Person Type: Team

MARK HODGE | VICE PRESIDENT

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MICHELLE LANGLOIS | SENIOR ADVISOR

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As a Senior Advisor with Shift, Michelle works with companies, financial institutions and other strategic partners to support their implementation of the UN Guiding Principles (UNGPs).

Michelle has a decade of experience analyzing the maturity of companies’ human rights reporting and played a central role in promoting the uptake of the UN GUIDING PRINCIPLES REPORTING FRAMEWORK, including through developing Shift’s UN GUIDING PRINCIPLES REPORTING DATABASE. She is also a leading expert in the application of the UN Guiding Principles to new and emerging legislation and standards. Her work includes analyzing the implications of these standards for leading companies and financial institutions that have commitments and practices that are aligned with the UNGPs. She is also involved in Shift’s work supporting the development of the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (EFRAG) under the EU’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive.

As part of Shift’s Business Learning Program, Michelle supports financial sector and FMCG partners, working closely with partners on human rights due diligence, including the identification of salient human rights issues, E&S risk assessment frameworks, grievance mechanisms, stakeholder engagement and internal capacity building – including for procurement departments, portfolio managers, and front-line teams.

Michelle is a (non-practicing) lawyer specialized in international human rights law. She completed her articling position at a major Canadian corporate law firm and graduated summa cum laude from the Master of Laws program in International Human Rights Law at the University of Notre Dame. Michelle is based in Canada and speaks English and French.

MAIREAD KEIGHER | ADVISOR

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As an Advisor with Shift, Mairead works hand-in-hand with companies and other strategic partners to build capacity to identify, prioritize and mitigate human rights risks. She blends her background in business, technology, CSR and human rights disclosure to help companies fulfill their responsibility to respect human rights. From 2016-2019, she managed Shift’s Reporting Program, a flagship initiative aimed at developing corporate capacity for improved human rights disclosure in line with the UNGPs and equipping other stakeholders to understand and interpret this disclosure, particularly through the expansion of the UNGP Reporting Database. As part of this program, Mairead worked closely with Mazars LLP through the development of the UN Guiding Principles Assurance Guidance.

Prior to joining Shift, Mairead worked for 16 years for Microsoft in Europe in both strategic and operational positions, the second half of which as Corporate Affairs Manager for Central and Eastern Europe. In this role Mairead coordinated across Microsoft’s 28 subsidiaries to engage with governments and bring a consistent policy and corporate social responsibility strategy to life. She participated on behalf of Microsoft in multi-stakeholder initiatives on key topics linked to business and human rights. Prior to this role, Mairead led Partner Marketing across Central and Eastern Europe and had European operational responsibility for the company’s Anti-Piracy programs.

ANNA TRIPONEL | SENIOR ASSOCIATE

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As a Senior Associate with Shift, Anna advises companies, investors and business associations on how to put the Guiding Principles into practice. Trained as a lawyer, Anna focuses particularly on working with legal professionals on their role in implementing the Guiding Principles and has led work on analyzing regulations in various jurisdictions and how they align to the Guiding Principles. She also has particular expertise on the UN Guiding Principles Reporting Framework. 

Prior to joining Shift, Anna provided input to the work of the Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for business and human rights John Ruggie as a legal consultant. During this period, Anna also opened the New York office of the Public International Law & Policy Group, where she advised government officials, opposition leaders, human rights victims and civil society organizations on human rights, constitutional reform and transitional justice in Burma, Côte d’Ivoire, Egypt, Kenya, Libya, Somaliland, Tunisia, Uganda and Zimbabwe.

Anna was previously a mergers and acquisitions associate at the law firm of Jones Day in New York, where she advised a broad range of multinational companies on cross-border mergers and acquisitions, joint venture, private equity and venture capital transactions. She founded and led the law firm’s International Law Pro Bono Group. She began her career as an advisor to the World Bank, advising on development governance structures to better meet the Millennium Development Goal of achieving universal primary education.

