From Belissa Rojas and Velina Serafimov from Fondaction Asset Management

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Finance has never had more potential to drive positive change. With capital markets increasingly focused on sustainability and impact, the opportunity to align investment decisions with meaningful outcomes is unprecedented.

At Fondaction Asset Management (FAM), this opportunity drives everything we do. As a fully impact-focused asset manager, we aim to deliver competitive financial returns while creating meaningful social and environmental outcomes. Now in our third year, we're reflecting on what it really takes to drive sustainable development through finance.

From our experience, and through conversations with peers, we’ve observed several recurring patterns that hold organizations back from reaching their full impact potential. Many teams become absorbed in designing granular metrics but lose sight of the bigger picture. Sophisticated measurement systems are valuable, but they can create the illusion of progress without real-world change. When teams focus on tracking micro-outcomes in isolation, deeper questions get lost: Is this intervention tackling the root cause of the problem? Are we challenging the conditions that keep systems stuck? Is the effect significant enough to drive the desired change? Are we really contributing to solutions? Without a broader lens, measurement becomes a substitute for strategy and meaningful change.

Sustainability and Impact also often gets separated from core decision-making. ESG and /or Impact teams may be well-intentioned, but when their insights aren't embedded into financial strategy, governance, or product development, outcomes remain disconnected from business decisions. Impact becomes a parallel track instead of part of how the organization actually works. Real transformation happens when leadership takes ownership of sustainability across every level of the business.

Impact frequently gets treated as a specialist function confined to technical teams. While expertise is essential, it isn't enough. When sustainability language stays with a few roles, broader engagement suffers. Colleagues feel uncertain about how to contribute, or afraid to ask the wrong questions. This creates disengagement at the very moment finance needs more curiosity, collaboration, and bold thinking. It hinders business ability to innovate to deliver impactful solutions.

There’s also a common tendency to mistake compliance for commitment. Sustainability frameworks play a crucial role - they raise the bar and create comparability. But following rules isn’t the same as managing for impact. When reporting becomes the primary goal, measuring impact becoming performative rather than purposeful. We treat frameworks as tools to support better decisions, not external demands to satisfy.

Building Impact from the Inside Out

For us, real impact starts with people.

In 2024, we launched our in-house ESG and Impact Program for business practitioners to build capabilities on how managers can apply an ESG and impact lens to their business decisions on a daily basis. Every team member, including executive leadership, participates as part of its ongoing training development. Earlier this year, we have achieved a key milestons: all FAM employees have completed the IMM for the SDG course based on the SDG Impact Standards, developed by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and delivered through Duke University.

Unlike traditional frameworks focused on disclosure, the SDG Impact Standards support decision-making. They offer practical guidance for embedding sustainability into governance, strategy, management, and transparency practices. These aren’t abstract ideals. They’re everyday tools that help ensure our decisions generate value for people and the planet—not just portfolios.

This shared experience gave us a common language and deeper understanding of what managing for impact really means. We’ve embedded the standards into our internal processes and investment approach, contributing to the global momentum that helped shape the ISO/UNDP Guidelines for the SDGs, released in 2024 by UNDP and the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). These guidelines provide practical tools and a shared language to help organizations embed sustainability into strategy, operations, and investment decisions—moving from SDG alignment to SDG action.

As Cathy Clark, Faculty Director at Duke University’s CASE center, puts it:

“The SDG Impact Standards are not about reporting. They are about how you run your organization.”

We share that view. These standards aren’t about ticking boxes. They’re about aligning values with actions in how organizations govern, grow, and make decisions.

What Real Change Requires

We’re not alone in this thinking. At the Fourth International Financing for Development Conference (FFD4), held in Sevilla, Spain from June 30 to July 3, 2025, UNDP’s Head of Private Finance for the SDGs, Sebnem Sener, reflected on how momentum around the SDG Impact Standards is starting to shift:

“What makes this moment significant is not just the number of people being trained. It’s how organizations are choosing to act on that knowledge. Seeing asset managers embed the standards across their entire teams is a sign that impact management is moving from the margins to the mainstream.”

That resonated with us. Thousands have now been trained on the SDG Impact Standards globally, but the real challenge lies in what happens next. For us, the training wasn’t the finish line. It was the starting point.

We’ve since continued to integrate the standards into our strategy and governance model. Our goal isn’t to comply but to lead. We’re building a culture where impact shapes how we define success, evaluate performance, and design financial solutions.

Building on this foundation, UNDP and ISO are now co-developing the Management System Standards for the SDGs, a global sustainability benchmark expected in 2026.

We know that systems don’t change unless people do. And people rarely change without space to learn, reflect, and ask better questions. The kind of impact we are working toward can’t be achieved through metrics alone. It requires a mindset shift. It requires organizations to make space for purpose, build internal trust, and take accountability seriously.

We’ve chosen to build an asset manager that puts values into practice. That view impacts not as a limitation but as a source of innovation. That believes finance can be a force for good, but only if it starts with how we lead and how we choose to act.

We are still early in our journey, and we know we can’t walk it alone. But we are convinced that progress happens through shared commitment. If this resonates with you, we’d welcome the opportunity to connect.

Let’s explore what’s possible when we align capital with courage and intention with action.

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Interested in discussing how to embed impact thinking in your organization? Contact FAM to continue the conversation.

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