Investors talk a lot about risk, returns, liquidity, and performance.
What if we prioritized impact risk?
Impact risk is the risk of not getting our desired impact.
As investors, imagine if the primary risks we were managing for were those that might impede our progress towards the desired social or environmental impact.
The Impact Management Project describes 9 types of impact risks. One that I love is: “Stakeholder Participation Risk” which they define as “The probability that the expectations and/or experience of stakeholders are misunderstood or not taken into account.”
Let’s take a step back.
What is our purpose? What are you put here on earth to help bring about? (This line of inquiry, which I often enjoy returning to – has often led many to explore different theological, philosophical and wisdom traditions. It’s also why Elizabeth and I lean in on Catholic Social Teaching as a wisdom framework that can help.)
Once you’ve gained a bit of clarity on your desired purpose and desired impact, then the question becomes:
Are you managing your money like you actually care about that desired outcome / future?
Conventional finance and investing doesn’t offer good options to steward our money towards our desired impact. To practice good stewardship towards desired impact / purpose requires an immense amount of hard work going against the grain of conventional investment management and advisory services.
If you are looking for a cohort of peers to go on this journey of caring more about the long-term meaning and purpose and achieving legacy through impact, then you might consider our workshop: Livable Future Investing.
We’re building a special cohort of investors (and a smaller group of managers) to roll up their sleeves on what we believe might be our most important work.