Helen Dean will leave her role as CEO at National Employment Savings Trust, London, next year, after eight years at the helm of the defined contribution multiemployer plan.
Executives and the board of the £30 billion ($39.3 billion) master trust are in the final stages of hiring a search firm for a recruitment process, a spokeswoman confirmed. The search will be open to both internal and external candidates, she added. The intention is for Ms. Dean to continue as CEO through a transition period.
Ms. Dean was promoted to CEO from executive director, product and marketing, in 2015. Before NEST was formed, Ms. Dean was one of the architects of the Department for Work and Pensions’ auto-enrollment policy — which forms the backbone of the U.K.’s occupational defined contribution offering for millions of participants. From the DWP, she moved to NEST’s predecessor, the Personal Accounts Delivery Authority, which took the concept of a low-cost, high-quality retirement plan and delivered it to U.K. workers.
Over her time as CEO of NEST, Ms. Dean has seen the retirement plan become the largest in the U.K. by number of participants, at 12 million. She also oversaw the creation of NEST’s first diversity groups and published the company’s gender and ethnicity pay reports.
“The success of NEST is down to the hard work of many, many people I’ve had the pleasure to work with over the years,” Ms. Dean said in a news release. “I’m delighted to have played my part in NEST’s story and can’t wait to watch how it continues to flourish in the future. NEST will always have a special place in my heart.”
NEST will work closely with the DWP throughout the recruitment process.
