Aligning the endowment with mission is an iterative process and includes ongoing monitoring of the endowment portfolio in terms of both financial performance and alignment with mission.

1. Measure the Endowment’s Financial Progress

In order to signal their focus on long-term investing, endowments will include a benchmark that matches their endowment's long term financial goals such as an inflation plus spending benchmark.

An intentional endowment may also choose to benchmark financial performance against an index that reflects its investment policy more closely. In addition to the standard broad market benchmarks, many index providers now offer benchmarks that address systemic factors including social inequality and the climate crisis. Some examples include:

• MSCI Sustainability Indexes: MSCI offers thousands of sustainable equity and fixed income indexes.
• FTSE Russell Sustainable Investment Indices: comprehensive range of sustainable investment indices spanning equities, fixed income and alternative asset classes.
• Adasina Social Justice Index (JUSTICE): a global universe of public companies whose practices are in alignment with social justice values.
• Etho Climate Leadership Index (ETHO): invests in climate leaders, removes companies associated with forced labor, discrimination, prisons, and other risk factors. 
• Sphere 500 Index (SPFFX): has the top 500 US companies by market capitalization, minus 93 companies.
• World Benchmarking Alliance Climate Benchmark: assesses the 2,000 most influential companies, also known as the SDG2000, on their responsibility to transition towards a sustainable, low-carbon economy, and in a way that is fair, inclusive and mindful of its impact on workers, communities and other affected stakeholders.

2. Measure Endowment Alignment with Mission

Endowments can use some of the same tools that were used in the original portfolio assessment to continue to monitor progress in aligning the endowment with the institution’s mission on a regular interval (annual or more frequent). Review those steps and tools for measurement here.

3. Use a Comprehensive Portfolio Impact Monitoring Framework

Read IEN’s five-step guide to implementing comprehensive impact management across your portfolio here. The guide points you to resources for learning more about impact management, setting impact goals, selecting the most relevant metrics and collecting data on them, analyzing that data and reporting your findings. Or take a quick look at three examples that are gaining traction with endowments and foundations:

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