Making engagement more effective
As stewardship and engagement have entered the mainstream, a narrative of “more activity” has prevailed. However, this misses the point.
Instead, the focus should be on stewardship and engagement that is ‘more effective’ in delivering long-term value for clients.
WHEB’s White Paper looks at the obstacles to effective asset manager engagement to understand how ‘more activity’ has become a proxy for quality.
The White Paper identifies three priority areas for improvement in engagement practices to drive higher standards across the investment community as a whole.
- Finding consensus on the fundamentals
- Unlocking long-term value amidst resource constraints
- Demonstrating effectiveness through correlation and contribution
The objective of WHEB's engagement
The objective of our engagement aligns with that of WHEB’s strategy; which is to support the positive impact delivered by the companies that we invest in. This includes engaging with companies to:
- Accelerate and/or enhance their positive impact;
- Limit any material negative social or environmental impacts;
- Deliver wider improvements in the quality of business operations in order to support the delivery of positive impact;
- Reinvest profits into further growth and direct other sources of capital to activities that will increase positive impact (e.g. R&D)
- Support high-quality management that extends the company’s overall positive impact and long-term success.
How we leverage our voting rights
We view our voting rights as equity holders as an opportunity to exercise a progressive influence on company governance and strategy. WHEB’s policy is to exercise our rights at 100% of company meetings where we're eligible to vote.
Our voting is guided by our policies, which are intended to promote long-term value for shareholders and mitigate risk at portfolio companies.
We publish full voting records quarterly that detail every shareholder resolution on which WHEB is eligible to vote, how we voted and a rationale for our decision.
Transparent stewardship
In our Stewardship Reports we tell you about the policies and processes that direct WHEB’s stewardship activities. These reports also document the extensive work we’ve done with portfolio companies over the year to encourage them to improve their environmental, social and governance (ESG) and impact practices.
We use the full suite of tools at our disposal, including:
- Voting at portfolio company meetings
- Engaging bilaterally with companies
- Escalating engagement to work collaboratively with like-minded parties
- Divesting and publicly reporting our reasons for doing so
Our Stewardship Reports provide summary data of the work undertaken in the previous year, detailed case studies that illustrate our decision-making processes and the impact that we have via our ‘investor contribution’.
Sustainability Policies
We are pleased to share our Stewardship and engagement and Voting policies.
Our Stewardship and engagement policy is aligned with the UK’s Stewardship Code and details WHEB’s purpose and governance, our investment approach, as well as voting and engagement activities.
Our proxy voting policy are intended to promote long-term shareholder value creation and risk mitigation at portfolio firms through support for responsible global corporate governance practices.
