As sustainable finance continues its uneven march into the mainstream, questions linger over what it actually means to do impact investing with intention — and whether doing so comes at the cost of financial return. Few are better placed to address these issues than Cristina Spiller, an ESCP alumna who has spent the better part of a decade working at the intersection of capital and purpose.

Now working at Astorg, a private equity firm not traditionally associated with impact investing, Spiller plays a leading role in its philanthropic arm, Astorg Philanthropy Investments, launched in 2022. Her career, spanning early-stage ventures and mainstream finance, offers a grounded take on what it takes to drive meaningful change through capital.

For investors and professionals alike, Spiller offers clear, experience-based insights on how to do impact investing well — from choosing the right partnerships to asking the right questions.

From Thesis to Practice

Spiller’s introduction to impact investing was academic. “I was first introduced to the concept during my masters in management at ESCP,” she recalls. “At the time, it was still a relatively new term, but it immediately appealed to me. I dedicated my thesis to it.”

That intellectual interest became professional conviction. A stint at Bridge Fund Management — “a specialist impact investor and one of the early pioneers in the field” — followed. The five years she spent there shaped her understanding of how impact plays out across sectors, asset classes and geographies.

“What started as a theory-driven view became more nuanced,” she says. “I came to appreciate the importance of rigorous measurement systems, but also their limitations. Impact isn’t one-size-fits-all — it sits on a spectrum. What matters most is intentionality, transparency and accountability.”

Rethinking What ‘Impact’ Means for Impact Investing with Intention

The term “impact investing” has been stretched thin in recent years. Spiller is careful to distinguish it from adjacent frameworks. “ESG is fundamentally a risk management tool,” she says. “Responsible investing is broader — it includes exclusionary screening or values-based approaches. But impact investing starts from a different question: not ‘how is the world affecting this company?’ but ‘how is this company affecting the world?’”

Read the full article about impact investing with intention at The Choice by ESCP.