Investors and consultants continually look for new talent with innovative ideas and long-term, successful, diverse strategies. And they are increasingly recognizing the benefits of partnering with small and diverse emerging managers, and launching emerging-manager programs.

Emerging managers are highly motivated to perform well for their investors. And emerging-manager programs or partnerships have achieved goals by attaining proposed target returns, providing investment strategy diversity and offering improved alignment of interest.

The spread of COVID-19 and current events have made investors uneasy, especially regarding investing new capital outside current investments. Are these emerging-manager programs finding it harder to develop new business against bigger household names — especially given the challenges around in-person meetings and due diligence? Or is having the reputation of being a “smaller firm” benefiting investors during these times of uncertaint