Manager Research TeamsACT for Manager Research Teams
The ACT Framework and Standard is designed to surface decision-useful information about firm culture and values that will enhance due diligence and risk monitoring processes, supporting better outcomes.
“ACT just makes good business sense. Being able to proactively present our culture to our prospects and clients within a structure that allows them to like-for-like assess us against our peers is an area we feel we can confident in.”
Jayne Fieldhouse
Managing Director, Head of Global Institutional Marketing at RBC BlueBay Asset Management
What is ACT?
Why Culture
The ACT Collective
The ACT Academy
Insights & Research
ACT helps professional fund investors cut through the noise, assess culture with confidence, and hold asset managers accountable.
Manager research teams are tasked with assessing asset managers’ intentions, actions, and ongoing performance across a wide range of metrics. Increasingly, culture — including how firms approach diversity and inclusion — is recognised as central to building a strong investment process. Yet without a shared language or standardised questions, these conversations are often inconsistent and manual.
The ACT Framework addresses this challenge by linking external commitments to internal values, giving MRTs confidence that firms are taking culture seriously. By using ACT, companies can identify gaps, set milestones, and track progress — while MRTs benefit from clear, comparable disclosures and standardised questions that enable more meaningful conversations and stronger due diligence.
What is ACT?ACT is a disclosure framework for corporate culture
ACT is a disclosure framework providing a standardised way for investment companies to understand, create and progress cultural change - and be able to communicate progress effectively via reporting.
Standardised
The Standard comprises three pillars with three components, which cover the approach to culture and inclusion.
Structured
Action > Challenge > Transparency question progression helps firms pinpoint good performance, where to improve and how to create the challenge to do so.
Strategic
Designed with and for investment companies, ACT enables you to communicate your approach to culture and inclusion across the business and why that matters.
Stakeholder-driven
Disclosures enhance conversations with clients, all within a predictable, accessible format
Why culture – and why now?Assessing culture isn’t optional anymore — it’s central to mandate decisions
Growing focus on producer, not just product
Clients are going beyond product level to consider the entire company ecosystem. Culture is central to how firms adapt to face complex global challenges. What can you say about your culture?
Evidence to combat greenwashing
Professional investors are under pressure to uncover greenwashing. Culture and diversity have become a standalone pillar of client due diligence, alongside other ESG factors.
Build trust through transparency
Demonstrating transparency on how internal culture enables a firm to meet external commitments is important to creating and maintaining stakeholder trust.
Standardised disclosure framework
Helping firms understand, progress, and report on culture consistently.
Decision-ready data
Turning subjective culture into comparable insights that strengthen investor analysis.
The solution? ACTBuilt with and for investors to make culture measurable
Built with the industry
Recognising that inclusion and positive culture drive sustainable growth and client outcomes.
Look credible. Work smarter. Build trust.
For MRTs, ACT is more than a framework — it’s a tool to shine in front of clients while simplifying the due diligence process. It positions you as an authority on culture, gives you comparable data at speed, and ensures your analysis is both rigorous and trusted.
The ACT-Mark is a symbol of trust
It is an assurance to the consumer that the values of the organisation managing their investments are aligned with their behaviours.
125+ Companies reporting with ACT
How professional fund investors use ACTMaking culture measurable across mandates and reporting
Professional fund investors need reliable ways to assess what sits behind a firm’s promises. ACT makes culture measurable, comparable, and transparent — giving MRTs the tools to strengthen analysis and hold managers accountable.
Request ACT status
Screen for Signatory status via data platforms alongside proprietary RfPs
Request and analyse ACT disclosures
Analyse disclosure track record and comparisons via Door due diligence platform
Communicate along value chain
Data on signatory clients can be used in impact reports and stakeholder communication
Embed in scoring process
Adopt ACT Framework into asset manager assessment and scoring
Request more information todayWant to know how ACT can support your due diligence?
Discover how ACT can integrate into your research process and strengthen your conversations with asset managers.
Shape the StandardThe ACT Collective
Join the ACT Collective — a growing network of manager research teams committed to building transparency and stronger cultural standards.
THE ACT AcademyFree Access to Learning & Events
As a member of the ACT Collective, manager research teams get complimentary access to all ACT Academy events. These sessions are designed to deepen understanding, share best practice, and strengthen culture-focused due diligence.
FAQsAll you need to know
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One of the key roles that manager research teams (MRT) undertake is assessing the intentions and actions of an asset manager and undertaking ongoing monitoring across a wide range of metrics. Increasingly, company culture, how it responds to questions about diversity and inclusion and how this helps to create a strong investment process is coming to the fore. But a lack of agreed terminology or set of questions, this can be a challenging, manual process.
Ultimately the ACT Framework aims to address this by capturing a company’s external commitments and show how they link to internal values. Companies that are using the ACT Framework are signalling to manager research teams that they understand the importance of looking at culture and inclusion across their whole business.
MRTs will know that by going through the framework, those companies will be able to identify gaps in their actions and create milestones to measure progress. Being able to ask standardised ACT Framework questions helps to create good conversations with asset managers, ensuring they understand that a good culture with inclusive practice is important.
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Manager research teams can access all ACT Framework content for free, via the Door Platform. The platform enables teams to request information from asset managers and for it to be supplied in a predictable and accessible way.
The requests are sent on to the asset manager RfP team. If the asset manager has not already completed the framework questions, it is also a helpful way to communicate that this information is important. While we recommend reviewing responses via the full ACT Framework, which covers nine areas of action, challenge and transparency across the business, individual topic areas will also supplement the research process.
To get a comprehensive and authentic response, asset managers should be expected to request around 3 months to complete the question set from scratch. Going beyond 6 months would signal difficulties in providing responses.
The full question set and high-level overview on what processes, activities and milestones to look out for can be accessed via the www.investorsact.com website.
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All asset classes including alternatives
All types of firms regardless of ownership structure or size.
ACT Stewardship Council
The ACT Stewardship Council sets the philosophical direction of ACT — balancing ambition with the speed of industry change.
ACT Insights
Stay ahead with expert research, reports, and commentary on how culture shapes investment outcomes.
ACT Academy
Events, workshops, and training designed to build knowledge and inspire cultural change across the investment industry.
Real Culture. Real Value.
Jayne Fieldhouse
Managing Director, Head of Global Institutional Marketing at RBC BlueBay Asset Management
“ACT just makes good business sense. Being able to proactively present our culture to our prospects and clients within a structure that allows them to like-for-like assess us against our peers is an area we feel we can confident in.”
Real companies. Real culture. Real reporting.
Across the UK and beyond, over 125 firms are actively reporting on their corporate culture through ACT.
This growing community is proving that culture can be measured — and that transparency drives trust. Start your reporting journey with us and bring your culture into focus.
125+
firms currently reporting
Alex Matcham
Head of UK Wholesale Distribution, M&G Investments