Masters success at Saffery Champness

A senior trust officer at Saffery Champness Registered Fiduciaries has achieved an MSc in Corporate Governance with merit.

Zac Hanley is celebrating completing his Masters Degree course, which was run by Bournemouth University and run locally through the GTA University Centre.

The course covered a range of topics, including corporate governance and ethics, corporate stewardship and corporate law: theory and practice, and was a combination of coursework and exams.

The final stage of the two and a half year course was a 13,000 word research project which Mr Hanley completed on the topic of “Outsourcing within Guernsey Corporate Service Providers and its impact on Corporate Governance.”

Hr Hanley joined Saffery Champness as a trainee trust administrator in 2011 and was promoted to senior trust officer in 2019. In 2019 he was named in eprivateclient’s Channel Islands Top 35 under 35 listing.  He holds the ICSA Certificate and Diploma and, upon completion of his MSc in Corporate Governance, has achieved Graduate status of ICSA.

In his role at Saffery Champness Mr Hanley has oversight of a team and is the lead contact on a particular family structure which is highly contentious. This has resulted in Mr Hanley getting first hand exposure to family governance challenges, allowing him to put theory into practice when it comes to the issues and dynamics involved in splitting trust assets when family members fall out.

“As I have progressed through the firm, the course has certainly assisted me in understanding more about company management, ethics and the governance required in the running of companies, which I can apply to my day to day role,” said Mr Hanley.

Nick Batiste, managing director of Saffery Champness Registered Fiduciaries in Guernsey, said:

“As a firm we are committed to learning and development and supporting our staff through their studies is a key part of that. Completing a Masters Degree and then going on to be awarded merit is an outstanding achievement and we are very proud of Zac.”