Longview Trustees Network – Navigating fiduciary duty & net zero

In her previous role Anne was a senior manager in internal audit at Aviva Investors overseeing the risk management controls across all asset classes in the UK, USA, and Europe.

Anne is currently the Chair of the Audit, Operations and Governance Committee for the Aviva Staff Pension Scheme, a £17 billion hybrid Defined Benefit (DB) and Defined Contribution (DC) scheme. In this role she has gained experience in fund governance, buy ins, longevity swaps, DC default strategy design, and advisor selection activities.

Previously Anne worked with three of the major actuarial consulting firms providing actuarial and investment advice across both defined benefit and defined contribution schemes in the private sector. This included pensions investment strategy, funding negotiations, liability management exercises, risk management, and investment manager recommendations.

She also has extensive experience in change management, risk and trading system implementation, ESG risks in financial services, and designing investment and hedging strategies for global insurance companies.

Anne has a diverse breadth of experience combined with strong technical skills and an excellent track record of successful project delivery.

Accredited Independent Professional Trustee, experienced Chair of Trustees, and Independent Governance Committee member. Extensive DB and DC experience, on pension schemes varying in size from £30m to £7bn. Awarded ‘Trustee of the Year’ at Professional Pensions Women in Pensions Awards 2021.

A solicitor by background, with private practice, ombudsman and commercial in-house experience, specialising in pensions law and dispute resolution. Director at Law Debenture since 2016, and a member of the Pensions Strategy Group.

Alan Pickering is President of BESTrustees and a Trustee of a number of pension schemes. These include Clara Pensions and the Mercer Master Trust.  He is also Chairman of the Civil Service Pensions Board.

Alan chairs the governance group of the Royal Mail Statutory Pension Scheme. He was a Trustee of the Kosovo Pensions Savings Trust between 2011 and 2015. Until February 2013, he chaired the financial literacy charity, Life Academy. He has served as a non-executive director of The Pensions Regulator having previously been a member of the Occupational Pensions Board.

Alan is a past Chairman of the National Association of Pension Funds (NAPF), now known as the Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association (PLSA) and the European Federation for Retirement Provision (EFRP).  His Government sponsored report “A Simpler Way to Better Pensions” was published in July 2002.

Tim is the former Head of Investments for Aon in UK and EMEA. He has over 30 years experience within pensions and investments. He has advised a broad range of clients as well as leading Aon Investments where he had responsibility for the client experience, market position, colleague engagement and commercial success of a business generating substantial annual revenues. He is committed to helping his clients deliver their objectives.

Tim’s experience has brought him into contact with a diverse range of clients, and he uses this experience to bring a practical edge to his advice, drive commercial success and deliver value to clients. He focuses on providing clear and informative advice and developing solutions to address concerns of trustees, sponsors and other asset owners.

Tim represented Aon in the press, on various public platforms, to a number of regulators (including the CMA and FCA) and influential industry bodies such as the CEO Advisory board for the Diversity Project. Tim joined Aon (then Bacon & Woodrow) in 1998. Prior to that he worked at the predecessor firms of Willis Towers Watson, PwC and Royal Sun Alliance. He qualified as an actuary in 1996 and holds a degree in Economics from Warwick University.

He is married with three children still in full-time education. Skiing is a big part of family life either as a result of watching his eldest daughter compete or as part of family holidays. He loves rugby and has spent several years coaching junior teams. He has run marathons and competed in triathlons, but now tends to prefer less exhaustive exercise and walking the dog.

Nick’s career in pensions started at JLT, where he learnt the basics of investment strategy for pension schemes and liability valuations. He also led JLT’s modelling delivery, as well as being a key member of their market forecast group. From there, he moved to Deloitte; leading their new business efforts, which saw him grow their Manchester office client base from three clients to 15, the majority which he was the lead trustee advisor on. During his time with Deloitte, Nick also assisted in growing the team from two members to six for which he acted as people manager for junior team members.

Prior to joining us at Vidett, Nick more recently worked at PwC as part of their investment team. His duties included managing their book of trustee clients and leading their business development efforts. During his time at PwC, Nick’s book of clients included scheme’s ranging in size from £50m to £500m. It was at PwC where Nick assisted trustees with managing their investment strategies and helped schemes prepare for and implement full scheme buy-outs; taking them from pre-transaction derisking to implementing price lock portfolios and eventual asset wind-up.

Nick fuses fantastic presentation and consulting skills with the technical knowledge required to build and evolve complex financial models. This allows him to understand and explain investment products in a way that people less familiar with the investment world can understand.

Outside of work Nick is a keen chef and foodie as well as having a second role as an internet personality in which Nick takes part in a weekly live-streamed D&D YouTube show, you will have to ask nicely for a link!