SASB’s Board of Directors is responsible for articulating and upholding the vision, values, and mission of SASB. They meet in-person twice each year and by teleconference regularly throughout the year. The board members, their role on SASB’s board and their biographies follow. Additional detail on key board roles is provided following the biography section.
BOB ECCLES, PhD
Professor of Management Practice – Harvard Business School
SASB – Chairman of the Board
Robert G. Eccles is a Professor of Management Practice at Harvard Business School. Right after receiving tenure in 1989, Professor Eccles started doing research on corporate reporting, a topic which remains of great interest to him from a research, managerial practice and public policy perspective. In addition to have written three books on the subject, Dr. Eccles is also a member of the Steering Committee of the International Integrated Reporting Committee (http://www.theiirc.org/). In 2011, Dr. Eccles was selected as one of the 2010′s Top 100 Thought Leaders in Trustworthy Business Behavior for his extensive, positive contribution to building trust in business.
Dr. Eccles received an S.B. in Mathematics and an S.B. in Humanities and Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1973) and an A.M. (1975) and Ph.D. in Sociology (1979) from Harvard University.
STEVEN O. GUNDERS, CPA, MBA
Partner, Deloitte & Touche LLP – Retired
Steven Gunders is a retired partner of the Management Consulting Practice of Deloitte. He joined Touche Ross & Co in New York in 1969 and proceeded to work in both the Accounting and Management Consulting functions of the firm. He became a partner in 1977 and managed several geographic consulting practices as well as the Strategy & Operations Practice for Deloitte across both the US and Europe. He has focused his career in the Financial, M&A & Strategy areas working on major global corporate clients, private equity investment firms and large private companies. His career has provided him with a broad based understanding of a number of industries including Manufacturing, Aviation & Leisure, Chemicals, as well as a number of Service Businesses. He has worked all over the world and has lived and worked out of London, UK for seven years. This experience has provided him with a broad based understanding of business enterprises in the US, Europe and Asia.
After his retirement, Steven has served on several corporate boards as well as a number of non-profit organizations in New York, San Francisco and London.
Steven received his MBA from the University of Chicago, Booth Graduate School of Business and his BA from the City College of New York.
DAN HANSON, CFA
Portfolio Manager – Jarislowsky Fraser Ltd.
Dan Hanson, CFA, joined Jarislowsky Fraser Ltd. as a portfolio manager after leaving BlackRock in early 2013, where he served as Managing Director, and member of the Fundamental Equity division of Group, as well as lead portfolio manager for the BlackRock Socially Responsible Equity portfolio.
Mr. Hanson’s service in the financial sector dates back to 2003, including his years with Merrill Lynch Investment Managers (MLIM), which merged with BlackRock in 2006. At MLIM, he was Senior Fund Analyst responsible for fundamental research for the Large Cap Series.
Mr. Hanson earned a BA degree, cum laude, in economics and French from Middlebury College in 1992, and an MBA degree in analytical finance and accounting from the University of Chicago in 1998.
ERIKA KARP
Managing Director, Head of Global Sector Research – UBS Investment Bank
Erika Karp Chairs the UBS Global Investment Review Committee and manages a team of sector analysts and strategists around the world. She sits on the UBS Securities Research Executive Committee and the Environmental and Human Rights Committee of the UBS Group Executive Board.
Erika created and drives products including the UBS Q-Series®, the Global I/O®, and the “UBS Global Portfolio Manager’s Spotlight” which synthesizes top UBS investment themes and ideas each week. Her work has been featured by Investment Dealer’s Digest, Euromoney, the Financial Times, BloombergBusinessweek, Wall Street Week, Forbes, and Wharton Magazine to which she is a regular contributor. For 2011, she was named among the nation’s “Top 50 Women in Wealth” by AdvisorOne. Erika is a member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on Financing and Capital.
She represents UBS at events for the OECD, the EPA, the UN Global Compact and PRI, and the Smith School at Oxford University. Erika sits on the Board of the world’s largest GLBT Synagogue (CBST), the Global Advisory Committee of Earth Day Network’s WAGE Campaign, and has served on the national Board of GLSEN.
She holds an MBA in Finance from Columbia University, a BS in Economics from the Wharton School, and began her career as an Account Representative at IBM Corporation.
