Photo: Jacqueline Dersjant
Impact investing as an entrepreneurial investor
Entrepreneurial investors often bring a distinct perspective: they are used to building, spotting opportunities and making decisions quickly. Impact investing can introduce a new set of questions. What do you want your capital to contribute to? Which opportunities fit your experience and convictions? And how actively do you want to be involved yourself? At PYM, peers share their experiences – from investment decisions and portfolio construction to the role they choose to play themselves – and explore new opportunities for impact together.
Read below to discover the steps you can take on your journey towards impact.
1. Read and get inspired
I see climate as a problem that we can and must solve now within one generation
Michiel is an impact investor with a focus on climate. Since selling his company in 2022, he has been investing his capital, time, strategy, and involvement in the energy transition, particularly in sustainable innovation and scalable initiatives. He invests in funds and directly, preferably with entrepreneurs who combine vision with a sense of reality.
I invest where the market fails, and I can make a difference
Marleen Kappert invests directly and via funds in innovative future-proof companies. She invested her first savings on the stock exchange and built her own impact portfolio. As a risk entrepreneur, she finances and invests in affordable and sustainable housing.
You shouldn't want to invest on your own
After founding two tech startups, Jochem Wieringa turned his attention to alternative financial services. Now, Jochem is an impact investor with a focus on Africa, where the perceived risk is high and the additionality is significant.
2. Watch the introduction video
What does impact investing actually mean?
In this video, together with CSP, we introduce the fundamentals of impact investing. How does it differ from traditional or sustainable investing? And what opportunities are there across different impact themes and asset classes?
3. Join Inside Impact investing
Learn from experience
During this online session, we briefly revisit the key principles of impact investing before focusing on practice. An experienced impact investor shares how they assess opportunities, make investment decisions, build their portfolio and navigate questions and dilemmas along the way. There is plenty of room to ask your own questions and learn from someone who has already taken these steps. This gives you insight not only into what is possible, but also into how other investors have developed their own approach.
4. Discover the meaning of your money
Impact investing does not start with the question of what you want to invest in, but why. Taking the time to reflect on what your wealth means to you can make it easier to choose investments that align with your values and ambitions. And that sense of purpose often leads to contributing more than capital alone — through your time, knowledge, network and personal involvement.
We will soon be organising regular gatherings around this topic. Want to get started now? Read Spark Your Meaning by Liet van Beuningen, which helps you explore the values that matter most to you.
5. Speak to a PYM ambassador
Do you have questions about how to shape your portfolio or select promising opportunities? Or would you like to hear how other entrepreneurial investors decide where to get actively involved and how much time to dedicate to their investments? Let us know what is on your mind. Maud will be happy to connect you with a PYM Ambassador who has experience with similar questions and can share their own insights with you.
Maud van Beuningen
PYM Board Member
6. Join a knowledge session
7. Join a PYM Impact Circle
Veerle Berbers
Board member
8. Discover new investment opportunities
Many investors discover their next investment through other investors. Within the PYM community, members share investment opportunities, experiences and lessons through our dealsharing platform. Join the dealsharing mailing list to hear about new opportunities shared within the community.
Dealsharing is exclusively available to members of the PYM community.
9. Find a deep dive expert or club
Sometimes it helps to go deeper together with a specialised advisor. For example, when assessing an investment opportunity, developing your portfolio further or deciding what role you want to play as an investor.
As an independent organisation, PYM is happy to think along with you and connect you with an expert or Trusted Partner who fits your situation, without having a financial interest in the choices you make.
Suzanne Rosman
Director
10. Keep learning
Impact investing is not an end point, but an ongoing learning process. As you make more investments, the questions often change too. Which opportunities still fit your strategy? Where do you want to be actively involved, and where not? And how do you continue building a portfolio that makes sense both financially and in terms of impact? By sharing experiences, questions and dilemmas with other entrepreneurial investors, you can continue to develop both your portfolio and your own approach. Conversations with people who are equally used to assessing opportunities, building businesses and making decisions can offer valuable new perspectives.
We are currently developing a more in-depth programme for experienced investors. Until then, we would be happy to connect you with other PYM members exploring similar questions.