The trend toward implementing ESG — environment, social and governance — criteria has hit critical mass, and most investment organizations are at various stages of either installing or preparing ESG policies. But could the current hype surrounding ESG cloud an organization’s mission?

That question is on the minds of decision-makers with a fiduciary duty to constituents. For example, institutional investors, such as pensions, endowments and sovereign wealth funds, serve the financial needs of particular interests — pensioners, college endowments, a country’s citizens. And these investment teams are duty-bound to make investments that further those missions.

But that mission can get caught between differing views on how ESG should be implemented.

As reported at Fox&Hounds Daily by Christopher Burnham, a former Connecticut pension fiduciary and founder and president of the Institute for Pension Fund Integrity, California Public Employees’ Retirement