In the same way that the accountancy profession has standardized accounting principles with GAAP, IRIS+ provides a generally accepted impact accounting system. IRIS+ combines impact investing’s most widely used impact performance metrics with research, evidence, and practical implementation guidance into a single, curated system.

Origins

In 2008, the Rockefeller Foundation gathered a group of pioneering impact investors to identify and begin to address critical barriers to investing for social and environmental impact, while also expecting a financial return. These investors, many of whom became the founding members of the Global Impact Investing Network (GIIN) Investors’ Council identified a lack of transparency and credibility in how funds define, track, and report the social and environmental performance of their portfolios. This scarcity of consistent, credible non-financial performance information also prevented fair comparisons between impact investing opportunities, development of social and environmental performance benchmarks, and other aggregate industry analyses. 

To address these challenges, The Rockefeller Foundation, Acumen and B Lab began efforts to create common metrics for reporting the performance of impact capital, with technical support from Hitachi, Deloitte, and PricewaterhouseCoopers. The IRIS Catalog of Metrics, one component of today’s IRIS+ System, was founded. Acknowledging that significant progress had already been made in sectors like microfinance where standardized metrics, data aggregation, and rating tools had already been developed, the founders mandated that the IRIS Catalog of Metrics incorporate and build on these sector-specific efforts in order to provide a common language that enables comparison and communication across the breadth of organizations that prioritize social or environmental impact. As a result, the IRIS Catalog of Metrics aligns with over 50 third-party standards and/or analytics platforms, growing that number even today. Read more about our standards alignment.

In late 2009, the GIIN became the home of the IRIS Catalog of Metrics and industry efforts to build crucial impact measurement & management infrastructure. Since then, IRIS+ the Catalog has evolved from its initial list of metrics drawn from a variety of standards and reporting frameworks. As a result of extensive, ongoing stakeholder engagement, it is now a more standardized, comprehensive, and nuanced Catalog supported by a set of features that enable investors, data platforms, and others to integrate it seamlessly into their work. 

Adoption

In 2011, 29 leading impact investors signed a letter of support for the Catalog of IRIS Metrics, recognizing standardized social and environmental performance as an industry best practice and strongly encouraging peer “impact investment funds and their portfolio companies to adopt IRIS Metrics for their performance reporting.” For more information about the GIIN’s role in the emergence of standards in impact investing, see How Standards Emerge: The Role of Investor Leadership in Realizing the Potential of IRIS (MIT Innovations, 2011).

Evolution and Impact Performance

In 2019, the GIIN released the IRIS+ System. Designed with input from hundreds of leading impact investing practitioners from around the world, the GIIN offers the IRIS+ system so investors and companies will have a common understanding of how to effectively measure and manage their impact and clarity for how to improve that impact over time. 

In 2022, the GIIN released a first-of-its-kind tool for impact investing, the IRIS+ Impact Performance Benchmarks. The first benchmark to be released, with more to follow, focused on financial inclusion. This tool gives investors the critical ability to understand and assess their impact as it relates to their peers and the broader market in which they are investing. 

Future

For further detail on IRIS+, its components, and its uses, see the IRIS+ Conceptual Framework. For more information on the GIIN vision for the future of impact investing and the role that standards like IRIS+ will play, read the Roadmap for the Future of Impact Investing. Among other actions, the Roadmap calls for efforts to “strengthen the identity of impact investing by establishing clear principles and standards for practice, such as by more clearly articulating the defining characteristics of an impact investor, developing standardized best practices for impact measurement and management, and facilitating collaboration among investors with different goals and preferences.” The IRIS+ system squarely addresses this key action to advance the vision for impact investing.

To get involved with the over 1800+ individuals supporting and guiding the development of IRIS+, sign up here.