Aviva Investors hires APG’s Diab for responsible investment integration role

Aviva Investors, the UK-based fund manager with £274bn (€324m) under management, has appointed Adeline Diab from Dutch pension management giant APG as Head of Integration for its Global Responsible Investment Team.

She will lead Aviva’s ‘Responsible Investment Officer’ network of analysts who have a role in integrating RI, helping to identifying material environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues and working to integrate ESG into the firm’s “mainstream” investment processes.

Diab will report to Steve Waygood, Aviva’s Chief Responsible Investment Officer. She joins from APG Asset Management in the Netherlands where she was responsible for embedding ESG into the investment process across asset classes, Aviva said.

The appointment comes after Aviva’s landmark decision last year to sell its seven-fund, £1.2bn specialist Sustainable and Responsible Investment team to Alliance Trust for £1m and instead focus on integrating ESG across all of its assets.Responsible Investor reported in December that Aviva was looking to hire a Head of Integration. Aviva is one of the first large asset managers to make the integration of ESG factors part of the pay criteria of its main investment desk heads.

Diab joined APG in January 2012, having been involved in setting up a sustainability focused venture called Women Capital.

Before that she was at London-based hedge fund GLG Partners where she managed a sustainable investment strategy in addition to two equity funds, and HSBC Asset Management in Paris, where she co-established the ESG Research team.

“Adeline has a wealth of experience in demonstrating how mainstream investment processes, long-term performance and risk management can be enhanced through ESG,” said Waygood.