Shareholder Engagement

Engaging with shareholders outside the context of the annual meeting – a period when governance groups at large asset managers are more receptive to deeper discussion of topics on the company’s agenda as well as surfacing other issues of particular interest among investors, such as ESG – is becoming increasingly important to developing and maintaining shareholder confidence in the board, and winning latitude and support for execution of the strategic plan.

Sometimes there is additional leverage by strategically engaging with the proxy advisors such as ISS, which can efficiently influence votes. Our team includes former ISS executives, who provide the insights to improve these recommendations and ultimately increase shareholder support.

SGA can help by:

• Developing engagement strategy including shareholder targeting, participants and roles, key messages, and measurements of effectiveness.
• Providing tactical support: introductions to proxy advisors and institutional governance groups, development and/or review of agendas and presentation materials and refinement of talking points.
• Briefing directors and executives on personnel and policies in advance of each engagement call, including each investor’s potential points of friction with the company’s governance profile or practices.
• Conducting training sessions with executives or directors are involved with the outreach campaign.
• Providing objective feedback following engagement calls, as well as ongoing and summary assessments of campaign effectiveness, key takeaways including points of vulnerability or opportunity, any proposed responses or changes, and next steps.