For the sixth GCI alumni talk, we were delighted to welcome SIPA alumna Remoca Shi, who also studied finance at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities, to share her career in ESG and impact investing. Her strong time management and entrepreneurial skills have let her keep shining in consulting, and her advice on choosing courses and on life will be a valuable guide for future students.
Planning | Sheng Jiyuan (Louise), Chen Yu (Victoria)
Editing | Zhang Xiaowen, Yu Yueyue (Selena)
1► About Remoca
An entrepreneur in both China and the US and an expert in ESG and impact investing, she holds a carbon emissions trading qualification certificate issued by the Shanghai Environment and Energy Exchange and has more than five years of cross-industry experience. She graduated with highest honours from the Carlson School of Management at the University of Minnesota and holds an MPA from Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs, focusing on ESG and impact investing. She provided ESG investment management advisory services to high-net-worth clients at a Wall Street investment bank in New York, designed social equity governance financing programmes and evaluation systems for an agency of the US federal government, took part in drafting social governance policy proposals for the US federal government, and has hosted many influential large-scale forums in China and abroad.
- A "slash" career: the key is time management
I have always seen myself as a "slasher" who loves to explore and loves to "tinker". I graduated with highest honours in finance from the Carlson School of Management at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities, and earned my master's degree at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA). Ever since my undergraduate years I have explored all kinds of possible career paths. I began with a series of finance roles, from a boutique investment bank on Wall Street to venture capital funds, FOF funds, investment, wealth management and asset management, rising from analyst to partner at a venture capital fund. At the same time, during my years at Columbia I launched many fun ventures, including a hot-pot restaurant, a bubble tea shop, an education consultancy and a sports club. During my years in finance, much of my work involved ESG and impact investing. Those experiences showed me the industry's potential and introduced me to my current partners. So after returning to China I founded WeCarbon to provide one-stop technology solutions and comprehensive consulting services for China's sustainability and ESG transition. As an entrepreneur, time management is extremely important. Over years of entrepreneurship I have developed a way of managing time that lets me run several tasks in parallel. At Columbia, both my studies and my work were very demanding, so I had to plan carefully. For example, I concentrated my classes into two or three days a week and studied in the library until midnight or 1 a.m. to get my coursework done. That way I could keep the rest of the week for work, and with such an efficient schedule I could often still free up weekends for travel. I have always believed that with good time management everything can be balanced. The key is to understand your own goals and priorities for managing time, and to divide your time efficiently and sensibly between work, leisure, study and sleep.
- Making good use of office hours: why I chose SIPA
From very early on I knew that my career goal was to start my own business, and I knew I needed to build up a foundation beforehand: in particular, to expand my network, gain better education and professional knowledge, and develop foresight in policy. In all these respects I saw Columbia University as an ideal platform. At Columbia I could easily stay in touch with former colleagues and friends from Wall Street, and I made full use of the university's abundant teaching resources. Beyond my core studies, I often went to professors' office hours to learn from their academic experience, find out about the research and projects they were working on, and discuss internship opportunities and career directions. To make these conversations efficient, I would read up on each professor's background in advance and catch up on their latest work. These experiences gave me a wealth of knowledge and resources during my master's.
- Build up, then take off: lessons from starting a business
–Before starting up: Looking back, every experience I had at school helped lay the groundwork for founding WeCarbon. Not only did I gain extensive ESG knowledge and practical experience from my earlier jobs and ventures, but at SIPA I was also lucky to meet co-founders who share my values and fight alongside me. This groundwork has given our team several important advantages in the market at once: advanced technology, policy foresight and local resources.
2► ESG
China and the US occupy different niches in ESG development, so there is considerable room for complementarity and cooperation. ESG in the US started from "governance", is relatively mature and is driven mainly by markets and capital. ESG in China has "sustainability" at its core and a distinctly Chinese understanding of social and corporate governance, so building an ESG system in China must pay attention to its fit with national conditions.
- The future direction of ESG in China
China's ESG policies will certainly keep improving, with clear policy responsibilities and evaluation systems for central and state-owned enterprises, listed companies and SMEs alike, and companies will become ever more committed to developing ESG.
