Investment Stewardship Analyst, Specialist

Serves as an analyst supporting day-to-day company engagement, research, and proxy voting activities. Analyzes proposals and contributes to proxy voting recommendations in alignment with Vanguard's proxy voting guidelines

About Vanguard

More than 45 years ago, John C. Bogle had a vision to start an investment company that did things differently. A company with no external shareholders. Where all the profits were invested back into the business and used to lower costs. Evidently, it was as bold as it was brilliant. To this day, Vanguard Group still has no external shareholders. That means no share prices to protect, and no profits to generate for outside owners. 

Today, Vanguard is one of the world’s largest investment management companies, serving more than 50 million investors worldwide. For more than 25 years Vanguard Australia has been supporting individual investors, financial advisers, and superannuation members to achieve their long-term financial goals.

About the job

Vanguard’s Investment Stewardship program has a clear mandate: to safeguard and promote long-term shareholder returns on behalf of Vanguard’s passively managed equity funds and their investors. We carry out this mandate by promoting governance practices that are associated with long-term shareholder returns at the companies in which the funds invest. We do this by:

• Engaging with portfolio company directors and executives to learn about companies’ corporate governance practices and to share our perspectives on corporate governance practices associated with long-term shareholder returns.
• Voting proxies at portfolio company shareholder meetings based on each fund’s proxy voting policies and guidelines.
• Promoting corporate governance practices associated with long-term investment returns through our published materials and participation in industry events and initiatives.

An Investment Stewardship Analyst supports Vanguard’s investment stewardship efforts through research on proxy voting, implementation of policies across the EMEA & APAC portfolio, preparing research for company engagements and managing a range of data and workflow requirements. Candidates with legal, governance, research, data and finance backgrounds and who have an interest in risk oversight and governance issues would be welcome.

In this role, you will:

• Develop an understanding of Vanguard’s Investment Stewardship philosophy and the funds’ proxy voting guidelines as well as expertise in select corporate governance areas, such as board composition and effectiveness, board oversight of strategy and risk, executive compensation, and shareholder rights.
• Utilize company disclosures, third-party research, and other available information to analyze proposals against the Vanguard-advised funds’ proxy voting guidelines and present relevant recommendations.
• Conduct research to prepare Vanguard’s Investment Stewardship team leaders for conversations with senior leaders of portfolio companies. Listen to and document notes from these engagements.
• Assist with research projects to enhance the knowledge base of the EMEA & APAC Investment Stewardship team.
• Proactively manage workloads through collaboration, prioritization and strong attention to deadlines. Partner with colleagues on improvements to quality, process and operations as needed.
• Establish and maintain effective working relationships with business partners and vendors. Proactively foster effective collaborative communication internally and externally.
• Participates in special projects and perform other duties as assigned.

What it takes:

• Undergraduate degree.
• Equivalent of minimum two years of business or investment experience.
• Strong work ethic. Demonstrated willingness to contribute to the overall success of the team and to Vanguard and its shareholders.
• Demonstrated interest in investment stewardship topics such as corporate governance and public policy or regulation.
• Fluency in one of the following languages preferred: Japanese, Korean, Mandarin.
• Demonstrated ability to function in a fast paced, ambiguous environment, managing multiple priorities and diverse responsibilities.
• Excellent verbal and written communication capabilities as demonstrated through prior work experience or education.
• Strong quantitative and analytical abilities.
• Ability to work both independently and collaboratively to achieve the best results.

Inclusion Statement

Vanguard’s continued commitment to diversity and inclusion is firmly rooted in our culture. Every decision we make to best serve our clients, crew (internally employees are referred to as crew), and communities is guided by one simple statement: “Do the right thing.”

We believe that a critical aspect of doing the right thing requires building diverse, inclusive, and highly effective teams of individuals who are as unique as the clients they serve. We empower our crew to contribute their distinct strengths to achieving Vanguard’s core purpose through our values.

When all crew members feel valued and included, our ability to collaborate and innovate is amplified, and we are united in delivering on Vanguard’s core purpose.

Our core purpose: To take a stand for all investors, to treat them fairly, and to give them the best chance for investment success.

About our Program

https://corporate.vanguard.com/content/corporatesite/us/en/corp/how-we-advocate/investment-stewardship/stewardship-in-action.html

How We Work

Vanguard has implemented a hybrid working model for the majority of our crew members, designed to capture the benefits of enhanced flexibility while enabling in-person learning, collaboration, and connection. We believe our mission-driven and highly collaborative culture is a critical enabler to support long-term client outcomes and enrich the employee experience.