Years ago, I was attending the SRI Conference. I hosted a small reception in my hotel room. To keep in their good graces, I invited the conference guests staying adjacent to my hotel room to join in the festivities. One of those guests was Leslie Samuelrich, President of Green Century Capital Management. We had never met before, but she came right over, and we’ve been friends since. Recently, I was able to interview her about one of her recent impact success stories. I hope you enjoy hearing the story as much as I did.

This article was originally published on CNBC on April 22, 2019.

Donald Trump’s surprising ascent to president of the United States has brought many unexpected effects to the financial markets. Ironically, one has been a rapid increase in interest and adoption of impact investing and other types of values-based investing.

Values-aligned investing is called by many different names, which are commonly misused or misunderstood by investors.

Let me decode the lingo, because a shared understanding of the terminology makes this type of investing more accessible to advisors and investors alike.

Earlier this month I featured some of my favorite impact investing “a-ha” moments from impact investing interviews I’ve written. Some of my Connected Investing readers shared their “a-ha” moments with me and I’m sharing a few here, with their permission.

Whenever I have the pleasure of interviewing an impact investing leader, I love to ask if they have an “a-ha moment” that led them to impact, ESG or SRI investing. It's one of my favorite things to ask, and it's one of the things my readers tell me they most enjoy. Below are some of the highlights, with links back to their interviews.

Sonya explains ESG, SRI, and Impact Investing- each in under a minute, on captioned video.

I'm excited to share with you a paper I co-authored on the racial disparities in staffs and boards of SRI mutual funds. Socially responsible funds pursue positive social and environmental impact through both investment selection and shareholder engagement. Because people of color are often affected first and worst by the issues SRI funds are trying to improve, it would behoove the industry to have people of color in decision-making positions at these firms, at least in an amount representative of the US population. (Although I'm making the business case here, but I don't believe we need a business case to treat people equitably and create systems that are more just.)

Can an Index have Impact? John Streur, CEO of Calvert says it absolutely can.

The three themes I predict we'll see in the impact investing world in 2019. I'd love to hear what your predictions are too.

The most popular, controversial, and most engaged content I've put out in 2018.

One of the benefits of using impact investing and ESG strategies with clients is that it allows clients to connect with their investments on more than just financial considerations. I wonder though, if the appreciation of knowing what you own is reflective of a larger trend. Has the move toward indexing led us to lose sight of what investing really is?

1. How do we effectively measure impact?

Although this theme is one I've seen before, the discussion feels more mature now. There is less talk about whether to measure impact and more talk about how to do it effectively. The “how” continues to be challenging, both in public and private investments. Best practices are focusing on materiality, and looking at impact holistically to consider the various communities each investment affects and what positive impact looks like to those communities.

The most common advice I share with clients is “share stories!” I love helping people tell impact investing stories and if you’ve heard me speak at a conference before, you’ve likely heard me tell this story of my first involvement with impact investing.

Last month I wrote about the important distinction between SRI and ESG. Today I'm continuing on that theme and answering one of the questions I get about terminology: what is impact investing and why do you use that term?

Almost every conference or panel discussion about impact or sustainable investing starts with a discussion of terminology. While it's annoying that we have to start all of our conversations with a discussion about semantics, that discussion is incredibly important.

Pat Miguel Tomaino is the director of socially responsible investing at Zevin Asset Management and is a leader in using shareholder advocacy to advance racial and gender justice initiatives.

We met recently at an impact investing event in Philadelphia and I’m excited to include his recent impact investing success story in my series of interviews.

If the work you are doing is even tangentially related to impact investing, you’ve likely heard chatter about the SDGs, which is short for the UN Sustainable Development Goals. I mentioned them as one of the top themes I saw in 2017, and they continue to come up at every impact focused event I attend. So let’s do a quick catch up. What are the SDGs, why are impact investing professionals talking about them, and what’s next?

I don't know about you, but sometimes it feels hard or even superficial to focus on work while seeing the heartbreaking stories of immigrant families being separated at the border. But how do we also leverage our positions in financial services to make pragmatic steps forward with the financial levers available to us? I have some thoughts.

Marian Wright Edelman says, “you can’t be what you can’t see.” It’s tough to stay in a field (let alone advance) when there are no colleagues or leaders who look like you. It’s not just that you can’t see the path to the top, it’s also that peers and managers can’t imagine “someone like you” as a leader.

One of the things I often speak and write about is the lack of diversity in financial services. We’re not even close to reflecting the racial, ethnic, or gender diversity of the United States. Today I want to share one relatively easy starting point where each of us can make an impact and push our companies and colleagues towards improvement.

I distinctly remember my mom preparing to ask for a raise so that she would be earning the same salary as her male physical therapist peers. I even remember the number; she asked for a 12% raise and equity participation. Her boss said no. What I don’t remember is seeing her feeling dejected, which she must have felt. Maybe she hid that for the benefit of us kids; I was 8, my brother 5. What I do remember is her being frustrated, then angry, then resolute. She was going to quit and start her own business.