- User pain points in advancing ESG in China
Many Chinese companies still understand ESG only as a compliance requirement and are at a fairly passive "policy response" stage. Their information collection and consolidation is incomplete, and they lack automated, digital and trustworthy management tools to help them manage efficiently. As a result, companies' ESG disclosure data struggles to win the trust of governments and financial institutions, and there is no clear pathway from developing ESG to obtaining financing and policy support.
Solving this requires two things. One is to focus on the audience and purpose of a report. When making ESG disclosures, companies often overlook the differences in the ESG dimensions and topics that different audiences care about. In fact, different audiences, such as regulators, exchanges, supply chains, export customs, the public, shareholders and investors, call for different tones and frameworks of communication and disclosure. The other is to focus on presenting quantitative indicators. To obtain fairer ESG ratings and benefit from incentives such as green finance, companies need to disclose credible, accurate and high-quality quantitative indicators as their disclosure frameworks require.
3► Advice for SIPA students
- Advice for current SIPA students
To begin with, balance your GPA with other experiences. While keeping a good GPA, actively develop your logical thinking and your understanding of career development. In future job interviews these abilities matter more than grades. Self-directed learning is the key ability among them, because much of the knowledge needed on the job never appears in textbooks. At work you need to learn quickly on your own and rapidly build a knowledge framework in a specific field to gain an edge in your career.
Second, make full use of SIPA's learning opportunities and resources. Beyond learning from renowned experts in class, seize the chance to learn from them outside the classroom too. Many professors, for example, are happy to mentor you on life and career.
Third, cherish the friendships you build with your classmates. Many of the people you meet at SIPA may be not only lifelong friends but also teammates who support and help one another along your future career paths.
Fourth, explore and practise as much as you can. Make good use of your time studying in New York to explore your career direction through internships, social events and other means, building experience and broadening your understanding.
Fifth, strengthen your data analysis skills. Big data and artificial intelligence are now essential basic skills for every role, so I recommend making good use of the school's courses to learn essential data analysis skills such as Python, SQL and VBA.
Sixth, stay creative and think independently (be creative, be critical). Develop independent thinking and the ability to build frameworks not only at work, but keep the same spirit in your approach to life and career.
- Advice for students who want to work in ESG
With ESG booming in China, the country is bound to have strong long-term demand for ESG talent. So if you want to build a career in China's ESG industry, internships in China let you explore career opportunities there while gaining a direct understanding of the local discourse, frameworks and client needs.
- Recommended courses
Impact Investing and Financial Innovation: A highly valuable course co-taught by Howard W. Buffett, built around planning a start-up project. In this course, you and your teammates choose a start-up project with social impact, interview experts and research the industry, and finally produce a business plan for the project. If your project attracts attention in the course, you may also have the chance to receive support from Columbia University's entrepreneurship programmes and seed funding to formally launch it. The course takes you beyond textbook theory to learn about the process, obstacles, market demand and investor priorities involved in getting impact projects off the ground, giving you a practical understanding of the criteria used to evaluate impact investments.
Global Financial Services in the 21st Century: A course I strongly recommend. The professor, one of Amazon's early shareholders, teaches with humour and engages students actively through real cases he has been involved in, giving an in-depth look at the characteristics of the global financial system in the 21st century. He is also very happy to discuss current affairs, political insights and career planning with students during office hours, which I benefited from greatly.
- Choosing a city
Many Chinese cities have introduced very active talent policies. Many Columbia alumni in China are concentrated in Shanghai, Beijing and Shenzhen. The choice of city depends mainly on your career direction. Demand in finance and ESG is mostly concentrated in the major tier-one cities. If you want to work in the internet industry, you can also consider other major cities such as Guangzhou and Hangzhou.
In finance, Shanghai and Beijing are still quite different. Shanghai's main employers are banks, fund companies and ESG firms; the city as a whole is more international, and its pace and way of life are quite similar to New York's. Beijing's main employers are financial institutions owned by central and state-owned enterprises, and PE/VC firms.
- Recommended reading
There are many books on ESG and sustainability policy. But with policies changing fast, we need to go back to the source and understand the overarching logic of ESG and sustainable development. That is why I recommend Wang Jun's "The Era of Carbon Neutrality". The book explains from a macro perspective why China set the strategic goals of peaking carbon emissions by 2030 and achieving carbon neutrality by 2060, and explores in depth how different sectors of society can work together across departments. It shows young people like us the roles, identities and concrete paths through which we can contribute to this field.
This article is an original production of Columbia GCI.