Our Process

 

We help clients answer the questions at the heart of ESG integration:

We believe that the strategy for ESG integration needs to be authentic, relevant, comprehensive, and informed by the realities of portfolio construction, risk management, and reporting. In our work with clients we seek to address the key questions at the heart of ESG integration -

  • What is the right governance structure to drive ESG integration at an organization?
     
  • How and where should ESG be integrated in the investment process?
     
  • How should ESG be integrated into research, trading, portfolio construction, and reporting?
     
  • What ESG research should be developed internally, what external services make sense?
     
  • How can all of this be accomplished in a way that does not interrupt the current business, but enhances it?
     
  • How can this plan be executed in a cost effective manner, including opportunity costs?

With the answers to these questions, we can chart the path for practical ESG integration.

ESG Integration Consulting:

ESG integration is only authentic when it is true to a strategy's investment process, and the skills and intellectual capital of an investment team. 

  • To accomplish effective integration, we work to get to know the members of the team, and the unique roles they play in the investment process.
     
  • Authentic ESG integration is a research based approach to identifying those Environmental, Social, and Governance factors that support strategy conception, security selection, trade execution, portfolio construction, and reporting. 
     
  • Since each investment team and investment process is different, authentic ESG integration is unique to each team. Successful ESG integration is a custom fit.

Here is how we can collaborate with clients to accomplish these objectives:

At Signatory Capital Advisors we can work with all members of the investment team to develop a complete understanding of the investment process so that ESG integration is custom fit to the real world operating environment of the team. This includes developing an understanding of each team member's role in the investment process including traders, portfolio managers, analysts and CIOs. It also includes understanding the investment committee process and how ESG should be integrating in that setting.  

To develop this understanding, we can meet with ESG stakeholders and decision makers in an organization to optimize the process. For example, we can meet with traders to discuss and map information flow between trading desk, PMs, and analysts. Our objective is to develop a solution for total ESG integration that promotes effective communication and clean decision making.

We may review current compliance policies and procedures to understand how these processes need to be adapted to promote effective ESG integration, governance, and oversight. We may review current technology used for trading and how it may adapt to ESG integration. We may meet with investment committee members to discuss how ESG can best be integrated in governance and decision making.

  • For organizations that do not have their own investment team, ESG integration focuses on how the governance structure of the organization, its investment committee, external managers, and external consultants, communicate and make decisions in a shared ESG decision making framework.