Day 1

8:30am — Tea and coffee

8:45am — Start time

• Welcome
  
  
• Evidence Based Investing — Professor Ben Marshall
  An overview of evidence-based investing globally and New Zealand from one of the foremost authorities on the subject.
  
  
• Consilium’s Approach to Portfolio Construction — Damon O’Brien
  How does Consilium use the academic evidence to select funds and construct robust investment portfolios.
  
  
• Equity Fund Implementation — Rob Ness
  An overview of how Dimensional constructs and trades equities.
  
  
• Fixed Interest Fund Implementation — Timo Zauner
  An overview of how Dimensional constructs and trades bonds.
  
  
• Media and Information Hygiene: Six Simple Tips for Clients in an Information-Saturated World — Jim Parker
  A guide to information hygiene and the critical role of trusted advice.
  
  
• Explaining Investments to your Clients — Ben Brinkerhoff
  Beyond the theory how can you explain these ideas to your clients.

4:30pm — Drinks and Canapes

Day 2

8:30am — Tea and coffee

8:45am — Start time

• Consilium Monitoring, Due Diligence Processes and Foundations of Responsible Investing — Mitchell Bristow
  How Consilium monitors all recommended funds to CEFEX standards, followed by an introduction to responsible investing and how Consilium builds their SRI portfolios.
  
  
• Living with Uncertainty: Stories, Scripts and Sketches to Help Your Clients Sleep Better — Jim Parker
  Jim Parker provides a useful framework to guide clients through uncertain times.
  
  
• Using portfolios to help your clients achieve their goals — Ben Brinkerhoff
  Now that we have portfolios, how do we select which one to use to help clients achieve their goals.
  
  
• Closing Remarks — Ben Brinkerhoff and Vivecca Robinson

12:00pm — Lunch

Prof Ben Marshall

Independent Academic Consultant
Consilium CIC

Professor Ben Marshall works with the Consilium Investment Committee (CIC) as an Independent Academic Consultant, with a particular focus on governance, analytical support and policy review.

He serves on the editorial board of a number of journals and has consulted to public and private companies in a range of different areas. He holds the MSA Charitable Trust Chair in Finance at Massey University.

Professor Marshall has undertaken research in areas such as the impact of climate on financial markets, factors that influence stock returns, quantitative approaches to portfolio management, transaction cost and illiquidity measurement, and exchange traded funds.

His research has been published in leading international journals and he is a regular speaker at international finance conferences. Professor Marshall is currently ranked in the top 1% of authors based on downloads of his working papers.

Damon O'Brien

Head of Investment Services
Consilium

Damon is the Head of Investment Services at Consilium and chair of the Consilium Investment Committee. He has over 23 years’ experience in the financial services industry, in roles focusing on the delivery of global best practice investment solutions.

Leading a team of six analysts, Damon is responsible for the design, implementation and support of Consilium’s evidence-based investment strategy. Under his investment stewardship, Consilium’s asset allocation and monitoring processes achieved international certification by the Centre for Fiduciary Excellence (CEFEX).

Damon is a Director of Consilium, a CFA® charterholder, a member of the New Zealand CFA Society and a member of the New Zealand Institute of Directors.

Rob Ness

Senior Portfolio Manager and Vice President
Dimensional Fund Advisors

Rob Ness is a Senior Portfolio Manager and has been with Dimensional since 2003. In this role, Rob is responsible for implementation of equity strategies managed out of the firm’s Sydney office.

Before joining Dimensional, Rob was a research engineer for the Cooperative Research Centre for Advanced Composite Structures. Rob holds a master of commerce in actuarial studies from the University of New South Wales and a bachelor of engineering from the University of Sydney.

Jim Parker

Vice President, Communications
Dimensional Fund Advisors

As head of the communications and marketing team in Australia, Jim Parker helps create strategies to communicate Dimensional's philosophy and process in ways that engage clients, prospects, regulators, and the media. He does so through presentations, books, papers, and articles, including his "Outside the Flags" column and, more recently, his weekly "Coffee Break" links to interesting articles.

Jim joined Dimensional in 2006 after 25 years working as a journalist in newspapers, television, radio, and online media. His specialty was financial journalism, particularly in relation to economics and financial markets. Jim holds a bachelor of arts in social and economic history from Deakin University and a journalism certificate from Auckland Technical Institute/

Timo Zauner

Portfolio Manager, Fixed Income
Dimensional Fund Advisors, Australia

Timo Zauner is a member of Dimensional’s Australian Fixed Income team. In his role as Portfolio Manager, he is responsible for the day-to-day portfolio management and trading of Dimensional’s Australian fixed income portfolios.

Prior to joining Dimensional, Timo worked in various roles as credit analyst and business analyst at MEAG, the investment management arm of Munich Re. He also worked as quantitative analyst at Philo Capital Advisors in Sydney. Timo earned the CFA® designation in 2010 and holds a computer science diploma (German equivalent to master’s qualification) from University of Freiburg.

Ben Brinkerhoff

Head of Advice
Consilium

Ben is Head of Advice and has been with Consilium since the foundation of the business. Ben works with partner firms to grow and develop their ideal advice practice through engaging advice processes, efficient business systems, increased investor education and goals-based advice, while finding their marketing and business development niche.

Ben is a frequent author writing many articles and whitepapers for Consilium. He regularly speaks at industry events, conferences and at client engagements.

Ben has over 20 years’ experience in financial services including General Manager of Bradley Nuttall, Chief Operations Officer of Index Funds Advisers, LLC in the United States and in various Economic Consulting roles in the US and abroad.

Ben has a BA in History and Economics from the University of California.

Mitchell Bristow

Investment Research Lead
Consilium

Mitchell is the Investment Research Lead for Consilium and has been working in the financial services industry for over 15 years. Mitchell is an integral part of the Consilium investment committee, with responsibilities in the areas of investment analysis, performance monitoring, supplementary fund due diligence, asset allocation and research.

Mitchell specialises in creating informative and educational graphics from complex datasets to help the advisers we work with understand, and explain, the fundamental concepts we use in our portfolio construction. Mitchell is passionate about Socially Responsible Investing and has been involved in several projects to bring innovative solutions to New Zealand investors with an interest in this field.

Mitchell is as a CFA® charterholder and is bound by the CFA Institute’s Code of Ethics and Standards of Professional Conduct. Mitchell holds a Bachelor of Science (Statistics) and a Bachelor of Commerce (Management Science) from the University of Canterbury.