There has been research trying to determine if new managers outperformed more established ones.

Some studies conclude that new managers outperform their established peers in their first three years, or at least beat those managers included in the indexes used to measure the industry.

THE pickup in the retail business began amid the market declines of 2001 and 2002; chastened investors focused on the often-ignored maxim that very few managers could consistently outperform benchmark indexes.

She said she looked for managers who had compiled a strong record elsewhere, and said that she believed these managers and their little funds could outperform big ones.

He said his Prudential Financial consultant told him that a manager closely monitoring his savings could outperform passively managed index funds like two of his Vanguard holdings.

In fact, in one of Mr. Black's first jobs - as a consultant for Arthur D. Little - he was hired by the mutual fund industry to prove that its managers outperformed the market.

Statistically it is so hard to prove that active managers can outperform, and that any outperformance is due to skill and not luck, Mr. Aronson said.

Last year, the endowment's managers greatly outperformed those benchmarks, producing a total return after fees and expenses of 12.5 percent, and thus their compensation was unusually high.

This year "is the third straight year that the global equity markets and long-only managers outperformed hedge funds," said Christy Wood, senior investment officer for global equities at the California Public Employees' Retirement System.

Charles Schwab & Company, the discount brokerage firm, has created its own index of 1,000 stocks, but the industry in general frowns on indexing because it undermines the marketable notion that smart managers can outperform robots.