Today, ILPA’s Diversity in Action initiative released its first progress report. Last December, Forgepoint was one of the founding signatories of the initiative, which seeks to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in the venture capital and private equity industry. This progress report focuses on accountability through DEI metrics and data capture.

We feel strongly that taking meaningful and measurable action is the right thing to do. As Managing Director Alberto Yepez says, “The DEI movement recognizes that despite significant progress, access to opportunity at all levels remains unequal. It is our duty and responsibility to make the social and professional spaces we inhabit more diverse, equitable and inclusive for the betterment of society.”

Building a diverse team with different perspectives and backgrounds has been core to our team since our founding, thanks to our underrepresented founders Don Dixon and Alberto Yepez. Tracking the below statistics and others like it are critical for us and the industry to reveal how we can improve and what to take pride in.

*Data taken from NVCA’s VC Human Capital Survey (2020)

We’ve taken steps to support our portfolio companies in their DEI efforts. We’re proactively promoting diverse candidates for board seats and key roles within the companies we invest in (and tracking our progress, similar to internal metrics). We’ve also connected our portfolio companies with DEI tools like Diversio and underrepresented talent networks such as ICMCP. Most recently, we’ve developed an ESG handbook for portfolio companies with initiatives to consider (including DEI) and corresponding timelines and tools.

Internally, we’re accounting for DEI efforts in performance reviews, tracking internal hiring and promotion statistics by gender and ethnicity, and incorporating actions to make recruitment and retention more inclusive.

This is an area that’s important to us, as it is for the other 130 LPs, GPs and investment consultants that have signed onto the Diversity in Action initiative. We are committed to continuing our efforts and sharing our progress along the way.