JOHN KATOVICH
Founder and Partner – K2 Katovich and Kassan Law Group
SASB – Treasurer of the Board
Mr. Katovich founded his firm, K2, in 2001, providing general legal counsel to start-up and mid-level companies, exchanges and broker-dealers. He also began teaching Capital Markets at the Presidio Graduate School MBA program in San Francisco in 2005 and continues to teach there.
Throughout his career John has been involved in a wide range of legal and financial services. Highlights include serving as the Pacific Stock Exchange’s General Counsel and Secretary from 1987 to 1998, and more recently the Boston Stock Exchange in 2007 as EVP and Chief Legal Officer.
Additionally John has represented and dealt with major securities regulators and governmental entities, including, among others, the SEC, FINRA, state regulators, Congressional banking and finance subcommittees as an advisor and consultant in capital market development. He has also been an exchange participant in front of the U.S. Supreme Court.
John received his law degree in 1979 after attending Southern Illinois University School of Law and John Marshall Law School in Chicago, and received his undergraduate degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1976. He completed the Executive Program on Negotiation at the Harvard Business School, and holds a Series 7 License. He is licensed to practice law in the state and federal district courts in both California and Illinois. John currently lives in Berkeley, CA with his wife, Lisa.
STEVE LYDENBERG, CFA
Partner, Strategic Vision – Domini Social Investments LLC
SASB – Standards Council Chairman
Steve Lydenberg is Partner, Strategic Vision, for Domini Social Investments. Mr. Lydenberg previously served as Domini Chief Investment Officer and was a founder of the Domini 400 Social Index, the first index to utilize social and environmental standards, and of the Domini Social Equity Fund in 1991.
Mr. Lydenberg has been active in social research since 1975. Mr. Lydenberg was a founder of KLD Research & Analytics, Inc. and served as its research director from 1990 to 2001. For 12 years he worked with the Council on Economic Priorities, ultimately as director of corporate accountability research.
Mr. Lydenberg has written numerous publications on issues of corporate social responsibility. Mr. Lydenberg is a fellow with the Institute for Responsible Investment, an organization he helped to found, and is a member of the Boston Security Analysts Society.
Mr. Lydenberg holds a B.A. in English from Columbia College and an M.F.A. in theater arts from Cornell University, and holds the Chartered Financial Analyst designation.
SUZ MACCORMAC
Partner – Morrison & Foerster LLP
SASB – Secretary of the Board
Susan Mac Cormac is a partner in the Corporate Group of Morrison & Foerster’s San Francisco office. She serves as co-chair of the firm’s 550-lawyer Business Department, and co-chair of the Cleantech Group.
Ms. Mac Cormac has extensive experience representing start-up to late-stage private companies primarily in the Cleantech or sustainable space. She provides corporate and finance advice in connection with mergers, acquisitions, asset purchases and sales, reorganizations, joint ventures, and equity and debt financings. She regularly advises boards of private and public companies, special committees, and CEOs on corporate governance as it relates to sustainability and Corporate Social Responsibility (“CSR”) issues and has joined the faculty (teaching on issues of sustainability and corporate governance) at both the Stanford Director’s College and the Northwestern Corporate Counsel Institute. Ms. Mac Cormac also represents nonprofit corporations involved with Sustainability and CSR, providing advice to their boards on fiduciary issues, conflicts of interest, and other corporate matters.
Ms. Mac Cormac was born in Davidson, North Carolina, and graduated in 1988 from Williams College with a degree in Political Economy. She received her J.D. and LL.M. degrees from Duke University School of Law in 1993. Ms. Mac Cormac resides in the Bay Area with her husband and three sons.
CATHERINE ODELBO
Executive Vice President, Corporate Strategy and Partnerships - Morningstar, Inc.
Catherine Odelbo is executive vice president of corporate strategy and partnerships, responsible for working with Morningstar’s senior management team on the firm’s overall strategic planning process, M&A activities, and major partnerships.
Odelbo was president of Morningstar’s global Equity and Credit Research division from 2008 until she assumed her current role.
Odelbo joined Morningstar in 1988 as a mutual fund analyst and from 1995 to 2000 served as senior vice president of content development, as well as publisher and editor of stock and closed-end fund research. In 2000, she was named president of retail, overseeing all print and online products for individual investors.
