BNY Mellon IM chief Smits to become 30% Club global chair

Succeeds Ann Cairns in the role

Hanneke Smits, CEO of BNY Mellon Investment Management, is to become the fourth global chair of the 30% Club, which campaigns to increase the number of women at board and senior management levels of the world’s biggest companies.

She succeeds Ann Cairns in the role, who retired as executive vice chair of Mastercard at the end of 2022. Cairns joined the 30% Club in 2019 as co-chair, working with the late Brenda Trenowden before becoming sole global chair in 2020. Smits, who became CEO of BNY Mellon IM in October 2020 after heading up Newton Investment Management for four years, has championed improving gender diversity in the workplace throughout her career. In 2015, she co-founded Level 20, a not-for-profit organisation established to inspire women to succeed in the private equity industry. She also chairs Imp...