Steve Waygood
Profile
Job title
Chief Responsible Investment Officer
Contact details
Work location
London, United Kingdom
Joined Aviva Investors
2006
Joined The Industry
1990
Biography
Main responsibilities
Steve leads Aviva Investors' Global Responsible Investment team, which is responsible for integrating environmental social and corporate governance (ESG) issues across all asset classes and regions of c£350bn of assets under management. The team has achieved an A+ ranking in governance and strategy from the UN Principles for Responsible Investment; a Tier 1 assessment for Stewardship from the UK Financial Reporting Council; and won the Responsible Investment Thought Leader and Innovator of the Year global award in 2017.
Experience and qualifications
Steve has recently been appointed to the European Commission High-Level Expert Group on sustainable finance, and the UK Green Finance Taskforce , and is also a member of the Financial Stability Board Taskforce on Climate Related Financial Disclosure (TCFD). Steve co-founded and now Chairs the Corporate Human Rights Benchmark and the World Benchmarking Alliance. He also co-founded the Sustainable Stock Exchange initiative as well as the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Coalition, which is aiming to catalyse a UN Convention promoting enhanced corporate transparency and integrated reporting. He is also an Ambassador for the International Integrated Reporting Council. Steve was a member of the UK Government delegation to the UN Rio+20 meeting in 2012, and a member of the European Commission's expert groups on corporate governance and corporate responsibility. His work became a case study in the Harvard Business School MBA in 2012. Steve has received the Leadership in Sustainability award from the Corporation of London and the British Chamber of Commerce. In 2011 he received the Yale Rising Star in Corporate Governance Award, and he was among the Financial News Top 100 Rising Stars in 2009. Steve was on the board of the UK Sustainable Investment & Finance association (UKSIF) from 2003 to 2010, serving as its Chairman from 2006. He was also part of the expert group that wrote the United Nations Principles for Responsible Investment. Steve is a member of the Chartered Financial Analyst institute, with a degree in Economics and a PhD in sustainable finance. He is a faculty member at the International Corporate Governance Network and the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership. He is also a Visiting Professor of Sustainable Finance at Cass Business School.
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Turning talk into action
It is only through commitment, passion and genuine collaboration that we can bring our sustainable aspirations to life. In our “This is how” series, we profile some of the ways ESG helps us be better investors, for our clients, and for the world around us.
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