Improving Fund Proxy Campaigns—Viewpoints from the Proxy Service Firm

Kelly O'Donnell currently serves as Director of Industry Operations and Transfer Agency at the Investment Company Institute (ICI). In this role, Kelly administers the Institute’s Small Funds Committee and Transfer Agent Advisory Committee (TAAC), along with various member working groups focused on matters pertaining to shareholder servicing including proxy, abandoned property, intermediary oversight, and shareholder compliance programs. Kelly is also responsible, in part, for the Institute’s Financial Innovation Working Group and is a subject matter contributor to ICI’s recently formed CIT and SMA advisory groups. As an operations and compliance professional, she assists members with regulatory and compliance requirements impacting their operations and administrative business areas. 

She has over 25 years of asset management experience, having most recently worked for 15 years for global asset manager Amundi Asset Management SpA, where she held various senior roles including roles in operations and compliance, overseeing their investor services division, and serving as Head of Financial Security and AML Officer. Prior to Amundi, Kelly worked at State Street Corp as Head of Investor Services, overseeing their institutional shareholder services business.

Lauren Davides is Vice President of Strategy and Business Development for Mutual Fund Proxy at Broadridge and is responsible for developing and leading Mutual Fund growth opportunities with a primary focus on both short- and long-term opportunities for Mutual Fund Proxy solutions, in addition to strategic execution on proxy campaigns. Lauren was previously at State Street, where she began in product management, and spent most of her time as Managing Director assessing the operational impacts of US regulations to asset managers, and then as Chief of Staff for State Street Global Markets. She ended her time at State Street as Chief of Staff of State Street Digital, with responsibility for all aspects of the successful launch of the digital assets division. She is a Certified Public Accountant and holds a double major in accounting and finance from the University of Illinois.

Christopher M. Hayden advises public operating and investment management companies on corporate governance issues, shareholder proposals, and proxy contests as Chief Operating Officer–US of Computershare and Georgeson’s corporate proxy practice.

With nearly 30 years of experience in the industry, Chris specializes in complex cross-border transactions and proxy contests. During his tenure at Georgeson, Chris has consulted with many corporations on offensive and defensive tactics in complex and extraordinary transactions. His corporate annual meeting clients include numerous S&P 100 members.

Chris also specializes in providing solicitation advice to investment management and business development companies. In addition to providing advice to closed-end funds and BDCs engaged in proxy fights, tender offers and rights offerings, Chris has worked on annual meeting proxy solicitation campaigns for many of the nation’s largest closed-end fund sponsors. Chris has advised on more than 100 closed-end fund contested meetings.

Chris is a member of the Society for Corporate Governance. He is a frequent speaker at Investment Company Institute events. He also serves as a Senior Managing Director for Georgeson Securities Corporation, where he oversees the firm’s Dealer Manager activities. Chris is an active volunteer at The Peddie School, where he serves as a class parent and Co-Chair of The Peddie Fund.

Chris received a bachelor’s degree in political science from Colgate University and holds Series 7, 24 and 63 licenses.

Nick is Chief Operating Officer with Morrow Sodali Fund Solutions.  Prior to joining Morrow Sodali Fund Solutions, Nick was Vice President of the Risk and Compliance Intelligence Group at DST (now SS&C) where he was charged to commercialize DST’s various Risk and Compliance products and build new business offerings. Previously, he was Chief Operating Officer at KEANE, a leading provider of unclaimed property communications, compliance and consulting services in the U.S. He also spent over a decade working at Andersen Consulting (now Accenture) and a boutique-consulting firm where his focus was mergers, acquisitions and process reengineering activities.

Alan Reid, Jr. is a co-founder of iconik, a fintech company that is defining a new market based on the transformative power of shareholder voting. His experience spans the wealth management and brokerage industries, with a track record of building a successful mutual fund company, guiding industry groups, bulge bracket firms, family offices, and startups.

Previously, Reid held the positions of president and chief executive officer of many Getty-controlled entities, including Forward Management, ReFlow Management, Sierra Club Mutual Funds, and Sutton Place Management. During his tenure, these companies shared a family office investment approach with astute retail investors. By addressing tax impact and liquidity, they were the first to bring awareness to mutual fund market timing and mutual fund liquidity limitations while leading the industry to move to Liquid Alternatives. During Alan’s tenure, Forward grew from $70 million to $7 billion in assets.

Reid served on the Investment Company Institute Board of Governors, the Forward Funds Board of Trustees, the Legato Board of Directors, the FOLIOfn Board of Directors, and the mutual fund industry working group at the NY Federal Reserve Bank. Previously, Reid held multiple positions at Morgan Stanley.