For institutional investors, the key benchmark for many professionals is the S&P 500®, which is considered to be the best single gauge of large-cap U. S. equities. More than US$7 trillion in Assets Under Management are benchmarked to this index, including indexed AUM of $1.9 trillion. In all, the S&P 500 captures 80% coverage of available market cap.
The esteemed business teacher and author Peter Drucker had specific views on ethical leadership: He thought the ethics of personal responsibility stemmed from the advice of the ancient healer, Hippocrates: Primum Non Nocere – First Do No Harm. Today’s healthcare professionals live by the rule. And explains commentator William Cohen, PhD for us: Drucker thought the mirror test was a good test: look in the mirror and ask, what kind of person do I want to see this morning?
Measuring a company’s success in responsible corporate sustainability
Blog
Social and environmental responsibility are more than just words
Are companies in the energy sector socially and environmentally responsible? How do you prove it?
International ‘sustainability’ investment experts — with the evidence to back it up — think they have the answers.
In fact, they believe that long-term survival for organizations has become increasingly dependent on their skillset in navigating sustainability issues and complex societal challenges. And many companies are doing exactly that.
Former Prime Minister Gro Harlem Brundtland of Norway (and then special envoy for the United Nations) was invited by the UN to create and manage a “World Commission on Environment and Development (“WCED”), which over time became known as the “Brundtland Commission.” The commission gave the world a framework for moving forward on what would become known as “sustainable development.”
Each year, the Corporate Citizenship Film Festival provides companies with an opportunity to demonstrate how they have utilized video as a tool to communicate their environmental, social, and governance efforts. Sixty-eight entries were submitted into this year's festival, showcasing how companies are having a positive impact in communities on their corner and around the world. Community involvement, economic development, and environmental stewardship are just some of the topics which were touched on by the 2016 participants.
Many nations have created what can be defined as a “Sovereign Wealth Fund,” which hold assets in portfolio that are supposed to benefit the entire population, and usually, future generations of the country’s citizens. The first such fund was launched in 1954 by the oil-producing nation of Kuwait. Today, the largest such “SWF” is that of Norway – officially, the Norway Government Pension Investment Fund – with “wealth” now approaching US$1 trillion in Assets Under Management.
Despite our best efforts, separating ourselves from nature is a fruitless endeavor. So long as we are made primarily of carbon, we are nature. So long as we breath in oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide, we are nature.
As I sit down to write this post, I think my mood can be described best by the following: feeling a temptation towards philosophical musings of the sort that would come naturally to you if we were sipping Earl Grey tea surrounded by many leather bound books. And here we go….
Graham Sinclair is one of the influentials, the thought leaders in sustainability. He shares his views on “mainstreaming sustainable investment” with us on the Triple Pundit platform. He sees 2016 as the year of the “new normal” for brand name asset owners and their managers to embrace ESG factors in their decision-making. An example is the CDP signatory base of now 822 financial institutions with US$95 trillion in Assets Under Management (AUM). Another strong signal is the Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change – 120 members with 13 trillion Euros in AUM. And, PRI with 302 as
