Evaluation Criteria

Specific attention will be paid to:

1. Firms that have demonstrated expertise and experience serving the needs of nonprofit organizations and have a record of foundation/nonprofit endowment management.
2. Credentials, experience, and reputation of the firm, and/or team that will be working with the College. Background and quality of the manager research and asset allocation methodology.
3. Competitiveness of management and advisory fees for our non-profit organizations.
4. Performance reporting capabilities.
5. Existing client relationships and references.

Firm Strength & Stability

1. Please provide the full name of your organization, address, telephone and fax number, firm website, mailing address of your main office and the name and CIMA license # of the team member who holds an active CIMA license. Include an organizational overview including a description of the corporate structure of the firm, ownership details, year of founding in present form, including the legal form of the organization, the parent company (if applicable), and any affiliated companies. If any change to the firm’s corporate structure is anticipated, please also note this.
2. Please indicate the number of years your firm has been performing investment services similar to those that you seek to provide to BlackfeeT Community College.
3. Please describe your client base, including types of clients served, the number of non-profits for which your organization currently provides services, the length of time of services and the range of asset values among your non-profit clients.
4. Please disclose any and all conflicts of interest your organization has in serving as our investment advisor. Disclose whether your firm has any financial or other affiliation with other brokerage firms, banks, insurance companies, investment banking firms, or money management firms. Please include copies of any conflict of interest disclosures.
5. Describe the levels of insurance coverage, including the amounts of errors and omission insurance and any other fiduciary professional liability insurance your firm currently has in force. Provide copies of all the appropriate state and/or national licenses required to act as investment manager as appendices.

Investment Process

1. Comment on your “investment philosophy” and process for analyzing a client’s portfolio structure and for recommending modifications. Describe your management approach towards this portfolio.
2. Describe your manager due diligence/research process. How often does your staff visit with money managers in-house and onsite?
3. Describe the capabilities and differentiating features of your firm’s manager research database. Is the database proprietary or purchased? Are managers charged fees for inclusion? How many managers are tracked?
4. Describe the firm’s manager search process. How are the managers initially screened? What criteria are emphasized in the latter stages of a search? Is there a minimum number of years of live performance required or a minimum amount of assets in the strategy to be included in the search? To what extent, if any are proprietary or affiliated managers included in a search and included in client portfolios?
5. How many analysts are employed by your organization that are responsible solely for investment manager research? How many analysts are responsible for performance evaluation, performance attribution analysis, manager evaluation and due diligence, etc.?
6. Discuss the theory and methodology of your asset allocation modeling process. Is your asset allocation software developed in-house or externally?
7. What is your firm’s approach to portfolio risk monitoring and management?
8. How are your capital market projections derived? How is that information used to develop investment strategy for clients?
9. Considering the College’s endowed pool, what type of investment(s) would respondent suggest- mutual funds, individual equities, bonds, or a combination of investment types.
10. If available, provide a representative portfolio for a client with similar characteristics.
11. How would you assist Blackfeet Community College in meeting its fiduciary responsibilities?
12. Describe the process you will use to assist us in the maintenance of our investment policy, spending policy, objectives and guidelines for our fund.
13. Address how you would structure the custody Blackfeet Community College’s assets. Would an internal, external or blended approach be used?
14. Please provide three client references two of which are non-profits applicable to this RFP whom we can contact. Include the contact name, title, address, telephone, e-mail, the length of time providing services, the level of assets under management and was the relationship discretionary or non-discretionary.

Service Structure & Accessibility

1. Please provide a full list of financial management services offered by your firm.
2. Provide the biographies of the key personnel assigned to our account. Please identify who would be our main representative, who would perform the analytical work on the relationship and who would serve as the back-up advisor in situations when the proposed lead consultant could not attend a meeting. What is the average number of client relationships per consultant?
3. Tell us about the support professionals who would be responsible for this account. Explain how the team dedicated to our account would function. Indicate any special endowment management expertise.
4. Does your firm, its employees, or any affiliated or related entities derive any economic benefit from any investment entities, intermediaries or service providers that are or will be involved in our account?
5. Will you or your representatives be available to meet regularly via teleconference and in person to review the account?

Performance Reporting

1. Comment on your process for providing performance measurement reports to suit the needs of Blackfeet Community College.
2. How frequently do you plan to provide investment performance measurement reports to the College? Are reports available after the end of each month/quarter? Can the College access performance reporting on a secure website?
3. Describe the performance measurement software your firm uses. Is the software proprietary, or does your firm utilize the software of an outside vendor? If your firm uses non-proprietary software, do you have the ability to influence changes to the software to customizer reports for our needs?
4. Please describe how you monitor the style adherence of investment managers. Specifically, what types of reports would you use?
5. Describe the performance attribution analysis services you could provide.
6. Provide, as an appendix, sample copies of portfolio reports that would be provided to the College.

Fee Proposal

1.Please describe the fees proposed by your organization for providing investment management
services to the college. Fully itemize all fees, if any, for the following:

•Advisory –percentage of assets or hard dollar investment manager fees, investment manager
revenue share, directed brokerage, soft dollar fees
•Conversion fee
•Transferring assets from one fund/manager to another

•Other transaction fees
•Travel
•Training
•Other administrative

2. If there are additional fees to be charged as a result of performing services related to preparing
or modifying Blackfeet Community College’s Investment Policy, asset allocation analysis, or
conducting manager searches, please describe those fees in detail.

Evaluation Criteria

1. Please describe your experience working with tribes and/or tribal entities.
2. Describe your knowledge of tribal colleges and universities, along with all applicable funding sources and legislation.
3. Please describe how you would assist Blackfeet Community College to meet its the goals and objectives.

Thank you for taking the time to respond to Blackfeet Community College’s request for proposal
for investment management services! Your effort is deeply appreciated and we will respond
shortly.