Bigwigs to help asset manager corporate culture standard expand to institutional

The asset manager research and selection heads at Aon and the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS) are among the founding members of a Stewardship Council for the institutional market that UK think tank CityHive has launched for ACT, its corporate culture standard for investment companies.

Akin to the existing members of the ACT Stewardship Council focused on the wholesale market, the new members will have oversight of the ACT framework and consider how its adoption is expanded into institutional industry practice.

The ACT Stewardship Council is a key part of the ACT standard’s governance, providing challenge and support on coverage, quality and completeness of the standard, and its credibility and applicability to industry practice.

According to CityHive, founding members of the ACT Stewardship Council for the institutional market include Debbie Clarke, the former global head of investment research at Mercer and now a consultant and non-executive director, Jo Holden, current head of manager research at Mercer Global; Paul Carne, EMEA delegated chief investment officer at Aon; and Phil Edwards, head of manager selection and oversight at USS.

Aon’s Carne said ACT had had a positive impact in the wholesale market and that he believed the standard could have “a similarly transformative influence on the institutional market, benefiting pension schemes, charities, endowments, and insurers alike”.

Holden said ACT was a pragmatic way of raising standards, eschewing box-ticking.

“Encouraging asset managers to self-assess, to evolve in a way that reflects their own aspirations and at their own speed where culture is concerned, and giving them a tool to discuss and engage with asset owners is a very healthy approach, I think,” she said.

Clarke, who spent more than 15 years as global head of investment research at Mercer, added: “Having researched asset managers for over 20 years, an assessment of culture has always been key. ACT assists clients in determining if the firm and team they entrust their assets to will still be acting in their best interests for the foreseeable future.”

CityHive today also announced RBC BlueBay Asset Management’s CEO, Erich Gerth, as senior adviser to the think tank and ACT.