Vital Capital’s Head of ESG & Impact Tamar Pashtan recently joined a panel of impact investing leaders to discuss one of the industry’s most pressing topics: alignment in impact performance reporting. The discussion, hosted by impact verification firm BlueMark, was based on research from the firm’s latest report, ‘Raising the Bar: Aligning on the Key Elements of Impact Performance Reporting.’
High-quality, standardized impact performance reporting is critical for ensuring industry integrity. However, the lack of widely-accepted standards or guidelines for reporting on impact performance makes it difficult to meaningfully analyze and compare impact results.
BlueMark’s analysis of 31 GP impact reports and interviews with 57 diverse industry stakeholders found that impact objectives vary considerably in their specificity; reported impact results are often cherry-picked; impact reports are rarely forthcoming about risks or failures; and reporters often overlook the stakeholder perspective.
The panel, moderated by BlueMark Managing Director Sarah Gelfand, featured Tamar; Fran Seegull, President of the U.S. Impact Investing Alliance and Executive Director of the Tipping Point Fund on Impact Investing; Elizabeth Seeger, Managing Director, Sustainable Investing at KKR; and Bhavika Vyas, Managing Director at StepStone Group. They delved into the current state of impact performance reporting among GPs and fund managers, best practices, and potential pathways to improve the quality and usefulness of impact reports going forward.
Listen to the full discussion here.
