Observations on Diverse Manager Selection Across Asset Classes
At Commonfund, we believe diverse managers offer clients access to investment talent and valuable investment opportunities and therefore should be explored and invested in. Overlooking the merits of...
Diversity and Inclusion: Ways to Make a Change
Across the United States, citizens are gathering to protest the unjust deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery; each of these individuals fell victim to police brutality and racial...
In Remembrance
The senseless killings of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor and most recently, George Floyd have once again brought the scourge of racism to the forefront of our nation’s conscience. For many Americans,...
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion: Staying the Course in Uncertain Times
The times we are living in are unprecedented. On March 11th, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared that the spread of COVID-19 constituted a global pandemic. Currently, in the U.S., the virus...
Commonfund’s First Invitational Diverse Manager Day
On January 16th Commonfund held its first invitational Diverse Manager Day. The day was made possible as a result of the success we had from submissions to the Diverse Manager Portal launched last...
Announcing the Commonfund Diverse Manager Portal
In the fall of 2018, Commonfund announced the creation of its Diversity and Inclusion Office with the mission to “intentionally promote and foster inclusion and equity across Commonfund and our...
Looking at Gender Lens Investing
What is Gender Lens Investing? Gender lens investing has garnered significant traction in the last decade. Broadly speaking, gender lens investing aims to achieve financial returns and benefit...
Traits of High-performing Boards … and Steps Toward Becoming One
Tom Hyatt is a partner in the Washington. D.C. law firm of Dentons US LLP and an authority on nonprofit governance. This blog is excerpted from a presentation he made recently at the Commonfund...
Diverse and Emerging Manager Programs: Worth Doing Well
Michael Rowland is the Commonfund Institute Summer Intern. He is a rising senior at Case Western Reserve University. He is majoring in Finance and Accounting. What are Diverse and Emerging Manager...
Commonfund Hosts Girls Who Invest at NYC Event
Girls Who Invest (GWI) is an organization focused on bringing more women into the field of asset management, a goal that Commonfund strongly supports. Every year, GWI invites rising juniors into...
The 5 Top Stewardship Imperatives
Christopher K. Merker, PhD, CFA, is a financial advisor and director of Private Asset Management at Robert W. Baird & Co. and an adjunct professor at Marquette University. He is also the co-author of...
Museums and Cultural Institutions: To Accept or Not to Accept, That Is the Question
In the last few months, high profile nonprofit institutions have come under intense scrutiny for ethical dilemmas pertaining to the stewardship of resources meant to support mission. In a three-part...
Applying the Endowment Model to Diversity and Inclusion
Commonfund recently launched a Diversity Office, a formal, cross departmental effort focused on diversity and inclusion. The mission of the Commonfund Diversity Office is to intentionally promote and...
Investing in Diversity
At Commonfund, we scour the globe to find investment managers that we believe have the ability to consistently produce excess returns (alpha) over and beyond their benchmark. But alpha alone is not...
10 Key Takeaways from Commonfund Forum 2018
Commonfund recently hosted its 20th annual Commonfund Forum in Orlando, Florida. The event brought together 400 institutional investors from the U.S., Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Canada, Chile...
How Does Board Structure Affect Performance?
The structure of a board has an important influence on its effectiveness, and being cognizant of these matters is essential to improving a board’s performance. In this article, we’ll discuss four...
ESG: What is it?
Generally speaking, Environmental Social and Governance, or ESG for short, is used to describe a group of characteristics that can have a material impact on the long-term success of a company and,...
10 Point Checklist to Get Governance Right
The regulatory and legislative landscape continues to become more rigorous for nonprofit organizations. In an atmosphere of increasing calls for accountability, boards and senior staff need to take...