Odelbo holds a bachelor’s degree in American History from the University of Chicago and is a member of the Phi Beta Kappa Society. She also holds a master’s degree in business administration, with honors, from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.
AULANA L. PETERS
Partner, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP – Retired
Aulana Peters is a retired partner of the law firm of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher of Los Angeles, California. She joined Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher as an associate in 1973, and was named a partner in the firm in 1980. She continued in the practice of law until 1984, when she accepted an appointment as commissioner of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission.
In 1988, after serving four years as commissioner, she returned to the private practice of law, from which she retired in December 2000. From January 1, 2001, to March 31, 2002, Peters was a member of the Public Oversight Board Panel of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. She was a member of the Steering Committee for the Financial Accounting Standards Board’s Financial Reporting Project, and a member of the Board’s Blue Ribbon Panel on Audit Effectiveness.
In addition to Deere & Company, Peters is a director of Northrop Grumman Corporation and 3M (Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company). Also, she is a member of the Mayo Clinic Board of Trustees.
She received an undergraduate degree in philosophy from the College of New Rochelle, New York, and a juris doctorate from the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, California.
JEAN ROGERS, PhD PE
Founder and Executive Director – SASB
Ex Officio, non-voting member of SASB Board
Dr. Jean Rogers has 20 years’ experience in sustainability and management consulting across a wide variety of industries, working with clients to integrate sustainability into strategy and operations in order to reduce risk and improve performance across the triple bottom line. Jean’s leadership experience includes 10 years as a Principal at Arup, a global consultancy focused on sustainable development, working with leading clients in the government, utilities, infrastructure, manufacturing, healthcare, and real estate sectors in the US, Europe, and Asia. She has particular expertise in developing metrics for measurement of sustainability performance, having worked with the Global Reporting Initiative on development of the G3 corporate sustainability reporting guidelines, and partnering with the Initiative for Responsible Investment at Harvard University to develop a method for assessing the materiality of sustainability issues by sector, as a basis for identifying key performance indicators and opportunities for improved competitiveness.
Prior to Arup, Jean was a management consultant at Deloitte, working in the environmental and manufacturing practices to help leading companies improve business and product performance through sustainability.
Dr. Rogers is a former Loeb Fellow at Harvard University who has authored multiple publications and won several awards. Dr. Jean Rogers holds a PhD in Environmental Engineering from the Illinois Institute of Technology, and an ME in Environmental Engineering and a BE in Civil Engineering, both from Manhattan College. Jean is based in the Bay Area, where she lives with her husband and daughter.
ANNE SHEEHAN
Head of Corporate Governance – CalSTRS
Anne Sheehan began her new assignment as the Director of Corporate Governance for the California State Teachers’ Retirement System in October of 2008. In this newly created position, she is responsible for the development and implementation of major corporate governance initiatives approved by the Board of Directors of the second largest pension fund in the United States. Prior to accepting this position, Ms. Sheehan has had a long and distinguished career in government.
Ms. Sheehan has had nearly three decades of management and leadership experience in major policy positions at both the state and federal levels. At 29, she was appointed by President Ronald Reagan as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Congressional Affairs in the Department of Energy
Anne also serves as the President of the State Personnel Board and the Chair of the California Earthquake Authority. Anne was elected to the Board of Directors of the Council of Institutional Investors (CII) in 2009. She serves on the Board of the Northern California Chapter of the National Association of Corporate Directors (NACD) and the Public Funds Committee of the International Association of Employee Benefit Plans (IFEBP). Most recently Anne was named to the SEC Investor Advisory Committee. Mrs. Sheehan currently resides in Sacramento, California with her two teenage children and a Labrador retriever named Portia.
