Description

New Forests (www.newforests.com.au) seeks a qualified candidate for the position of Associate Director, U.S. Operations to join its growing team.  The role will be critical in supporting the ongoing operation and growth of New Forests’ U.S. strategy. The ideal candidate will have a passion for nature-based solutions to environmental challenges, have a strong background in forestry and finance, and enjoy working as part of a team. In this role you will be responsible for managing a portfolio of assets that are designed to deliver positive environmental outcomes and positive financial returns. This role is a remote position that includes travel as required to fulfill role-specific responsibilities. While primarily remote, it also involves occasional in-person participation in broader team meetings.

New Forests is an investment management business offering leading edge strategies in forestry, land management, and conservation. We seek to manage sustainable landscapes for production and conservation and to generate shared value for our clients and the communities where we operate. Founded in 2005, we offer institutional investors dedicated investment strategies in Australia-New Zealand, the United States, Southeast Asia, and Africa and have more than USD 7.86 billion in assets under management, covering 10.61 million acres. We manage sustainable forestry assets, forest carbon projects, agricultural assets, rural land, and timber processing infrastructure such as ports and mills. New Forests is headquartered in Sydney, with offices in San Francisco, Melbourne, New Zealand, Singapore, and Nairobi.

New Forests believes that sustainably managed forest and agricultural landscapes can play a significant role in mitigating the impacts of climate change, while also providing valuable economic, social, and environmental returns.

New Forests is offering a great opportunity for a qualified candidate to undertake the role of Associate Director, Asset Management. In this role you will support the Director, Asset Management in the management of U.S. forestry assets for targeted financial returns and measurable climate impact. The current asset pool includes approximately 550,000 acres of forestland, predominantly in Northern California and Oklahoma.

Key Responsibilities: In this role you will work across New Forests’ functional teams in the U.S. and globally as well as with third-party property managers to successfully execute New Forests’ U.S. investment strategy. This position will be responsible for managing a portfolio of fund assets.

Specifically, this position is responsible for:

 Fund Management

• Responsible for the overall performance of a group of fund assets, including financial, environment, social and governance outcomes consistent with Fund constituent documents and New Forests internal processes and systems.
• Responsible for the coordination, management and reporting of all fund operations to optimise the performance of the fund assets.

 Fund Governance

• Ensure compliance with fund constituent documents, internal policies and legal obligations in collaboration with internal and external company secretarial support and legal risk and compliance staff.
• Responsible for Investor and internal quarterly and annual reporting and presentation to Investor Annual Meetings including ESG reporting requirements and Fund Operating Model long term forecast returns for the fund.
• Responsible for Investor and internal quarterly and annual reporting and presentation to Investor Annual Meetings including ESG reporting requirements and Fund Operating Model long term forecast returns for the fund.
• Responsible for responding to Investor enquiries and providing periodic updates and information to meet Investor requirements.
• Responsible for the funds environmental, health and safety performance.

Fund Operations

• Manage procurement and engagement with Fund asset property managers (both fund owned and third-party) including performance management and reporting.
• Lead major fund strategic projects in collaboration with fund asset property managers and other internal functional teams including carbon projects, conservation easements, material business development, sales, procurement and stakeholder engagement.
• Procurement and supervision of third-party providers including, auditors, consultants and valuers.
• Responsible for coordinating fund financial operations including, review of loan structuring and taxation, actual expenses against budget, payment approvals and review of fund performance fee calculations.
• Lead coordination of fund strategic plans, long term financial models and fund budgets consistent with current internal processes.
• Lead coordination of fund asset third party valuations including data handover, valuation review/feedback, compilation of valuation change analysis for internal and Investor reporting.
• Lead the acquisition process for incremental fund acquisitions including analytics bid models (model development & reviews, IC papers, coordinate with 3rd party providers, data management).
• Coordinate the disposition of fund assets in collaboration with the Investments team.

 Corporate Engagement

• Responsible for liaising with other New Forests functions which support the fund to ensure effective collaboration and task completion including; impact and advocacy, finance, legal risk and compliance, investor services, investment analytics and investments.
• Support fund raising and deployment of other New Forests managed fund vehicles.
• Liaise internally with New Forests ANZ and corporate teams to share operational information and intelligence and contribute to information needs and projects across the business.
• Contribute to corporate strategy, governance, sustainability and responsible investment activities across New Forests business. Support other related corporate projects in collaboration with the Director Operations, Developed Markets, and other fund Portfolio Managers

Requirements

Requirements: 

• 5-15 years of experience in management of commercial forestland operations with a good understanding of applicable forest practice rules, best management practices in varying jurisdictions, and third party certification requirements for US forest management.
• Strong commercial skills including contract management, negotiation, financial analysis and formation, interpretation of legal agreements and operation of REIT structures.
• Experience and understanding of plantation forestry commercial operations, science and estate modelling.
• Excellent stakeholder management, time management and organizational skills, strong written and verbal communication skills
• Good Microsoft Office skills including Outlook, Word, Excel.
• Experience with forest inventory, growth and yield modelling, geospatial data, and linear programming; and the design and development of forest carbon offset projects for the California regulatory cap and trade system or for the voluntary carbon market, an advantage.

Qualifications and Knowledge:

• Minimum Bachelor’s degree in forestry, natural resources management, environmental science, agriculture or equivalent. Advanced degree an advantage.
• In-depth understanding of forest valuation methodologies, including demonstrated experience in valuation of timberland assets.
•  Registered Professional Forester or Certified Forester qualification and broad exposure to private investments and comingled funds, an advantage.

What can we offer?

Our environment is active and supportive, with a focus on work life balance. New Forests’ team boasts an impressive range of professionals that prefer to operate in a relaxed business setting. If you join us, you will be joining a growing, fast paced business which is a leader in sustainable forestry and landscape investment globally. You will also be working with professionals who are passionate about their work!  We offer professional development opportunities that will help accelerate your career.