IRIS+
Also written IRIS plus · IRIS+ system
The impact accounting system offered by the Global Impact Investing Network, giving investors shared definitions of impact categories and themes plus core metric sets aligned to the SDGs.
In plain language
Two impact funds can each report that they "improved health". Without a shared set of words and measures, an investor cannot tell which did more.
IRIS+ is built to fix that. The workbook calls it an impact accounting system. Impact investors use it to measure, manage and optimise their impact.
It is offered by the Global Impact Investing Network, or GIIN. Its aim is to make impact data usable in decisions: to promote transparency, credibility and accountability across the whole impact investment industry.
What does it actually give a user? Three things.
It gives agreed definitions of impact categories and impact themes. It identifies common goals and core metric sets by theme. And through those, it gives everyone a shared language for describing, assessing, communicating and finally comparing impact performance.
Most impact investors aim at the Sustainable Development Goals. So the core metric sets and the wider metrics catalogue are aligned to the SDGs.
IRIS+ does not invent its own way of framing impact. It measures through the Impact Management Project and its five dimensions.
How it works
What the workbook says IRIS+ provides (Chapter 6, section 6.2.2A):
| Element | What it does |
|---|---|
| Generally accepted definitions | Fixes what an impact category and an impact theme mean, so two investors describing the same thing use the same word |
| Common goals by theme | Identifies what investors in a theme are typically trying to achieve |
| Core metrics sets by theme | Key impact performance indicators for each theme, so results are comparable |
| A catalogue of metrics | The wider library beyond the core sets |
| SDG alignment | Both the core metric sets and the catalogue are mapped to the SDGs, because most impact investors frame their interventions around them |
How it measures. IRIS+ measures impact through the Impact Management Project (IMP), based on five dimensions — WHO, HOW MUCH, WHAT, CONTRIBUTION and RISK — each with its own defined data categories. Under RISK, the type of impact risk is typically described using one of 10 risk factors. The five dimensions and the ten risk factors are set out in full on the Impact Management Project page.
Where IRIS+ sits among the Chapter 6 tools. The workbook groups its guidelines and tools by the kind of body that produced them:
| Section | Producer | Tool |
|---|---|---|
| 6.2.1 | Ministry of Corporate Affairs | National Guidelines on Responsible Business Conduct — 9 principles |
| 6.2.2A | Global investing community (GIIN) | IRIS+ |
| 6.2.2B | Global investing community | GIIRS — ratings, methodology used by 6,000 companies |
| 6.2.2C | Global investing community | GRI — established 1997, three standard categories |
| 6.2.3 | Multilateral development agency | UN Global Compact — 10 principles, over 9,500 companies |
What IRIS+ is not. It is not a rating. GIIRS scores and ranks companies and funds; IRIS+ supplies the definitions and metrics that make such measurement possible in the first place. It is also not a reporting standard in the GRI sense: GRI tells an organisation what to disclose publicly, while IRIS+ tells an investor what to measure and how to compare it.
One figure, honestly placed. The workbook attaches no adoption count, member count or launch year to IRIS+ itself. The numbers in this passage — 6,000 for GIIRS, 1997 for GRI, 9,500 for UNGC — belong to the neighbouring tools. The only quantity IRIS+ itself carries in this workbook is the five IMP dimensions and their 10 risk factors.
A worked example
Illustrative fund and figures.
Setu Impact Partners, a Mumbai impact fund, holds two investments in the same theme — improving smallholder farm income.
| Investment | Amount | What the company reported before IRIS+ |
|---|---|---|
| A cold-chain venture in Kolar | ₹8,00,00,000 | "Reached 4,200 farmers" |
| An agri-advisory app in Vidarbha | ₹5,00,00,000 | "1,10,000 app downloads, farmers empowered" |
Setu's foreign investor asks for reporting against IRIS+ core metrics for the agriculture theme, mapped to SDG 2. Now both companies report the same handful of things:
| Core metric | Cold chain | Advisory app |
|---|---|---|
| Smallholders reached | 4,200 | 26,500 active users, not 1,10,000 downloads |
| Average farm income before | ₹6,500 a month | ₹7,100 a month |
| Average farm income after | ₹8,400 a month | ₹7,650 a month |
| Change in income | +29% | +8% |
| Post-harvest loss reduced | 30% to 12% | not applicable |
What the shared language changed. The app looked larger on its own numbers and smaller on the common ones: 1,10,000 downloads became 26,500 active users, and its income effect is a third of the cold chain's in percentage terms. The cold chain reaches fewer farmers but moves each one further.
