Our Company
Founded in Copenhagen, Denmark, in 2014, we are an independent ESG (environmental, social and corporate governance) engagement provider, serving institutional investors to be active responsible owners through corporate engagement dialogues. In addition to meeting the investee companies to discuss their most material ESG issues on behalf of our investor clients, we also support clients’ own engagement efforts with bespoke solutions.
The company is privately owned by the CEO and its core associates. It is governed by a board comprising of seasoned experts in investment, corporate sustainability and digital solutions. We also have representations in Poland and the Netherlands.
Erik Alhøj
CEO and founder
erik.alhoej@engage-int.com
Read about Erik
Erik holds a master’s degree in business and economics from the University of Aarhus. In the first part of his career, he worked as a teacher in economics and as a business journalist and editor for several leading Danish media, the latest the House of Monday Morning. At the same time Erik was co-author of five books and other publications about economic and business issues. In 2001, he shifted to the industry of responsible investment as CEO of GES Investment Services Denmark. After thirteen years in this position, he founded Engagement International in 2014. Erik has an extensive experience in company evaluation based on financial and non-financial methods. He has been one of the pioneers of responsible investment in Denmark. From several hundreds face-to-face engagement meetings with listed companies all over the world, he has solid experience in collaborative engagement and active ownership. Erik is a board member of Dansif.
Marta Górska
Senior Engagement Manager
marta.gorska@engage-int.com
Read about Marta
Marta holds a master’s degree in political science. She has played a role in shaping a responsible and sustainable landscape since 2007 as a senior research analyst and product manager at GES, an active participant in the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board industry working groups, and an independent expert of the European Commission and Polish Institute for Human Rights and Business. In 2016, Marta joined Engagement International. She has experience in developing engagement strategies in relation to ESG risk and opportunities in investment portfolio as well as conducting engagement dialogues with executives within multiple industries, including extractives, energy, IT, communication, and finance. Marta has broad expertise in guiding companies towards strategic alignment of sustainability priorities based on value creation and ESG risk management, including policy design, materiality analysis, risk assessment, performance, monitoring and reporting.
Nathalie Rasmussen
Senior Engagement Manager
nathalie.rasmussen@engage-int.com
Read about Nathalie
Nathalie holds a master’s degree in law. After starting out as a lawyer in the Netherlands in 2005, she moved to Responsible Investments in 2009 at Nykredit Asset Management in Denmark, and moved in 2010 to GES as an Engagement Manager and Head of Business Conduct. She has been a member of Dansif’s event committee. In 2019, she took the role of Associate Director of Engagement at Sustainalytics. In 2022, Nathalie joined Engagement International as a Senior Engagement Manager. She has experience in developing engagement products, sales, conducting engagement dialogues with executives within all industries, including food and beverage, energy, IT, retail, healthcare and finance. Nathalie has broad expertise in guiding companies towards strategic alignment of sustainability priorities based on value creation and ESG risk management, including policy design, materiality analysis, risk assessment, performance, monitoring and reporting. She has engaged with companies regarding a very wide range of ESG issues including responsible tax, anti-corruption, as well as environmental and social issues related to for example the palm oil industry. She speaks Dutch, Danish and English.
Bowen Gu
Engagement Manager
bowen.gu@engage-int.com
Read about Bowen
Bowen has 7+ years’ experience in responsible investment. In her most recent role as the investor engagement manager at the Access to Medicine Foundation, she was managing a network of 100+ institutional investors with USD 14 trillion AuM and providing guidance to investors on engagement with the pharmaceutical sector. Prior to this, she obtained the German Chancellor Fellowship to conduct a research into the European responsible investment ecosystem. She had also worked as a consultant with CSR Asia in Hong Kong and as an ESG analyst with Sustainalytics in Singapore. In 2019 Bowen was recognized in the inaugural SRI Conference 30 under 30 Award. Bowen holds an Erasmus Mundus master’s degree in environmental sciences, policy and management from the University of Manchester and a bachelor’s in mathematics and physics from Tsinghua University in China. She is currently pursuing a PhD in ecological economics at the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology, Autonomous University of Barcelona (ICTA-UAB). Her research looks into coal and environmental justice in China and the Belt and Road Initiative.
