☕️ TEA Cup Honours: Great British Businesses Leading on Governance and AGMs
News on the most impactful shareholder engagement—delivered in a 5-minute read. ✨Governance 'legends' edition✨
Welcome to the TEA Cup Honours Newsletter
TEA supports companies in their endeavours to treat all their stakeholders fairly, in line with their duties under s.172 of the Companies Act. As AGM season kicks into high gear, that duty takes centre stage.
This newsletter contributes to that mission by calling attention to exemplary acts of engagement—by company representatives and individual investors alike. Because governance isn’t just about compliance. It’s about connection.
I’m Sheryl Cuisia, founder of TEA – The Engagement Appeal, and I’m grateful to say that many of the people I’ve worked with over the years should now be receiving this newsletter. It’s a privilege to continue those relationships—and to build new ones with a generation that’s reimagining what shareholder engagement can be.
📍 For more on TEA Cups and our work, visit teaxall.org/blog
📥 You can always reach me directly at AGM@teaxall.org
👇 Inside this cuppa:
The Great British AGMs
AGM season is well and truly underway—and for the most part, UK companies are rolling out the welcome mats (and sometimes the biscuit tins) for shareholders. Our 1st May TEA Talk with Mail on Sunday’s Patrick Tooher officially opened the season in style, with a spirited roundtable on what’s at stake for retail investors this year. Read Patrick’s latest coverage of AGMs here.
In this edition, we reflect on key moments from that discussion—including the disruption at the Drax AGM—and look ahead to another jam-packed week of shareholder meetings. Let the season of questions, quorums, and corporate accountability begin. 🎥 Watch our video report here.
🏆 TEA Cup Honours
This week’s kudos go to Dame Anita Frew, Chair of Rolls-Royce, and Graeme Baldwin, General Counsel & Company Secretary of Pearson plc, for showing that AGMs can be more than box-ticking—they can be actual moments of dialogue, accountability, and mutual respect. Both proved that when governance is done right, it resonates.
🫖 The Enduring Power of Good Governance
What do Sir Roger Carr and Dame Anita Frew have in common (besides excellent boardroom posture)? A belief that governance is a craft—and that future-focused, emotionally intelligent leadership is the new standard. We revisit Sir Roger’s timeless advice to non-executive directors and connect the dots to today’s boardroom leaders. From Dame Ruth Cairnie to Paula Rosput Reynolds, the baton isn’t just being passed—it’s being upgraded with style. 👉 Jump ahead to the story here.
🌱 Trailblazers Who Advance Boardrooms & Humanity Forward
Activism doesn’t have to be loud to be effective. Julie Baddeley of Chapter Zero and Catherine Howarth of ShareAction blazed the trail for effective engagement—reshaping governance with strategy, integrity, and real results. For those seeking lasting impact, theirs is a path worth following.👉 Jump ahead to the story here.
📌 IRO & Governance Pros ‘Good-to-Knows’
Why listed companies need to stay on top of Trading 212 action, and why it’s time to stand up for shareholder rights. 👉 Find out by watching the video here.
Directors, please set the tone for the rest of us! ✍️ Sign the AIC petition today and help push for a fairer, more transparent investing landscape. If every single board chair, CEO, and NED signed, we can easily get the minimum 10k signatures, but I’m sure we can get to 100k. She-Ra! and her other superhero friends at the AIC thank you!
👥 TEA Cups Community
Explore our budding community, upcoming events, and opportunities to get involved. Many are nextgen-friendly—so bring along that savvy Gen Z in your life.
👀 LATER THIS WEEK IN OUR TEA TIMES NEWSLETTER:
🤑The CEO–RemCo Chair Power Dynamic — When the Spanker Gets Spanked
It’s AGM season—cue the ‘fat cat’ outrage. But what if the real injustice isn’t the CEO’s pay… but the punishment of the RemCo Chair who dared to approve it? Often female, often modern, and often right—yet still thrown under the proxy bus. If we want our UK companies to recruit and retain world-beating talent, we need to revise this system of surface-level scrutiny—or risk demoralising the very NEDs who bring promise, rigour, and public purpose to the boardroom.
📊💰UK Investment Trusts — Spotlighting the Board Chair who not only exemplifies good governance and rolls up his sleeves, but can also deconstruct the activist’s playbook.
💼📈#NextGenFD — Meet the Gen Zennial Finance Director who' is demystifying pharma and investing to next generation shareholders with his engaging and indentifiable style.
The Great British AGMs
Last week marked the official start of the 2025 AGM season—and TEA is here for it. While retiring Warren Buffett drew over 40,000 attendees to the Berkshire Hathaway AGM in Omaha this weekend, British businesses like Rolls-Royce and Pearson were flexing their own engagement muscles closer to home.
We continue to draw inspiration from TEA Cup Honourees, Dr José Viñals and Bill Winters of Standard Chartered, whose commitment to in-person shareholder dialogue—despite disruptive activist protests sets a thoughtful tone for the season. But the discussion at our 1st May TEA Talk—featuring Mail on Sunday’s Patrick Tooher—reminded us that not all companies are leaning into engagement.
Retail investor Phil Clarke’s first-hand account of the frightful scenes at the Drax Group AGM, which ended in disruption and the abandonment of the meeting, underlines a key challenge: how to protect the value of AGMs as open forums without allowing them to be derailed.
Still, it’s heartening to see many UK businesses continuing to welcome shareholders into the room—and proving that dialogue need not be digital-only.
It’s a busy time at TEA. Holding at least one share in over 1,400 UK-listed companies, we have no shortage of AGMs to cover. To help make sense of the season, we have started organising details of forthcoming details on this blog and via our beta platform, called FinGlitz. Look out for more info on this later this week. In the meantime, check out the shortlist of AGMs that I am tracking this week and next here.
