The overwhelming majority of engagement activities are structured around a request for specific reform and often take the form of a shareowner proposal and individual letters, for example to grant shareowners the ability to nominate directors using the company proxy, to disclose political contributions, challenging excessive CEO pay at Bed Bath &Beyond, prompting executive pay clawbacks at Wells Fargo, calling for governance reforms at Mylan, advocating for climate change risk disclosure at Exxon Mobil, eliminating human rights abuses in the seafood supplychain, supporting increased disclosure of supplier diversity data, or to disclose the race and gender of the workforce by job category, including senior management. Progress in the advancement of these issues can be, and is, measured and is then reported by BAM to the various New York City pension systems, including TRS.
The principal exceptions are softer engagements, such as the Human Capital working group efforts, in which the Comptroller's Office, on behalf of TRS and the other NYC Pension Funds, has been part of a collaborative engagement of major retailers to better understand how they manage and measure human capital as a driver of value to be maximized and not just as a cost to be managed. This work is creating a foundation to engage more effectively with companies on human capital management. Engagement outcomes are reported to the TRS board and a summary is included in the Postseason Report to trustees that is also available to the public.