On 30 March 2017 Willis Towers Watson's Investment business was honored with 2 awards presented by Asia Asset Management (AAM). As published in the AAM’s 2017 Best of the Best Awards Supplement, the profile page shares the Investment team's key strengths and accomplishments that have enabled Willis Towers Watson to win Asian Asset Consultant of the Year and Greater China Asset Consultant of the Year.

1. Reprinted from Asia Asset Management Best of the Best Awards 2017 Supplement
Dedicated and connected
Adedication towards helping its clients achieve better
outcomes in the competitive investment world,
developing regional resources to work effectively with diverse
clients, and actively sharing research and ideas with other
industry participants are key strengths that won Willis Towers
Watson Asia Asset Management’s Best of the Best 2016 awards
for Asian Asset Consultant of the Year and Greater China
Asset Consultant of the Year.
Naomi Denning, Managing Director, Investments, Asia
Pacific, who this year will celebrate 23 years with the company,
notes that the above three areas are key success factors that
enable the team at Willis Towers Watson to earn clients’ trust,
operate a resourceful investment centre of excellence for Asia
and continually contribute to the industry across the region.
“In distinguishing our investment operation from our
peers, we organise our Hong Kong investment team to operate
as a regional centre, deploying resources to the location that our
clients need us. We find that this approach allows us to coordinate
expertise for our clients and efficiently use our resources in
Greater China and across Asia,” Naomi Denning explains.
A team effort
Naomi Denning is supported by Philip Tso, Director,
Investments, Hong Kong and Janet Li, Director, Investments,
Greater China. Philip Tso leads the investment business in
Hong Kong, while Janet Li is responsible for managing both
Mainland China and Taiwan and also a Senior Investment
Consultant for Hong Kong.
Philip Tso, who has been with the company for 19
years, notes that having a team of close to 40 in Hong Kong,
represented by 13 nationalities allows Willis Towers Watson
to place the necessary expertise and resources for its clients
across Asia. Many team members have been with the company
for more than ten years. The team comprises not only client
advisors, but also professionals dedicated to capital markets
research, strategic asset allocation, portfolio construction, and
manager research and selection including private markets.
“As the investment world gets more complicated, diverse
experience, cultures and backgrounds are crucial to ensure that
we place the right resources, and more importantly help our
clients to achieve great outcomes,” Philip Tso explains.
In the Greater China region, Willis Towers Watson has
had long-term trusted relationships that span over ten years
with many clients. Janet Li explains: “The inception of many
relationships occurred even before the funds or schemes were
set up. In my 15 years with the company, I have witnessed
funds grow from zero assets to millions and billions of assets;
from having a few staff to having full teams of staff; and
from having no readily available infrastructure to being fully
equipped with the necessary platforms for daily work.”
“No journey is ever straightforward and paved. Each
step must be carefully considered and recommendations
made in light of investment, political, social and economic
considerations,” Janet Li notes.
Earning trust
The trust Naomi Denning and her team have built with
clients over the years is evident in the responsibilities they have
been asked to take on. With the relevant expertise and capacity
in place to help manage the risks and complexity of their
clients’ investment programs, Willis Towers Watson is well
placed to go beyond traditional consulting roles, playing more
the role of advisory portfolio manager, from research through
to implementation.
“Our journey has gone from essentially being an advisor,
where clients make a series of investment decisions and
implement them based on our research, to us being asked by
clients to take ownership of these decisions. The complexity
and breadth of the decisions our clients are facing has grown
enormously as they now face a much wider spectrum of asset
classes and regulations,” explains Naomi Denning. “Our
multi-asset capability and fiduciary mindset also allows us to
help clients implement ideas in a timely and cost-effective
manner based on the clients’ exact needs and interests.”
Willis Towers Watson has been offering delegated,
fiduciary and fund solutions to clients in EMEA and the
US, and two years ago began offering outsourced solutions
in Japan. This year, seven Japanese institutions are using
Willis Towers Watson’s delegated solutions as the most cost-
efficient implementation route for their offshore mandates,
accounting for a total of US$90 million. And it is not only
asset owners who are placing their trust in the company, with
service providers, including those in the growing FinTech
sector, also outsourcing their research responsibilities to the
team. ■
From left: Philip Tso, Naomi Denning and Janet Li