Accelerating ESG

…advancing sustainability initiatives through innovation, collaboration and education, Sustain SoCal presents a seminal roundtable on Environmental, Social and Governance…

 Accelerating ESG

How today’s challenges are further elevating the importance of ESG business and investment decisions

September 16, 2020

Noon – 1:30 pm

Link to Sept 16 2020 Roundtable Session Recording here…

Attend this virtual roundtable discussion (via Zoom Webinar) with industry leaders at the forefront of sustainability, finance, and investment – providing their insights and discussing key trends and implications for CFOs, investors, and other stakeholders. Speaker biographies are at the bottom of this page. 

Roundtable Participants:

Riyad Said, Senior Vice President and Key Client Advisor (Moderator)
Bank of the West BNP Paribas

 

Katie Schmitz Eulitt, Director of Investor Outreach
Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB)

 

Michelle Edkins, Managing Director & Global Head of Investment, Stewardship
BlackRock Investment Management Company

 

Kirsty Jenkinson, Head of Sustainable Investment and Stewardship
CalSTRS

 

Brad Sparks, US Executive Director
The Prince’s Accounting for Sustainability (A4S) Project

 

Harout Diramerian, CFO
Hudson Pacific Properties

 

Or point your web browser to: https://esg-acceleration.eventbrite.com

Attend this virtual roundtable discussion (via Zoom Webinar) with industry leaders at the forefront of sustainability, finance, and investment – providing their insights and discussing key  trends and implications for CFOs, investors and other stakeholders.

 

Thank you to the ESG Acceleration Roundtable Sponsor:

Roundtable Participant bios:

Riyad Said, Senior Vice President and Key Client Advisor (Roundtable Moderator)
Bank of the West BNP Paribas

Riyad Said is a Senior Advisor in the Key Client Group America with Bank of the West/BNP Paribas’ Wealth Management Group. He is responsible for providing holistic advice to ultra-high net-worth clients throughout the Southern California markets based on their needs & aspirations, as well as facilitating their access to the vast array of solutions and services the Key Client Group offers. Over the past 23 years in the financial services industry, Riyad has built client relationships and served ultra-high net worth individuals, business owners, executives & families. Riyad is also at Sustain SoCal Board member.

 

Katie Schmitz Eulitt, Director of Investor Outreach
Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB)

Katie Schmitz Eulitt has worked with the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) since its inception. She now serves on SASB’s Capital Markets Policy and Outreach team, cultivating the use of SASB standards in investment decisions. Katie co-manages SASB’s Investor Advisory Group, comprising 45 leading global asset owners and managers – with over $34 Trillion in assets – supporting a market standard for the communication of corporate performance on financially-material ESG issues to investors. She also curates and edits ESG Integration Insights, SASB’s ongoing series of investor-written case studies examining the use of SASB tools across asset classes, markets, and investment strategies. Katie worked with investment bank Salomon Brothers for over a decade in the US, Japan, and Hong Kong. Her experience in project development and finance spans the energy sector (both fossil fuels and renewables), the protection of forested lands, and water disinfection in developing markets.
 

Michelle Edkins, Managing Director
BlackRock Investment Stewardship

Michelle Edkins is a Managing Director in BlackRock’s Investment Stewardship team of over 45 specialists covering the Americas; Europe, the Middle East and Africa; and Asia-Pacific. In that role, she is responsible globally for institutional relations, policy on investment stewardship issues, and communications related to BlackRock’s investment stewardship perspectives and activities. She also serves on the firm’s Global Operating and Government Relations Steering Committees. An active participant in the public corporate governance debate, she was named in the NACD Directorship 100 Governance Professionals list the past seven years. She is also a Fellow of the Aspen Institute’s First Movers program and a former Chair of the Board of Governors of the International Corporate Governance Network. She currently serves on a number of industry initiatives to enhance governance and sustainable business practices including the US chapter of the 30% Club, a market initiative to increase the number of women on boards and in senior management, the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) Investor Advisory Group and the CECP’s Strategic Investor Initiative. An economist by training, Michelle has also worked in the UK in a number of investment stewardship-related roles and in government roles in her native New Zealand.

 

Kirsty Jenkinson, Head of Sustainable Investment and Stewardship
CalSTRS

Kirsty is the Investment Director, Sustainable Investment & Stewardship Strategies for the California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS), the largest educator-only public pension fund in the world with over $240 billion of assets under management. She joined CalSTRS in January 2019 and is responsible for managing over $6 billion placed with sustainability and activist managers, overseeing the fund’s stewardship activities including corporate engagement and proxy voting, and outreach with the fund’s stakeholders. Prior to joining CalSTRS, Kirsty spent four years at Wespath Benefits and Investments in Chicago and four years as the director of the Markets and Enterprise Program at the World Resources Institute (WRI), a Washington, D.C.-based global research organization focused on the environment and economic development. Before moving to the U.S., Kirsty was a Director of Governance and Sustainable Investment at F&C Asset Management (now BMO Global Asset Management) and an Executive Director in the Fixed Income division of Goldman Sachs in London. Kirsty sits on the board of the Business and Human Rights Resource Centre and is a member of WRI’s Sustainable Investment Advisory Council. She received an M.A. degree in International History from the University of Edinburgh, Scotland.

 

Brad Sparks, US Executive Director
The Prince’s Accounting for Sustainability (A4S) Project

Brad Sparks is Executive Director of The Prince’s Accounting for Sustainability (A4S) Project. He leads the US Chapter of the A4S CFO Leadership Network, supporting Fortune 500 CFOs and their finance teams in embedding sustainability into strategy and business decision-making. He is also responsible for A4S engagement activities across the US, including A4S work with the capital markets and with alliance partners. Brad previously served as an Executive Director with KPMG, supporting multiple organizations in developing sustainability strategies, responding to sustainability-related risks, assessing sustainability performance, and external reporting. He also led KPMG’s global environmental sustainability strategy and worked with KPMG global leadership to advance KPMG Corporate Citizenship initiatives. Brad is a Certified Public Accountant. He has an MBA in Sustainable Enterprise from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, as well as Accounting degrees from Appalachian State University. Brad serves on the Board of GRID Alternatives and is an Executive-in-Residence at Cornell University’s Center for Global Sustainable Enterprise.

 

Harout Diramerian, CFO
Hudson Pacific Properties

Harout Diramerian joined Hudson Pacific in 2010 and serves as Chief Financial Officer. He is responsible for the company’s finance and accounting functions. He previously served as Chief Accounting Officer for Hudson Pacific. Prior to joining the Hudson Pacific, Diramerian was Vice President of Finance and Analysis at Thomas Properties Group, where he was responsible for corporate-level earnings and cash flow projections, net asset valuations and corporate finance forecasting and analysis. Diramerian also worked in the real estate practice groups at Nanas, Stern, Biers, Neinstein and Co. LLP, Arthur Andersen LLP and KPMG LLP. Diramerian is a graduate of the University of California, Santa Barbara, and holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Business Economics with an emphasis in Accounting.