ED WAITZER
Partner – Stikeman Elliott LLP
Former Falconbridge Professor of Law at Osgoode Hall Law School, Mr. Waitzer currently holds the Jarislowsky Dimma Mooney Chair in Corporate Governance and is Director of the Hennick Centre for Business and Law at Osgoode Hall and the Schulich School of Business at York University. He was Chair of Stikeman Elliott LLP from 1999 to 2006 and remains a senior partner whose practice focuses on complex business transactions. He also advises on a range of public policy and governance matters. He served (1993-1996) as Chair of the Ontario Securities Commission (and of the Technical Committee of the International Organization of Securities Commissions) and (until 1981) as Vice-President of The Toronto Stock Exchange. He has written and spoken extensively on a variety of legal and public policy issues and serves or has served as director of a number of corporations, foundations, community organizations, editorial boards and advisory groups. Mr. Waitzer Earned his LL.B. (1976) and LL.M. (1981) from the Faculty of Law, University of Toronto. Called to the Ontario (1978) and the New York (1985) Bars.
Key Board Roles
Role of the Chairman of the Board
The Board Chair is responsible for leading the board and ensuring that it is fulfilling its governance responsibilities on all levels. To do so the Board Chair has variety of important duties which include, but are not limited to serving on and managing various committees, proposing new policies and practices, overseeing searches for new board members, and coordinating an annual performance evaluation of the Executive Director,
Role of the Secretary
A member of the executive committee, the Secretary of the Board is the custodian of the organization’s legal documents as well as all board-related records. Additionally he or she ensures that the Board adheres to the Articles of Incorporation and Bylaws. The Secretary is also responsible for maintaining SASB’s 501(c)3 status.
Role of the Treasurer
A member of the executive committee, The Treasurer of the Board is the officer assigned the primary responsibility of overseeing the management and reporting of the organization’s finances. He or she works closely with the Executive Director and Director of Operations to ensure that the proper financial materials (reports, annual budgets, and audit materials) are easily accessible and comprehensible by the board.
Role of the Chair of the Standards Council
A member of the executive committee The Chair of the Standards Council will be the Board liaison to the council of experts convened to review and approve the core work and primary output of the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board, as such this member must have an in-depth understanding of SASB’s process and principals. This Board member will work closely with the Executive Director to ensure proper composition of the Standards Council as well as facilitate its recruitment.
Role of the Executive Director
The responsibilities of the Executive Director are to implement the strategic goals and objectives of the organization. The Executive Director gives direction and leadership toward the achievement of the organization’s philosophy, mission, strategy, and its annual goals and objectives. The Executive Director reports to the Board of Directors, primarily liaising with the Chair of the Board and the Executive Committee. The Executive Director is responsible for regularly informing the Board with regard to progress in implementing programs and any activities or situations necessary for the Board to fulfill its governance duties.
Board Committees
Executive Committee
The Executive Committee is chartered to make decisions necessary in the interim period between Board meetings. The Executive Committee will inform the Board of any interim decisions taken. The Executive Committee will consist of the Chairman of the Board, the Secretary, the Treasurer, the Chair of the Standards Council, and the Executive Director. Members: Bob Eccles, Suz MacCormac, John Katovich, Catherine Odelbo, Dan Hanson, Jean Rogers
Development Committee
The Development Committee is chartered to establish SASB’s fundraising strategy, which maps to the annual budget. The committee will work with SASB management to identify and build relationships with major donors and to engage the full board in development activities as appropriate. Members: Dan Hanson (chair), Bob Carter, Bob Eccles, Erika Karp. SASB liaison – Jean Rogers
Finance & Audit Committee
The Finance Committee is chartered to review SASB’s finances quarterly, annually, and more frequently if needed, including budgets, cash flows, and other financial statements required to manage SASB. Additionally, the committee is responsible for working with SASB management to develop the annual budget. Members: John Katovich (chair), Ed Waitzer, Steve Gunders, Jean Rogers. SASB liaison – Tyler Peterson
Stakeholder Committee
The Stakeholder Committee is chartered to identify and map key SASB stakeholders, and develop and maintain a stakeholder engagement plan that involves the full board and leadership team of SASB. The objective is to ensure that SASB is appropriately positioned and building constituencies that will ultimately enable SASB’s success. Members: Catherine Odelbo (chair), Aulana Peters, Steve Gunders, Jean Rogers. SASB liaison – Jean Rogers
Governance & Nomination Committee
The Governance Committee is chartered to review, maintain and update as necessary SASB’s by-laws. The committee is also responsible for nominating board candidates when open seats are available. Membership: Suz MacCormac (chair), Anne Sheehan, Catherine Odelbo, Steve Lydenberg. SASB liaison – Tyler Peterson
