All prospective investments in external managers are asked about compliance with the UN PRI and UK Stewardship Code and/or their Proxy Voting Policy (as appropriate) based on the investment strategy and location of the Manager. This information is used to assess the professionalism of the manager and its commitment to the highest industry standards. We believe that managers should demonstrate an awareness of the importance of such ESG factors.
The firm examines the level of appreciation of corporate governance that is on display by the external managers’ management team. In particular we seek to determine whether the quality, ethics and decision making on display is suitable given the external manager’s role as stewards of assets. In addition the relevant fund’s Board of Directors is assessed as to whether they have the appropriate experience to provide the required degree of oversight and governance of the structure.
We partly use the UN PRI Hedge Fund DDQ to assist us in developing this approach.