🎥 Watch the video of our reflections of the AGM season so far here, which includes reference to the Drax AGM disruption and our analysis of / tribute to Dr José Viñals and Bill Winters of Standard Chartered.
👉 Read the full feature on Bill Winters → here
🏆 TEA Cup Honours: Dame Anita Frew, NextGen Chair & Queen of Hearts and Minds
Inspiring the Next Generation—From the Boardroom to the Apprenticeship Floor
We’re raising our TEA Cups this week to Dame Anita Frew, Chair of Rolls-Royce, for running this year’s AGM like an absolute boss—in her signature style: calm, clear, deeply attuned, and (as ever) effortlessly approachable. In response to my question about the company’s popularity on Trading 212 among Gen Z investors (Rolls-Royce has an impressived 205k followers on the trading platform, while BAE only has 6.4k and Babcock not even 1k!), she drew a strong link to younger generation’s enthusiasm for STEM and Rolls-Royce’s commitment to making engineering exciting and relevant for the next generation. I was even kindly invited to next year’s AGM to meet some of their 1,200 apprentices—woohoo! This is a standout gesture that shows real intent behind the company’s inclusion agenda. Massive congrats, Dame Anita, for leading with purpose, presence, and people-first energy.
Side note: I first met Anita over Zoom back in 2021 (pre-dame), and even then, her thoughtful, grounded leadership stood out. It’s only scaled since. And a huge shoutout to Claire-Marie O’Grady, Rolls-Royce’s Chief Governance Officer (LOVE this highly appropriate title), who guided the AGM with expertise, and intent. Shareholder questions? Handled. Engagement? Real. This wasn’t a tick-box exercise—it was a live example of what corporate listening looks like. Rolls-Royce isn’t just engineering engines—they’re engineering trust.
🎥 Watch our video honour to Dame Anita → here
👉 Read the full feature → here
🏆 TEA Cup Honours: Graeme Baldwin
Graeme and Gang are Pivoting to the Future and Keeping the Good Governance Party Going
When governance has groove, you feel it. This week’s TEA Cup Honours goes to Graeme Baldwin, General Counsel & Company Secretary of Pearson plc, for delivering structure with soul and proving that AGMs don’t have to be stale. With a will.i.am-approved CEO, a fintech legend on RemCo, and a board that looks more like a tech summit than a stuffy committee, Pearson’s approach to engagement feels refreshingly alive. This wasn’t Coachella-for-Capitalists (yet), but it hit all the right notes—clarity, continuity, and genuine respect for shareholders.
It was governance with rhythm and rigour—anchored by Graeme’s year-round tempo of engagement and amplified by his equally capable colleagues, Natalie White and Christie Wolstencroft, whose strategic oversight and operational finesse helped author an AGM experience that actually worked. No stitched-together Frankenstein of a meeting here—this was a living, breathing structure with flow, presence, and intent. A space where shareholders felt seen, not sidelined. So, about that AGM Festival 2026… just putting it on the vision board. 🎪🫖
🎥 Watch our video honour to Graeme Baldwin and Pearson → here
👉 Read the full feature → here
🫖 The Enduring Power of Good Governance
Dame Anita Frew’s AGM presence reminded me of another icon: Sir Roger Carr, whose now classic 2019 NED Awards speech outlined five timeless principles for board effectiveness:
✅ The right motivation
✅ Clear boundaries
✅ Patience and humility
✅ Valuing others’ contributions
✅ Character over credentials
Today’s best nextgen chairs—like Dame Anita, Paula Rosput Reynolds, Ruth Cairnie, and Cressida Hogg—are bringing those values into a digital, fast-paced world. Their leadership proves that emotional intelligence and operational excellence aren’t mutually exclusive—they’re mutually reinforcing.
I’ve experienced this firsthand through my own long-time mentor, Paul Lester, CBE. His guidance (and no-nonsense honesty when it counts) continues to shape how I see leadership, legacy, and impact.
👀 This week, we reflect on key transitions:
Sir Peter Gershon → Paula Rosput Reynolds (National Grid)
Sir Ian Davis → Dame Anita Frew (Rolls-Royce)
Mike Turner → Ruth Cairnie (Babcock)
Sir Roger Carr → Cressida Hogg (BAE Systems)
And why the next generation of chairs is more than ready.
On a side note: We’d be curious to know what Sir Roger would make of BAE’s 2025 AGM format — virtual-only in all but name. The TEAm and I would, of course, welcome a conversation with Ms Hogg on this matter.
🎥 Watch our video coverage → here
👉 Read the full feature → here
🌱 Trailblazers Who Advance Boardrooms & Humanity Forward
Disruption makes headlines. Transformation builds futures.
This week, we salute two quiet powerhouses:
Julie Baddeley, founder of Chapter Zero, who’s been equipping directors with the climate fluency to lead from within
Catherine Howarth, CEO of ShareAction, whose two decades of principled engagement has shifted ESG from fringe to front row
They don’t shout. They strategise. They don’t drown out. They draw in.
At TEA, we don’t condone intimidation—but we celebrate evolutionary revolutionaries like these. Because this is what real boardroom activism looks like.
🎥 Watch our video coverage → here
👉 Read the full feature → here
🔔 Final Sip
Thanks for reading this week’s edition of TEA Cup Honours. Feel free to share this.
If you’ve witnessed an act of meaningful shareholder engagement, drop as a line to tell us about it.
Let’s continue to build a better capital market together:
AGM@teaxall.org | teaxall.org