Anna is a (non-practicing) lawyer qualified in New York, England & Wales and France. She is a frequent expert speaker and writer on business and human rights and is the recipient of various professional awards, including the Empire State Counsel Award for changing the lives of those unable to afford counsel and the Seymour-Reuben Award for shaping international law. Anna has a Masters in International Law from American University Washington College of Law and a degree in common and civil law from the University of Paris X. She has been awarded the Business Sustainability Management certificate from the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL) and the MBA Essentials certificate from London School of Economics (LSE). Anna is a British and French national and speaks English and French.

LLOYD LIPSETT | SENIOR ASSOCIATE

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As a Senior Associate with Shift, Lloyd engages with our collaboration partners on an everyday basis, with a particular focus advising companies in the extractives sector and in emerging markets. As a leading expert on human rights impact assessments, Lloyd has a deep understanding of the impact on communities and workers of large scale infrastructure, extractives and natural resources projects.

Lloyd is an international human rights lawyer with 25 years of experience working with companies, governments, national human rights institutions, civil society organizations and indigenous peoples on corporate impacts on people.  Lloyd has led or participated in over 75 on-the-ground assessments in challenging contexts around the world.

Lloyd has particular expertise on indigenous peoples rights, economic, social and cultural rights, stakeholder engagement and grievance mechanisms. He regularly publishes and makes presentations on a wide range of human rights issues relevant to companies, industry associations and governments.

Lloyd previously served as the senior assistant to three presidents of the Canadian human rights organization Rights & Democracy from 2003 to 2008, and participated in all aspects of the organization’s management and programming, including the development of a community-based human rights impact assessment methodology. He began his career as a corporate litigator at McMillan Binch in Toronto. He successfully represented clients at all levels of the courts of the province of Ontario and in the Canadian federal court system and developed a specialization in class actions, mediation and dispute resolution. Lloyd is a graduate of Queen’s University and McGill University and is a member of the Law Society of Ontario. He is a Canadian and United States national and speaks English and French.

DAVID VERMIJS | DIRECTOR, BUSINESS ENGAGEMENT

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As Shift’s Director of Business Engagement, David oversees our work providing expert advice to a select number of companies across a diversity of sectors and geographies.

David has over a decade of experience advising multinational corporations, governments, NGOs and others on business and human rights. Prior to joining Shift, David provided research assistance to the Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for business and human rights John Ruggie. As part of his contributions, David field-tested human rights due diligence with a group of Dutch companies and their stakeholders, and he supported research on company-led grievance mechanisms.

From 2008 to 2010, David was the lead consultant on an 18-month project, the Business and Human Rights Initiative, under the umbrella of the Global Compact Network Netherlands. The initiative was a collaboration between 10 Dutch multinationals – ABN AMRO, AkzoNobel, Essent, KLM, Philips, Rabobank, Randstad, Shell, TNT and Unilever – and led to the publication of a ground-breaking business guidance tool, How to Do Business with Respect for Human Rights, in 2010. Through his work at Shift, David led the update of this publication from 2014 to 2016 with the support of the Dutch government under their National Action Plan on implementing the Guiding Principles.

Another major guidance tool David has helped develop addresses due diligence on child labor, published by the International Labour Organization (ILO) and the International Organisation of Employers (IOE) in 2015. The guidance was the result of a multi-year, multi-stakeholder, multi-country project led by David involving the ILO, IOE, companies, unions, NGOs and other stakeholders.

David was previously a Research Fellow at the Corporate Responsibility Initiative at the Harvard Kennedy School, including assisting in teaching on business and human rights, global governance, corporate governance and leadership. David sits in a personal capacity on the board of the Dutch Social and Economic Council International Corporate Social Responsibility Committee. He has a Masters in Public Policy from the Harvard Kennedy School and a Bachelor of Arts in Business from Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands. David is a Dutch national, speaks English and Dutch and is proficient in Spanish and German.