Natalia Matuszak
Engagement Manager
natalia.matuszak@engage-int.com
Read about Natalia
Natalia holds a master’s degree in strategic leadership towards sustainability from the Blekinge Institute of Technology. She has participated in consultant capacity in several European Commission-funded project, specializing in incorporating social impact perspective in scientific research and technological solutions assessment. She has got corporate experience in sustainability ratings, ethical compliance, and ESG analysis and engagement. She has experience in consulting for non-profits and commercial enterprises on impact assessment, non-financial reporting and climate change adaptation. She is passionate about transition towards sustainable cities and actively participates in civic dialogue on raising resilience to climate change in the urban areas. She speaks Polish, English, French and Russian.
Piotr Nieporowski
Back Office Manager
piotr.nieporowski@engage-int.com
Read about Piotr
Piotr holds a master’s degree in sociology, majoring in data analysis. He graduated the Cross-National Studies Interdisciplinary Research and Training Program organised by the Ohio State University and Polish Academy of Sciences. In 2014, he was recognised as one of the most active and involved CSR Ambassador in Poland throughout the tenth edition of Responsible Business League programme. In the same year, Piotr joined the CSR Profit Foundation, in which he held the position of Board Member and Project Coordinator. He organised and conducted several courses, workshops and trainings on Corporate Social Responsibility and business/NGO partnerships for university students and NGO members. In 2016, he joined Engagement International. Piotr has an experience in designing, coordinating and participating in nationwide and international research projects. He is an author of several scientific articles and conference speeches regarding employee relations and corporate ethics.
Magdalena Grzempa
Senior Engagement Analyst
mgr@engage-int.com
Read about Magdalena
Magdalena holds a master’s degree in Economics with a special focus on Human Resources Management, she also completed range of courses, for example: PRINCE2 Foundation on project management; Agile Fundamentals: Scrum, Kanban & Scrumban course on efficient processes. She has 15 years of experience in Responsible Investing gained while working at GES International and then at Sustainalytics (a Morningstar company). Throughout those years she was involved in performing ESG analysis (negative screening, incident-based screening), maintaining dialogues with companies and answering clients inquiries, as well as working on delivery preparation. Furthermore, she was responsible for internal operations, providing technical support to the team and maintaining quality assurance processes. Magdalena has broad expertise in process and project management. She speaks Polish and English.
Jonathan Ziani
Engagement Analyst
jonathan.ziani@engage-int.com
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Jonathan holds a bachelor’s degree in innovation and entrepreneurship, in addition he also has an AP Degree in financial management. He is currently enrolled in the master’s programme in Organizational Innovation and Entrepreneurship at Copenhagen Business School, specialising in managing processes of innovation and entrepreneurship – at all levels in society and businesses. Furthermore, he has gathered practical experience working with investment advisory, wealth management and alternative investments, such as solar energy, wind energy, green infrastructure, and real estate. Here he focused on including alternative and sustainable investments in investors’ portfolios. Jonathan is a native speaker of Danish and speaks English.
Christian Honoré
Associate and Chairman of the Board
Read about Christian
Christian has 20+ years of experience of corporate sustainability, working as CSR manager and senior advisor primarily for large multinationals. He was, among other things, the sustainability and climate change partner for KPMG in Denmark and one of the founding partners that built and developed a new KPMG in Denmark in 2014. The last 5 years, Christian has increasingly focused on impact investment and impact business models, having started several impact start-ups himself. He is the Co-founder of Baxters Investment Group and founder of Goodwings. He has board experience from CSR Fonden and Green Network and has served as an advisor to the Danish Government, developing a new guideline for responsible investments for institutional investors. In sum, Christian has profound understanding of strategic management in international and consultancy start-up companies; analytical thinking and strong strategic understanding; as well as solid experience with management of stakeholder relations and investor relations.
Keld Holm
Associate partner and member of the Board
keld.holm@engage-int.com
Read about Keld
Keld is M.Sc. (Econ) from the University of Copenhagen. He brings substantial investment expertise to EI based on his 20+ years career in the investment industry working in various positions as Head of Research, Head of Asset Allocation & Risk Management and Chief Investment Officer at some of Denmark’s largest asset managers, a.o. Danske Capital and Nykredit Asset Management. He was deeply involved in establishing Nykredit’s first company-wide ESG policies and framework. In 2009, he became the first CEO of The Danish Finance Society and CFA Society Denmark. During the following eight years he substantially developed the societies’ offerings and relationship to the members and stakeholders building on his widespread domestic and international network. He has been instrumental in the inclusion of the first ESG statistics and key ratios in “Recommendations & Key Ratios”, which has been the societies’ guidelines for corporate reporting and company analysis for more than 40 years. After eight years at the societies, Keld decided to resign from his position to apply his finance and investment expertise within areas as business and project development, non-executive board positions and ESG. He is the chairman of Kapitalforeningen Investering & Tryghed.
