The Future of Sustainable Investing in Endowments with George Suttles

George Suttles is Executive Director of the Common Fund Institute, where he leads the organization's education, benchmarking, and professional development work for endowment and foundation investors. In this episode, Suttles joins host Georges Dyer to discuss how institutional investors are approaching sustainable and mission-aligned investing amid a shifting political and regulatory environment, a conversation relevant to any CIO, trustee, or asset manager weighing how to hold a long-term course through short-term pressure. Key themes covered in this episode: - How fiduciary duty and sustainable investing intersect for long-term institutional investors - What long-running endowment research shows about the direction of the field - How institutions build governance literacy through structured professional development - The current state of diverse manager allocation amid legal and political headwinds This conversation offers a grounded, practitioner's view of how institutional capital continues to evolve without departing from fiduciary discipline.   --   Resources: IEN 2026 Annual Forum 📅 November 18–20, 2026 📍 University of Toronto, ON 🔗 https://www.zeffy.com/en-US/ticketing/2026-annual-forum NACUBO-Commonfund Study of Endowments — https://www.commonfund.org/commonfund-benchmark-studies Investment Stewardship Academy (Commonfund Institute, Yale University) — https://www.commonfund.org/investment-stewardship-academy Espresso Chats podcast (Commonfund Institute) — https://www.commonfund.org/espressochats Impact Finance Center's Diverse Managers initiative — https://impactfinancecenter.org/diverse-managers/   -- General Timestamps: 00:00 Introduction 01:59 Fiduciary Duty and Staying the Course 06:22 Where Institutional Investors Stand Today 10:06 How Asset Managers Are Responding 15:45 Inside the NACUBO-Commonfund Study of Endowments 20:41 Building Governance Literacy 29:36 Diverse Managers Amid Legal and Political Headwinds 38:23 What Effective Governance Change Looks Like 45:59 Closing Thoughts and Advice