times op-ed piece confirms what they think of the 143-year-old investment bank.

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A couple of weeks ago I wrote about why I want to become an impact investor and why I chose MicroPlace as my broker. Since then, I’ve been perusing investment options on MicroPlace to figure out where in the world my money is most badly needed—a pretty daunting task, considering that every single investment offered on the platform is worthy.

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SJF Ventures and Citi Community Capital, Citigroup’s community lending and investment group, announced the closing of SJF Ventures III LP, the first nationally focused Impact Investment SBIC fund. Licensed by the US Small Business Investment Corp. (SBIC) under its new Impact Investment Initiative, the SFJ Ventures III fund will make equity investments in growth-stage cleantech and “positive impact” companies.

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Whole Foods Market is performing very well in the stock market. An article on Motley Fool argued that these results are connected to the fact that Whole Foods’ mission is “making its business really matter, in far more ways than the traditional bottom line.” In other words, Whole Foods has become an impressive example to the business case of sustainability. But is it true?

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Just days before BP was set to go to trial with a group of more than 100,000 plaintiffs, the company announced over the weekend that it would agree to a settlement of $7.8 billion dollars.

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As companies consider the steps in incorporating or re-incorporating as a benefit corporation, one unique aspect of the process continues to cause confusion. It is the idea that a company’s “material positive impact” will be determined by a third-party standard. This post reviews what that means and provides a list of third party standards available.

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Contrary to popular belief, humans have failed to address the earth’s worsening emergencies of climate change, species’ extinction and resource overconsumption not because of a lack of information, but because of a lack of imagination, social scientists and artists say.

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Sen. John Bingaman and supporters are once again introducing federal legislation that would require power utilities to generate electricity from clean energy sources. Though the Clean Energy Standard Act of 2012 is once again likely to be shot down in Congress, the push for a long overdue overhaul of federal energy policy focused on clean energy looks certain to be a “hot button” issue right through the November elections.

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The Club of Rome and the Smithsonian Institution’s Consortium for Understanding and Sustaining a Biodiverse Planet are hosting a symposium on March 1, 2012 to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the launching of Limits to Growth, the first report to the Club of Rome published in 1972.

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