Dr. William Crist (Bill) became Chairman of GO in October 2008. He is an Emeritus Professor of Economics at California State University, Stanislaus, USA, where he served as Professor of Economics from 1969 through his retirement in January, 2003. He was Chair of the University\'s Department of Economics from 1986 to 1990. He also served the CSU as the University’s Corporate and Foreign Education Liaison from 2000 to 2003. He has been Executive Vice President of Governance for Owners USA, Inc. since its inception. He holds a Master’s Degree in Economics and Business and a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Nebraska.

During his early academic career, Dr. Crist was the founding President of the California Faculty Association, which is the exclusive collective bargaining representative of more that 30,000 university faculty members in California. He served as President and Chairman of the CFA Board from 1976 to 1985.
Dr. Crist was an elected member of the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) Board of Administration from 1987 to 2003. He served as President of CalPERS and Chairman of the Board from 1992 until his retirement from the Board in January, 2003. He served on every standing committee of the CalPERS Board during his tenure. CalPERS is the largest public pension fund in the United States with more than 1.6 million members and more than $226 billion in assets.

Bill has served as Co-Chair of the U.S. Council of Institutional Investors, and as a member of the Council\'s Executive Committee. He was a founding member of the International Corporate Governance Network and served as a member of the ICGN Board of Governors. He earned international acclaim by receiving the 2003 Award for Excellence in Corporate Governance from the International Corporate Governance Network for his work in promoting good corporate governance world wide. He presently is Chair of the ICGN Nominating Committee.
Bill was a member of the Board of Directors of the Pacific Pension Institute from 1997 to 2004 and served as Chairman from 1998 to 2003. He currently is on the PPI Advisory Board. He serves on a number of other advisory boards in both the public and the private sector, and on corporate boards. He has written numerous articles on pension fund investing, retirement system administration, corporate governance and public sector collective bargaining.
 

Ronnie has over twenty-five years experience in the fund management industry and has managed funds covering most corners of the globe. He is currently an Executive Director at Stonehage Limited, a wealth management firm, where he is also heads up the Investment Advisory division. Prior to joining Stonehage in 2006, Ronnie was Fund Services director at IPGL (the investment vehicle of ICAP Chief Executive Michael Spencer) where he led the development of the fund management area of the business. Previous to joining IPGL, Ronnie was with Lombard Odier, which he joined in 1983, and where he was CIO, Head of the Group Institutional Unit and, latterly, Managing Director.
 

Steve Brown has worked in investment management since 1986, having spent 18 years at Hermes Pensions Management. Following three years as Director of UK Equities in the mid-1990s, in 1998 he founded Hermes Focus Asset Management (HFAM) with Peter Butler. The first HFAM fund, the Hermes UK Focus Fund, performed strongly during 1998-2004, and in February 2002 the Hermes European Focus Fund was launched. Prior to the European expansion, Steve was appointed Managing Director (Investments) to be the senior investment professional overseeing the development of the shareholder engagement funds across Europe. The European fund also performed strongly in 2002-2004. Steve resigned from Hermes in November 2004 to found Governance for Owners.

Peter Butler (CEO) became a founder partner of Governance for Owners (GO) in November 2004. From 1996 to 2004 Peter was responsible for building the highly respected Corporate Focus and Focus Fund teams at Hermes Pensions Management Limited in London. Hermes is the in-house fund manager of BT Pension Scheme which is the largest pension fund in the UK. During this period he established the largest corporate governance team in the world – some 45 people working on 2,500 stocks across all major global markets– and developed the concept of the Hermes Focus Funds, the first institutionally-owned fund to invest in underperforming companies across Europe and employ relational shareholder engagement techniques to add value to the fund. Under Peter’s leadership the Hermes Focus Funds grew to over £1.5 billion of funds under management from c40 major institutional clients in Europe, North America and Japan and achieved substantial out-performance against benchmarks.

Peter had over 20 years’ global experience in a wide range of industries as a senior executive before joining Hermes, and for seven years was a director of public companies in both executive and non-executive positions. As CFO he steered Berisford International, a UK based conglomerate with £1.9 billion of turnover, through two difficult years of crisis management and work-out under refinancing agreements when 68 banks called a standstill on over £1.4 billion of debt. As Finance Director of British Sugar plc he led a team of 170 and introduced radical changes which doubled annual profits to over £100m. His early career was spent at global accountants Touche Ross & Co and BOC Group plc in the oilfield services and welding industries.

Peter is at the forefront of the global debate on the development of corporate governance and is a past board member of the International Corporate Governance. He frequently participates in seminars and conferences worldwide.

He is Chairman of Essex & Southend Sports Trust, a member of the General Committee of Essex County Cricket Club and the former Chairman of the Essex Auto Group Southend Cricket Festival. He is an avid follower of Southend United Football Club.
 

Sir John was born in 1939, is married to Julia and has two daughters, Katy and Lydia. He was educated at Bablake School, Coventry and London University where he graduated in Petroleum Engineering. From 1962 to 1966, he was employed by Shell International as a Petroleum Engineer. From 1966 to 1968, he studied at the London Business School and obtained an MSc in Business Studies.

In 1968 he became General Manager of AC Delco’s UK replacement parts operation, part of General Motors. He then joined British Leyland in 1971 and his initial period with that company culminated in his appointment as Director of BL Parts and Service. In this role he was responsible for the rapid development of the very successful Unipart operation.

Sir John left British Leyland in 1976 to become Marketing Director of Massey Ferguson’s construction and machinery division based in Rome. He subsequently became Corporate Parts Director.

Sir John rejoined British Leyland as Chairman of Jaguar Cars in May 1980 and when it was privatised in August 1984, he remained as Chairman and Chief Executive of Jaguar Cars Limited, later becoming Chairman and Chief Executive of Jaguar plc in March 1985.

After the takeover by Ford, Sir John retired from Jaguar and was appointed to the Board of Directors of BAA plc on 15 June 1990, taking up the position of Chief Executive on 1st September 1990 which he held until 1st October 1999.

He is past President of the Institute of Management and retired as President of the CBI in May 2004. He joined the Board of Severn Trent Plc in October 2004 and became Chairman in January 2005. He retired as Chairman of Severn Trent plc in July 2010.

Sir John’s interests are sport, theatre and music. He was knighted in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List in June 1986 and is a Deputy Lieutenant of the County of Warwickshire.

Professor Haspeslagh became Dean of Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School in May 2008 and he joined full-time in September 2008. He is currently on leave from INSEAD, where he holds the Paul Desmarais Chaired Professorship in Partnership and Active Ownership. Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School, founded in 1953, has campuses in Gent, Leuven and St Petersburg, and is the degree granting partner of Peking University’s BiMBA programme. The School is ranked number 10 in Europe by the Financial Times and is accredited by AACSB, AMBA and EQUIS.

Philippe Haspeslagh has a degree of Commercial Engineer of the Catholic University of Leuven (1972), and a postgraduate degree in management from the Vlerick School of Management (1973). He also holds an MBA (1977) and a DBA (1983) from the Harvard Business School where he was a Baker Scholar.

He joined the INSEAD faculty in 1979, where until 2008 he directed the Strategic Issues in Mergers and Acquisitions programme (1980 - ), as well as the International Directors Forum (2002- ). He was a Visiting Professor at the Stanford Business School (1984 - 1985) and at Harvard Business School (1992). During 1996 and 1997 he was on leave of absence as “Directeur de Cabinet” of the Belgian Minister for Agriculture and SMEs. He was also a part time Extra-Ordinary Professor of Management at the University of Ghent, detached to the Vlerick Leuven Ghent Management School until 2007.

His research over the years has covered four areas: Corporate Strategy and the Strategic Process in Diversified Firms, the Management of Mergers and Acquisitions, the Implementation of Value Based Management, and Board Effectiveness. His work on Portfolio Planning and the Management of Diversified Companies received the American Academy of Management 1984 A T Kearney award for outstanding research in general management. His book on “Managing Acquisitions: Creating Value through Corporate Renewal”, (with David Jemison, Free Press/McMillan 1991) received the Academy of Management’s 1993 George R. Terry Award for the most significant contribution to management. His work on the implementation of value-based management was published in the Harvard Business Review July-August 2001 issue (“Managing for Value: It’s Not Just About the Numbers” with Tomo Noda and Fares Boulos). His work on Board effectiveness led to the creation of the International Directors Forum, a peer-based learning process for Chairmen and Non-Executive Directors, and a series of company specific programmes for company Boards.

Professor Haspeslagh has consulted widely on corporate role, strategic planning in diversified firms, acquisition management, and managing for value. He has conducted multiple Board effectiveness programmes and Board reviews. He is the Chairman and co-founder of Dujardin Foods, a European frozen vegetables family firm and a NED of Vandemoortele, a €1 billion Belgian food firm. In the private equity and asset management sphere he is a Director and co-founder of Quest for Growth, a listed technology cross-over fund, Chairman and co-founder of Capricorn Venture Partners, a European VC firm, and a non-executive partner and co-founder of Procuritas, a Scandinavian buyout fund. He was the Academic Director of the European Council on Corporate Strategy of the Conference Board (2000-2007) and was a Board member of INSEAD (1992-1995).

He is Belgian citizen, married to Martine Van den Poel, and has two children.

Yoichiro Iwama is Chairman of the Japan Securities Investment Advisers Association. Until June 2009, Mr Iwama was President of Tokio Marine Asset Management, a position he had held since 2005. Prior to being appointed as President, he held a number of positions in Tokio Marine group including Senior Managing Director of Millea Holdings (now Tokio Marine Holdings) and Tokio Marine & Nichido Fire Insurance. He held some positions of the board of directors and advisory boards outside Tokio Marine Group as well.

Yoichiro Iwama has over 40 years experience in the asset management and insurance industries and holds a BA degree in Law from the University of Tokyo.
 

Frank joined RPMI in 2004 as Finance Director and became Managing Director, Investments in 2009. He oversees the investment business streams of RPMI and RPMI Railpen, with assets under management of some £18 billion.

Frank is a chartered accountant and holds a Commerce degree. Before joining the company, Frank held a number of finance director posts in the transport sector.