Location: UK: London with flexible working

Opportunity: Supported Hiring into Permanent Role

Apply by: ASAP

* Applications are now closed *

WTW is looking for an Investment Consultant and welcomes professionals who have taken an extended career break to apply. Applicants with a career break of 18 months or more will benefit from Career Returners Coaching Support provided by Women Returners. During your career break you may have been working on a small-scale basis to fit around your other commitments or have not carried out any paid work for a number of years.

They are looking for an insightful, adaptable and motivated consultant to join their Advisory Investment Services team within the London office. They are a very close, collaborative team in London, but you will also benefit from opportunities to work with colleagues across the UK.

WTW aim to empower institutional investors to achieve their specific objectives by delivering outstanding investment advice and solutions, based on a strong foundation of research, analysis, innovation and trust. As an Associate Director, you will be working with a number of client teams in the preparation and delivery of this advice. This will include leading on a number of clients, as well as supporting senior client leads in some cases. You will work primarily with a variety of UK Defined Benefit and Defined Contribution pension schemes covering a range of asset sizes (£100m to £5bn+), sectors and industries (including many household names).

The role is both analytical and client facing – you will be involved in overseeing the preparation of detailed modelling which helps arrive at the proposed investment solutions and will also be discussing ideas and persuading clients to take advice. Building relationships internally and with clients and third parties is a key aspect of the role.

Experience of UK pension fund liabilities and investment markets will be expected for this role. The role opportunity allows for flexibility in your working arrangements and they would be happy to discuss this with you further.

The Role

The Advisory Investment Services team represents an important part of the Global Investment business of WTW. Many of their clients are UK Defined Benefit pension schemes, including some of the largest schemes in the UK, although you may also work with DC schemes, sovereign wealth funds and charities.

The core of their work involves:

• helping clients determine their mission, beliefs and investment strategy;
• designing and implementing ‘best in class’ investment portfolios to achieve their objectives.
• understanding pension scheme liabilities in order to help clients and their LDI managers design, model and implement derivative-based investment solutions;
• for DC schemes, helping clients build and deliver innovative investment solutions to drive better value for members; and
• assisting clients to measure and monitor progress against their strategy.

Your role in the team will cover the follow elements.

Client / portfolio

• Oversee the preparation of analysis and client/internal reports covering governance, investment strategy (including Journey Planning and hedging decisions, and default design for DC schemes), implementation (portfolio construction and manager selection) and monitoring
• Develop and build client relationships, including understanding their business environment
• Attend client meetings to deliver our advice, training and reporting of client performance
• Actively seek opportunities to grow client revenue, through delivery of additional services and developing new business

People 

• Support a collaborative and inclusive working environment
• Build strong relationships across your working network and collaborate effectively across all WTW specialist teams (e.g. research, reporting, retirement) to deliver in an efficient and timely manner
• Build relationships with external entities (eg investment banks and asset managers) in order to contribute to the development of client solutions
• Develop more junior colleagues, to either support you or provide services to other clients, through effective mentoring and coaching

Excellence

• Be an ambassador for ‘Excellence’ principles and risk management by ensuring high standards are applied and maintained across all work

Engage in continuous professional development to enhance technical investment knowledge

The Requirements

• They would expect individuals at this level to have relevant industry experience. Knowledge and understanding of UK DB pension liabilities and of UK DC pensions is expected
• Ability and desire to build relationships and adapt your communication skills to the needs of different clients and stakeholders
• Project management skills including the ability to work successfully in cross-discipline teams to ensure successful delivery of projects and to build strong networks.
• A relevant qualification, such as CFA or Actuarial is preferred