He is also a founding partner of the Chicago chapter of the Social Enterprise Alliance (SEA), a network of philanthropy-minded investors.

[4][verification needed] Lane undertook an eight-year research project to determine how investment choices can be utilized to communicate clients' values, along with their money, to heirs.

[7] Lane's investment strategy generated a result that beat the Russell 3000 benchmark by an annual return of 2.53% over the eight years ending December 31, 2003.

The Wall Street Journal commented that Lane's theories added a new variation to the socially responsible theme.

"[10] William Baue cautioned the readers to take his findings with the same grain of salt as he sprinkles on others' research as Lane excluded mutual funds outside the purview of his study in his book for practical reasons.

Most recently, Lane released the book, The Mission-Driven Venture: Business Solutions to the World’s Most Vexing Social Problems, published by John Wiley and Sons in 2015, and was acclaimed as “arguably the most prolific writer in the social enterprise sector,” by Rolfe Larson in his review of the book.