Plenary 1: Is Canada taking a lead on ESG integration in global markets, or dragging its heels?

Michael Kelly is OMERS Chief Legal & Corporate Affairs Officer. In his current role, Michael oversees OMERS Legal Division and is involved in various matters and initiatives related to pension and investment law, regulatory affairs and corporate governance. Michael is actively involved in Board and Committee functions and oversees the Board Secretariat.

Michael also chairs the Sustainable Investing Committee, which oversees OMERS approach to matters such as environmental, social and governance (ESG) integration in its investing activities. He also represents OMERS on various domestic and international organizations focused on areas including governance, institutional investing, sustainability and climate change, and finance.

Keith Ambachtsheer has been recognized as the globe’s number one knowledge broker in institutional investing and is known for his ‘out-of-the-box’ approach to pension design, governance, and investing issues. Since its 1985 inception, KPA Advisory Services has been a trusted incubator for new thinking in the field of pensions. CEM Benchmarking Inc., co-founded by Keith in 1991, has earned a reputation as the premier global benchmarking organization in the pensions and investments industry.

Keith was named "One of the 30 Most Influential People in Pensions" by Pensions and Investments in the USA and has received many honours over the course of his professional career.

Randy is CIO for Sun Life since 2016 and leads SLC Management’s insurance business with $119 billion in assets under management (AUM). Randy is Executive Sponsor of SLC Management’s Sustainable Investment Program, and a member of Sun Life’s International Sustainability Council responsible for implementing the global sustainability plan.

Randy was Global Head of Insurance and Pension Solutions and UK Head of Asset and Wealth Management, Deutsche Asset & Wealth Management. As Co-Chief Investment Officer of Deutsche Asset Management, he led a global investment team of 750 with $1.2 trillion AUM. As head of its investment business, he managed money for insurance companies with more than $200 billion AUM.

Randy achieved Bachelor of Science and Master of Engineering degrees, in Electrical Engineering, from Cornell University. He has an MBA from Cornell University's Johnson Graduate School of Management, where he was a Lester B. Knight Scholar.

Nalini is a Director within the Responsible Investment team at BMO Global Asset Management, based in Canada. Nalini joined the team in 2019 after working for 3 years with the UN supported Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI) as the Head of Canada. At the PRI, Nalini managed the Canadian base of institutional clients and educated the broader investment community on ESG issues and integration strategies. Prior to the PRI, Nalini worked at BlackRock Canada covering pension funds, endowments and foundations and also championed BlackRock’s responsible investment initiatives locally. Previously, Nalini worked in the UK with Roubini Global Economics and the Gerson Lehrman Group, both alternative investment research firms supporting the buy-side. Nalini started her career with Accenture consulting with clients in the Technology, Media and Telecom sector.

Joy started her career as a traditional mechanical engineer working on aircraft landing gear before completing a Master’s of Applied Science with a collaborative in Environmental Engineering. Her years at ICF Consulting allowed her to work on a broad range of strategic and management projects on topics of climate change and energy for clients as diverse as forestry companies to power generation associations.

To deepen her experience in climate change, she moved to the UK where she was a technical lead on greenhouse gas emission projects for the UNFCCC carbon markets. She gained on the ground experience in preparing, educating and registering projects in developing countries for a venture cap firm.

Complementary her prior experience, Joy returned to Ontario to work for the Ontario Ministry of the Environment in a large modernization project involving the Ontario Environmental Protection Act and Water Resources Act. Additionally led the change management project designing major process changes throughout the approvals branch.

Most recently, Joy applied all her previous experience establishing the responsible investing framework and acting as the in-house climate change subject matter expert at Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan. Working across asset classes including private equity, infrastructure, real estate, credit and public equities, she helped to integrate environmental, social and governance practices in investment teams. A large part of her role focused on educating the organization on climate change and helping to develop a corporate response.
She chaired the Decarbonization Advisory Panel for the $209.1 billion New York State Common Retirement Fund. The panel provided recommendations on how to best to mitigate investment risks stemming from climate change and maximize opportunities from the new, low-carbon economy.

Joy is a Professional Engineer of Ontario and a Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst.