Selecting an asset manager – Feature


ers if they are given targets against which they can be measured. Given their importance in pension funds, it is unsurprising that the selection of asset managers is a carefully conducted operation. Centrica, which has the luxury of a well-resourced in-house investment team that is not shared by many of the 5,500 UK DB pension schemes, has a well-developed selection process. To begin with it makes it as widely known as possible what it is


looking for by using such channels as the press, thereby allow- ing potential candidates to approach it, rather than the other way around. It typically spends two to three years getting to know a manager through meetings and only then is the candi- date put to its investment committee. According to Ghosh, Centrica does not have a tick-box approach to asset manager selection but rather considers whether the individual managers can deliver it a competitive advantage. “It’s a clear example where we might think differently; if some-


Issue 90 | February 2020 | portfolio institutional | 31


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