An IR team built for today and tomorrow
11.12.2024 – Articles
Karen Sands, COO of Federated Hermes Private Equity has transformed the firm’s IR team over the past 12 months, growing headcount from 1.6 to six FTEs, with a mix of skill sets, experience, professional qualifications and seniority. We spoke to Sands to find out how she did it and the impact it’s had so far.
The Line: You have transformed Federated Hermes IR function; you’ve rebuilt and repositioned the team and you’ve more than tripled its headcount. What was the initial vision? What prompted all of this?
Karen Sands: If we go back a step, what is now Federated Hermes Private Equity was born out of the captive investment arms of two UK defined benefit pension schemes. That meant we had internal investment desks; there was no requirement for an external client focused team. Being internally facing meant that we didn’t need many of the functions or teams that you would anticipate as we utilised central resources where we could, with our teams focusing on investing, portfolio management, GP relationships and reporting.