How we vote for you

Natasha is currently a Partner and Head of Stewardship at the asset manager Sarasin & Partners LLP, where she steers the firm’s stewardship work, ensuring effective engagement, voting and public policy outreach in order to promote the creation of sustainable value. Since 2017, she has spearheaded Sarasin’s flagship Climate Active strategy.

Natasha has been a vocal advocate for reform of the accounting and audit system to promote long-term stewardship as well as action by company boards to confront climate change. Natasha is a member of the Disclosure and Transparency Committee of the International Corporate Governance Network, as well as the Consultative Advisory Group for the International Audit and Assurance Standards Board. Natasha sits on the Investment Committee for the Cambridge Assistants Contributory Pension Scheme and is a non-executive director at Carbon Tracker, a leading think-tank on investment and climate change.

Natasha has a background in development economics and responsible investment. Prior to joining Sarasin & Partners, she spent six years as the Senior Analyst leading ESG integration and several areas of policy work at the Universities Superannuation Scheme’s Investment Management arm; and four years in Budapest working with OTP Fund Management and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. Before moving into finance, Natasha spent a number of years working on sustainable development issues in Asia, Africa and Latin America. Natasha started her career as an Overseas Development Institute Fellow, working as the Chief Economist in the Guyana Forestry Commission.

Natasha has Masters in Economics from Cambridge University, an MSc in Natural Resource Economics from University College London, and is a CFA Charterholder.

Therese is responsible for undertaking rigorous analysis on the financial implications of ESG factors for specific stocks as well as on a sector/industry basis. She also supports and leads company engagements and voting.

Prior to joining Sarasin & Partners in 2019, Therese worked as a senior research analyst at Institutional Shareholder Services Inc (ISS), a provider of governance and responsible investment solutions to the financial community. Prior to ISS, she worked at ShareAction, a UK organisation that promotes responsible investment.

Therese has an MSc in Corporate Governance and Business Ethics from University of London, and a BMath in Actuarial Science from the University of Waterloo, Canada. She is also a Fellow of the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries (IFoA).

Julia Kochetygova is the Ownership Lead at Sarasin & Partners. She is responsible for engaging with, and voting at, portfolio companies with a focus on driving sustainable change in their environmental, social, and governance performance.

She joined in January 2022 from Northern Trust Asset Management where she was the Head of EMEA Stewardship, with engagement and voting responsibilities for companies in EMEA. Prior to that, Julia was the Senior Sustainable Investing Research Analyst for Northern Trust Asset Management. In that role, she was responsible for ESG thought leadership and product innovation.

Her past positions include Head of sustainability indices at S&P Dow Jones Indices, Head of the Corporate Relations function at MDM Bank in Russia, and Head of Corporate Governance Services at S&P Ratings.

She holds a PhD in Economics from the Institute of Economics, Russian Academy of Sciences, and MSc in Economics of Industry from the Moscow Institute of National Economy. Julia graduated from the INSEAD Executive Education Program; she holds a Fundamentals of Sustainability Accounting (FSA) credential from SASB (Sustainability Accounting Standards Board) and a Climate Change Financial Risks and Opportunities credential from Imperial College Business School.

Ben is responsible for evaluating the investment implications of climate change and integrating these risks and opportunities into portfolios .

Prior to joining Sarasin & Partners in 2018, Ben worked for RBC and CIBC as a sell-side Equity Research Analyst covering global natural resources. He has also worked in audit and assurance for PwC in London, and as a commodities economist in Sydney, Australia.

Ben is a Chartered Accountant with the Institute of Chartered Accountants of England and Wales, holds a Certificate in Investments (Securities) from CISI, a Certificate in Economics of Competing Energy Technologies from Stanford University and graduated the Global MBA at Imperial College London with Distinction.

Kwai San is responsible for overseeing stewardship activities undertaken by the investment team on individual companies, and the positioning of stewardship issues internally and externally.

Prior to joining Sarasin & Partners in March 2016, he spent five years as an analyst in the Governance and Sustainable Investment team at BMO Global Asset Management EMEA, covering ESG integration, proxy voting and company engagements across a number of markets in the UK and Asia. Before coming to the UK, he worked for HSBC and AECOM in Hong Kong in the areas of information technology and management accounting.

Kwai San has an MBA from the University of Durham, an LLB from the University of London International Programme, and a BEng in Information Engineering from the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He is also a CFA Charterholder.