Burgess COMMENTARY
Comments on this event:

PeterBurgess • a few seconds ago
An interesting interview. Early on Bugg-Levine talks about the need for systemic reform in order to have more impact investing. I was very disappointed, however, in the way he discounted the role of metrics in facilitating systemic change. I reminds of the 1960s and 1970s when senior executives in many corporate organizations did not 'get it' that management information would result in radical reform of the corporate organization and how it was run.

I have a passion for management metrics, and I make no apology for this. Good management metrics do not have a net cost to the organization, but produce an important valuadd. The silly metrics that are often implemented do have cost, and do not produce much value. People have got to differentiate between good management metrics and silly metrics ... but in general they do not.

Without meaningful metrics about everything that matters, people are going to choose what they want and be inordinately influenced by people who can 'spin a good story' without the data and rigorous metrics that validate the story.

I should also observe that a good system of management metrics for society and the economy will serve all the different organizations and structures in a completely agnostic manner. I want to see metrics that help to differentiate using the same system of metrics between the performance of a highly profitable but environmentally disastrous organization on the one hand and the impact of, say, a microfinance investment in a village in Africa, or a health clinic, or a safe potable water supply.

I very much like what Bugg-Levine is talking about, and have a lot of respect for what he has accomplished. I only take issue with his position on the relative importance of metrics in the management of society and the economy.

Peter Burgess - TrueValueMetrics
Multi Dimension Impact Accounting
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Avatar Marzena Zukowska • 20 days ago Hello NextBillion,

Thank you for hosting this fantastic event! Here is my question for Mr. Bugg-Levine:

From my knowledge and experience working at Ashoka Changemakers, measuring impact and obtaining quantifiable results in the social is oftentimes difficult. However, when investors are putting money on line, they want to see progress towards a measurable goal. How can investors and social innovators meet somewhere in the middle? Do you think that the growth of impact investing could be getting us towards that middle ground?

Thank you, Marzena Media Manager and Strategist Ashoka Changemakers •Reply•Share ›

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Avatar scottnextbillion • 18 days ago

Wow, great discussion! Thanks so much for taking part in NBFI's first Google Hangout, Antony. I had one followup question. When it comes to impact investing funds, the focus seems to be on small and medium sized businesses (SMEs) is that where it needs to stay? And if so, what about smaller, but higher risk types of businesses? •Reply•Share ›

Tuesday, October 15, 2013 Google Hangout with Antony Bugg-Levine: Watch the replay of our conversation with an impact investing pioneer By James Militzer Antony Bugg-Levine

We’re excited to announce NextBillion Financial Innovation’s first Google Hangout. It will take place on Oct. 15 at 2:00 PM Eastern Standard (US) Time, and we’ve got an outstanding guest lined up. Antony Bugg-Levine is truly a pioneer in impact investing. In fact, as the founding board chair of the Global Impact Investing Network, he convened the 2007 meeting in which the phrase “impact investing” was first coined.

As a managing director at the Rockefeller Foundation, he designed and led the Harnessing the Power of Impact Investing initiative. And he currently serves as CEO of the Nonprofit Finance Fund, a nonprofit financial intermediary at which he oversees more than $340 million of investment capital and works with a range of philanthropic, private sector and government partners to develop and implement innovative approaches to financing social change. Mr. Bugg-Levine writes and speaks on the evolution of the social sector and the emergence of the global impact investing industry. He is the co-author of Impact Investing: Transforming How We Make Money While Making a Difference. He’s also an associate adjunct professor in the Social Enterprise Program at the Columbia Business School.

We’re delighted to have the opportunity to bring his insights to you in a live interview format – and we’d like to make it as interactive as possible.

So if you have any questions that you’d like to ask Mr. Bugg-Levine, you can share them in the comments section of this post, in an email (jamesmil@umich.edu) or on Twitter (@NextBillionFI). We’ll ask as many audience questions as possible in the interview, but depending on the response, we may have to do so on a first-come/first-served basis. So please submit your questions ASAP. You can watch the interview live on NextBillion Financial Innovation on Oct. 15 at 2:00 PM EST. Just come back to this post a little before 2:00 PM, and a Google Hangout video window will be embedded below. The video will start automatically, and it will be streamed and recorded to YouTube. The recorded video will remain embedded in this post, so you can view it at your convenience if you don’t have a chance to tune in for the live event.