SIL Investments: Conflict of Interest Guidelines

Stanford Impact Labs (SIL) operates at Stanford University and observes and follows all existing policies and agreements related to Conflict of Interest, Intellectual Property, and acting as ethical and lawful stewards on behalf of the University. This SIL Investments Conflict of Interest Guideline document does not supersede or replace existing Stanford University Policies (referenced below). 

 

Stanford Impact Labs (SIL) Social Impact Ecosystem

Stanford Impact Labs’ strategy springs from our founding agenda: to enable teams of Stanford scholars to work with the public, social, and private sectors to tackle social problems using human creativity, rigorous evidence, and innovative technology. We believe actionable, solutions-focused social science research must happen in partnership with communities, industry, and government. Our emphasis on social impact necessitates that we cultivate strong and productive relationships with Stanford faculty and research labs doing focused and measurable work on the greatest social problems of our time. Our SIL community at Stanford University, focused on the social sciences, is a growing ecosystem of evidence-based researchers and practitioners.   

 

Investment Review Process

Stanford Impact Labs dedicates significant resources and effort to designing, announcing, publishing, and managing complex Requests for Proposals (RFP). Stanford Impact Labs also dedicates significant resources and effort to reviewing, vetting, and awarding funds as a result of these RFP activities. 

Stanford Impact Labs maintains a large and growing database of prior and potential reviewers and committee members for its investments. As the proposal review process begins, reviewers and committee members are selected to ensure a high degree of autonomy and rigor in evaluating proposals for award. 

 

Conflict of Interest Guidelines

Stanford Impact Labs defines conflict of interest as: a reviewer, investment committee member, or decisionmaker having an actual or perceived unfair advantage or favorable treatment of a proposal in the award review process, by way of direct financial or reputational benefit if that proposal were to be selected. 

SIL’s Investments and Accountability team will identify any conflicts of interest for proposal reviewers. SIL also requires that investment committee members and decision-makers disclose any conflicts of interest (as defined above) to the Investments and Accountability team. In the event of a  conflict of interest (as defined above), SIL, via the Investments & Accountability Team, will always disclose the conflict to decision-makers and investment committee members. SIL, via the Investments & Accountability Team, will then take action to address the conflict of interest (depending on the specific circumstances of that conflict) through one or more of the following remedies: 

  • recusing the conflicted individual from reading, scoring, evaluating, and/or discussing a specific proposal; 
  • recusing the conflicted individual from reading, scoring, evaluating, and/or discussing all of the proposals in a given investment stage; or 
  • revoking the invitation for the conflicted individual to review one or more proposals / serve on an investment committee / make an investment recommendation / make an award decision. 

In addition, any real or perceived conflict of interest for a member of SIL Executive Leadership (faculty director and executive director) as decision makers will be addressed as follows: the individual SIL EL member affected by the conflict will be recused from reviewing and deciding on proposals for the specific Stage. SIL will also make the decision process as visible and transparent as possible to the Stage applicants.  

Where appropriate or necessary by virtue of existing expertise, SIL Executive Leadership may be consulted for guidance on Stanford processes and constraints that affect the future success of the potentially awarded lab or Stanford Impact Labs. 

These Guidelines are not all inclusive and may change over time to reflect Stanford Impact Lab’s broadened scope and investment priorities. SIL retains the right to determine additional remedies to conflicts of interest, where necessary and possible.

 

References: 

  1. Stanford University Staff Policy on Conflict of Commitment and Interest
  2. Stanford University Research Policy on Conflict of Interest and Conflict of Commitment
  3. Stanford University Office of Ethics and Compliance Conflict of Commitment/Conflict of Interest Policy 
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