Neither company is dishonest. They were simply counting different things. The fund can now put ₹13,00,00,000 of portfolio impact into one table, and the RISK dimension makes each one state what could still go wrong — monsoon power cuts for the cold chain, users lapsing for the app.
Why NISM asks about it
Chapter 6 (Social Impact Assessment Frameworks, Techniques and Standards, 10% weightage), section 6.2.2A, introduces IRIS+ as the framework produced by the global investing community and ties it to GIIN, to the IMP's five dimensions and to the SDGs.
Chapter 7's second sample question is a direct IRIS+ question: "______ is an impact accounting system which can be used by impact investors to measure, manage and optimize their impact," with GIIRS, GRI and UNGC as the distractors. The answer is IRIS+. Learn the one-line role of each of the four Chapter 6 tools and this question type is answered by elimination.
Common exam traps
- IRIS+ is an impact accounting system, not a rating system. GIIRS is the rating system. This is the exact swap Chapter 7's sample question sets up.
- IRIS+ is offered by GIIN, the Global Impact Investing Network. GIIRS is separately named and is not GIIN's system in this workbook's account.
- The five dimensions belong to the Impact Management Project, which IRIS+ measures through. IRIS+ did not itself invent them.
- The three verbs are measure, manage and optimize. Not "monitor", not "certify".
- IRIS+ is aligned to the SDGs, not to the NGRBC principles. The nine NGRBC principles are a separate national framework in section 6.2.1.
- GRI is for reporting; IRIS+ is for investing. GRI tells an organisation what to disclose; IRIS+ gives an investor comparable metrics.
- The workbook gives IRIS+ no adoption figure. The 6,000-company number belongs to GIIRS, and the 9,500-company number to the UN Global Compact.
Check yourself
1.IRIS+, the impact accounting system used by impact investors to measure, manage and optimise their impact, is offered by:
- a)Global Reporting Initiative (GRI)
- b)Global Impact Investing Network (GIIN)
- c)UN Global Compact (UNGC)
- d)United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)
Show the answer
Answer: (b) Global Impact Investing Network (GIIN)
The Global Impact Investing Network (GIIN) offers IRIS+ to support impact investing and to promote transparency, credibility and accountability in the use of impact data.
GRI develops sustainability reporting standards. UNGC sets ten principles for business. UNEP partnered in setting up GRI in 1997, but does not offer IRIS+.
Where this is taught
Free preparation for NISM Series XXIIIRelated terms
- GIIRSThe Global Impact Investing Rating System: an online tool that rates the social and environmental performance of companies and funds, with a methodology the workbook says 6,000 companies have used.
- Global Impact Investing NetworkThe global body that offers the IRIS+ impact accounting system, to promote transparency, credibility and accountability in how impact data is used for decision making.
- Global Reporting InitiativeAn international non-profit set up in 1997 with UNEP, whose three sets of reporting standards — Universal, Sector and Topic — let any organisation report its economic, environmental and social performance.
- Impact Management ProjectThe framework, used by the GIIN's IRIS+ system, that describes impact in five dimensions — What, Who, How Much, Contribution and Risk — with defined data categories for each.
- Key Performance IndicatorA metric chosen to track the most critical aspects of a social project's performance; split into external KPIs used by funders for third-party assessment and internal KPIs for management control.
- Sustainable Development GoalsThe UN's 17 goals for 2030, adopted in 2015, that India's social sector is expected to advance — and against which India shows a large, workbook-cited funding and performance gap.