Kim Skjoldborg
Associate and member of the Board
Read about Kim
Kim holds a master’s degree on finance and accounting from Copenhagen Business School. He started his career as Financial Analyst and Chief of Research at The House of Monday Morning and later at Børsens Nyhedsmagasin. His strong strategic skills lead him to a position as Chief of Sales at Berlingske Nyhedsmagasin and the daily newspaper Urban. The last 12 years Kim has been working for the digital development company Dwarf in different positions. He started as Head of Business Development and advanced to the very top as CEO. After having this position for six years, Kim decided to return to the less administrative position as Head of Business Development that he holds now. Kim brings not at least substantial knowledge and experience to the company in the areas of business strategy, marketing, sales and digitalization.
Inger Andersen
Associate partner, Administration and Accounting
Read about Inger
Inger holds a master’s degree in Political Science. She has a long career as Executive Head of Public Administration, responsible for schools and daycare in several Danish Municipalities. At Engagement International she takes care of the administration, accounting and book keeping.
Partners and Networks
Primary Partners
Primary ESG Research Provider
MSCI ESG Research is the world’s largest provider of environmental, social and governance (ESG) research. With more than 40 years of experience and 150 ESG analysts located across the world, the company assesses more than 8,000 companies in terms of ESG risk and opportunity exposure, ESG management and controversial activities. MSCI ESG Research is a subsidiary of MSCI Inc. It is listed on NYSE and provides all underlying ESG data for the MSCI Index family. Engagement International has collaborated with MSCI ESG Research since the launch of the company in 2014.
Primary Proxy Voting Provider
Minerva is Europe’s independent provider of global proxy voting services with a sustainability-centric approach. Minerva, formerly known as Manifest, offers an integrated suite of services comprising electronic voting, governance research, bespoke voting templates, and a comprehensive range of ESG data to support an evidence-based approach to responsible stewardship. For the past two decades Minerva has helped organisations such as the OECD, the UK Government and FRC, academics, asset owners, and asset managers to tackle the challenges of analysing ESG data and incorporating this into decision-making. In June 2019, Minerva became a Solactive group company.
Other partners and networks
The PRI is the world’s leading proponent of responsible investment. Founded by UN Global Compact and UNEP Finance Initiative in 2005, it organises more than 1,800 asset owners, investment managers and service providers. They have signed the six Principles of Responsible Investment and thereby are committed to integrate ESG considerations in their investment decisions and strategies. Engagement International is a signatory to the principles.
UN Global Compact is a United Nations initiative to encourage businesses worldwide to adopt sustainable and socially responsible policies and to report on their implementation. More than 13,000 corporate participants and other stakeholders have signed the organisations ten principles in the areas of human rights, labour, environment and anticorruption. Engagement International is committed to following UN Global Compact principles, but cannot formally be a signatory because of the relatively small size of the company.
The FSB Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) develops voluntary, consistent climate-related financial risk disclosures for use by companies that help investors, lenders, insurers, and other stakeholders measure and respond to climate change risks. Engagement International is a supporting company of the TCFD.
Transition Pathway Initiative (TPI) is a global initiative led by asset owners and supported by asset managers, assessing companies’ preparedness for the transition to a low-carbon economy. Engagement International supports the TPI and incorporates its company performance data in engagement assessment.
Climate Action 100+ is an investor initiative to ensure the world’s largest corporate greenhouse gas emitters take necessary action on climate change. The companies include 100 ‘systemically important emitters’, accounting for two-thirds of annual global industrial emissions, alongside more than 60 others with significant opportunity to drive the clean energy transition.
Dansif is the Danish Social Investment Forum, organising responsible investors in Denmark. Founded in 2008, Dansif is an impartial forum for institutional investors and others with interest in ESG and responsible investment activities in Denmark. The objective of the organisation is to exchange experiences among members and in the society as well as to facilitate a diversified debate. Engagement International is a member of Dansif and has been represented by our CEO at the board until 2016.
Finansforeningen is the Danish Finance Society/CFA Society Denmark, founded in 1974. The society has about 1,700 members. The aim of the society is to act as a professional forum on the highest international level for professionals within finance and investment. Engagement International is a member.
WeESG provides board advisory, consulting, and professional education globally. It originated in the Global South, building on connections across the financial services sector and academia. The company’s mission is to grow the knowledge and strategic application of sustainable finance across both hemispheres. It also seeks to help grow the capacity of the next generation of financial services leaders to create more sustainable and resilient economies. WeESG has offices in Bahrain, Brazil, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom.
