Senior Specialist Stewardship, Nature

Job Description

This newly created role will be responsible for contributing to Spring, PRI’s new stewardship initiative for nature. Spring is a PRI stewardship initiative for nature, convening institutional investors to use their influence to halt and reverse biodiversity loss across the globe by 2030. Spring aims to address the systemic risk of nature loss to societies and secure long-term value creation by enhancing corporate practices, ultimately generating positive, real-world outcomes. In its first phase, Spring focuses on forest loss and land degradation in priority geographies, and on responsible political engagement by companies. We also seek to support the work of other stewardship initiatives on nature, as we recognise the need for multiple approaches to create a sustainable future.

This position sits within the PRI’s Stewardship Initiatives team, which is responsible for facilitating collaborative investor engagement activities on key environmental, social and governance issues.

Stewardship is one of the most powerful mechanisms by which investors and their agents can contribute to the achievement of the PRI’s mission: the creation of a sustainable financial system which benefits the environment and society as a whole. The role is an exciting opportunity to contribute to work that will encourage and enable PRI signatories to fully realise the potential of stewardship to drive real-world outcomes on topics that are part of the broader nature agenda.

The primary responsibility for this role will be to coordinate and support 15-20 investor-company dialogues and to be a point person for all of Spring’s activities in the Latin America region. Spring will facilitate small groups of PRI signatories who in turn will use engagement and other stewardship tools to positively influence companies across a range of sectors to address forest loss, land degradation and other environmental issues.

The role reports to PRI’s Head of Stewardship, Nature and will involve extensive collaboration with the PRI colleagues working on Spring, on ESG Issues – in particular the Climate and Environment team – who are responsible for issue expertise on nature-related topics, and with the regional relationship managers.

Core Responsibilities

Coordination of 15-20 company engagement groups

• Manage and track participation of investors: define participation criteria, keep track of and respond to investor requests to join the engagement group, manage and onboard new joiners, upkeep of signatory participation and contact details.
• Plan, facilitate and track company engagement: Schedule meetings, taking and sharing meeting notes, conduct company research; Coordinate investor engagement planning; track developments and results.
• Engage with and provide capacity building to participating investors: support the organisation of educational sessions, share relevant reports and other resources, share past investor experiences.
• Engage with external company stakeholders, including civil society, community organisations, trade unions, other investor initiatives, public officials, etc.

Support the governance and strategy development of Spring

• Support the development, finetuning and monitoring of Spring’s initiative-wide strategy
• Support the screening of company performance against Spring’s company assessment framework. The Company Assessment Framework is intended to inform the engagement asks for focus companies and to periodically screen progress and results of the initiative.
• Monitor the progress of the initiative in Latin America and provide periodic communication about impacts and lessons learned. Support the development of initiative-wide progress reports.
• Consult with Spring’s advisory committees and/or its individual members on initiative-wide strategic choices.
• Support general governance and project management functions, including the preparation and updating of Terms of Reference and other governance documents.   

External representation

• Act as an initial point of contact for participating signatories in Latin America. Build relationships with investors to maintain and expand expertise of engagement practices, best practices and needs. Actively recruit new participants for Spring.
• Build relationships with stakeholders in the nature space to inform investors’ expectations and create channels of communication between the investor group and relevant stakeholders and technical experts.
• Speak publicly at regional events, both digital and in person to senior-level stakeholders, on Spring, on stewardship and the PRI’s work more generally.

Internal processes

• Manage and/or contribute to other initiative-wide projects (as needed), such as sector work/research, signatory accountability, webinars, progress report, etc.
• Work to identify and implement improvements to PRI coordination of collaborative engagement processes, including shareholder resolutions and the role of proxy voting.
• Work closely with other PRI engagement staff to ensure that various initiatives (both inside and outside of PRI) are aligned and coordinated.
• Proactively share knowledge with other PRI stewardship staff on lessons learned from past and ongoing engagement efforts.
• Be responsive to feedback from PRI colleagues, signatories and other stakeholders, proactively following up to ensure any issues are resolved. Engage with colleagues to gain a broader understanding of issues and seek to respond to or resolve them.
• Independently deliver well-structured, logical presentations, recommendations and outputs that deliver maximum impact with minimum editing.

Person Specification

• Demonstrated subject matter expertise on nature, deforestation and corporate political engagement, and strong knowledge of stewardship as relevant to the initiatives that are supported by the PRI.
• Recognised by colleagues, signatories and stakeholders for depth and breadth of specialist knowledge on stewardship, nature, deforestation and/or responsible political engagement. Adds value by sharing specialist knowledge and insights in a professional and objective manner. 
• Excellent analytical and critical thinking skills. Ability to identify trends (and risks) and solve problems in a structured and rigorous way with a view of implementing improvements.
• Proactive approach to keeping up to date with the latest science and research on nature, deforestation and political engagement. Ability to apply knowledge and analysis to identify issues, communicate fact-based insights and develop and evaluate tailored engagement strategies.
• Ability to translate specialist information and providing technical expertise in a clear and understandable format.
• A collaborative and consultative approach to working with others & committed to fostering an inclusive environment. An ability to find consensus among differing perspectives and identifying mutually beneficial solutions.
• Good written communication and verbal presentation skills. Strong public speaking skills with ability to give presentations and lead meetings with senior stakeholders.
• Excellent networking, influencing and interpersonal skills with the ability to build strong and constructive relationships in different circumstances (remote/in-person or internal/external) with a clear understanding of what drives people and how to achieve optimal outcomes.
• Ability to engage Spring participants using their language, tailoring communication style for this audience. Ensuring that engagement asks to companies are framed in actionable and constructive terms.
• Ability to clarify matters by absorbing and understanding relevant information and feeding them back in concise terms. Using effective listening and questioning to enhance understanding of complex issues.
• Very good programme management skills, with experience in delivering complex projects successfully, including directing others that may not be your direct reports.
• A strong sense of execution and delivery, working to agreed deadlines, involving relevant colleagues and allowing enough time for review and quality assurance.
• Ability to capture knowledge at the end of each project/ process/activity, to use and share.
• Effectively captures and structures complex, ill-defined or vague problems and is comfortable handling uncertainty (in own work and that of team members). Offers appropriate guidance or recommendations, including considering examples outside of the PRI.

As this is a regional role, international travel may be required [3-6 travels per year].

We encourage applications from those who do not meet the full list of competencies and experience listed below.

We particularly welcome candidates from under-represented groups, including Black, Asian, and other People of Colour, those with visible or non-visible disabilities, LGBTQ+ candidates and those who are neurodivergent.

The PRI is committed to offering flexibility to our employees, both formal (e.g. part-time work) and informal (e.g. a shift in hours to accommodate caring responsibilities). Please talk to us about how we could make this role flexible for you.

N.B. We reserve the right to close a vacancy before the closing date in the event of an overwhelming response or a change in business priorities.

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