As AI becomes increasingly integrated into investment processes, investment teams are exploring how to harness its capabilities to enhance stewardship.
Rather than replacing human judgment, AI serves as a powerful tool to augment decision-making. It is providing deeper insights and enabling more effective engagement strategies.
Strategic Integration of AI in Stewardship:
AI is often framed in terms of technical performance. However, for asset owners, the real value lies in how and where it is used.
By identifying patterns and anomalies, AI supports more informed decision-making in stewardship activities.
Its ability to process and analyse large volumes of data enables asset owners to gain insights that were previously unattainable. Interesting examples include:
- Fiduciary Responsibility: AI sharpens stewardship focus, helping asset owners fulfil their duty to beneficiaries through more informed decisions.
- Intergenerational Equity: By identifying long-term risks, such as unpriced climate liabilities or social instability, AI supports sustainable value creation across decades. Read more from the University of Bonn, Germany, here.
- ESG and human rights due diligence: Spotting patterns in language and policy framing in modern slavery, disclosures from the top 100 global companies operating in the UK, a Large Language Model was used by CCLA Investment Management. This was in its pilot benchmark to score companies based on a detailed framework covering policy, risk assessment, remedy, and prevention.
The question is not if AI should be part of stewardship. It’s how we use it wisely, collaboratively, and transparently, in order to avoid unintended consequences such as:
- bias,
- opacity, and
- loss of accountability.
As Judy Wade, then Managing Director at CPP Investments, speaking to Davos Radio notes:”AI is going to, it already has enormous benefits, but there are significant risks. And if you want to take advantage of those enormous benefits and mitigate those risks, then you really have to deploy this responsibly.“
Enhancing Human Judgment with AI:
Global institutions are aligning around the need for ethical AI governance.
The Responsible AI Playbook for Investors (2024) was published by the World Economic Forum and pension fund CPP Investments. It sets out real-world examples of how investors can and must use their position to promote responsible AI.
According to the playbook:
“Investors have a key role to play in ensuring AI is developed and used in ways that align with societal values.”
So, for large investors, ensuring all AI applications are responsible (i.e. honest, helpful and harmless) is not merely a technological upgrade but a strategic imperative.
By applying principles such as transparency, accountability, and robustness to their own use of AI, and to practices of their investees, asset owners become stewards not just of capital, but of innovation itself.
To ensure ethical and effective stewardship, the human element remains crucial, combining AI’s analytical power with human oversight.
Maanch in the Machine: Amplifying Impact
At Maanch, we believe technology should serve values, not the other way around. That’s why we built the Engagement Tracker: a stewardship intelligence platform that blends automation with ethics, enabling asset owners to:
- Centralise stewardship data
- Track ESG-themed engagements
- Benchmark across managers
- Generate tailored reports and insights
Our integration with Sustainalytics enhances these capabilities. It offers clients real-time access to hundreds of corporate ESG engagement cases and voting insights, turning data into action.
Maanch is not just a platform, but an active agent within tech-enabled systems driving ESG performance, stewardship, and impact.
Building Collaborative Ecosystems:
The integration of AI into stewardship is not solely about technology adoption. It is also about fostering collaboration among asset owners, managers, and other stakeholders.
The most forward-thinking asset owners view stewardship not as a task, but as a system, interdependent, dynamic, and constantly evolving.
By sharing data and insights, these entities collectively enhance their understanding of ESG risks and opportunities. This leads to more coordinated and impactful engagement efforts.
For example, Maanch’s Engagement Tracker. It provides asset owners with centralised visibility over the quality and effectiveness of engagements across their portfolios. This platform enables benchmarking of stewardship performance. It also drives strategic alignment with long-term sustainability goals, leveraging the power of AI to help tell the story.
Conclusion:
The fusion of human expertise and AI capabilities is redefining stewardship for asset owners. By embracing this collaborative approach, they can enhance their ability to manage ESG risks, drive positive change, and fulfill their fiduciary responsibilities – in an increasingly complex investment landscape.
By combining machine-scale intelligence with human values and judgement, asset owners and managers can move beyond compliance and toward genuine transformation. This is stewardship fit for the 21st century – a collective, strategists, analysts, data scientists and AI.
Want to Learn More?
Explore how Maanch supports asset owners with AI-powered stewardship insights: Get in touch at: info@maanch.com
