THE CHANGING ROLES in FINANCIAL SERVICES in The 21st Century

INVESTMENT MANAGERS - ADVISORY FIRMS - TECHNOLOGY PROVIDERS
It's easier to see the changing roles of all three groups by examining the managed account consulting process, which includes the interview process at the account's inception to establish the goals and framework, the universe of investment options, how you organize those investments in a solution for the client and then the monitoring, rebalancing and reporting. You have to go back and revisit that entire structure and make the front end much, much more robust - that's the job of the the advisors and the advisory firms. The interview process has to include lots of preferences and issues other then just investments. You have to expand the entire group of available products to go far beyond investments. And then you have to organize them around the client's life issues instead of an account statement. If you do all that, you end up looking at a balance sheet and deciding what can be done to help with the risks and liabilities. The reporting has more to do with life goals and not just whether we've gotten you to a million bucks yet. Technology providers will facilitate the blending of client preferences and aggregate the information necessary for both better account instructions and more effective monitoring of assets. Finally, investment managers will provide more absolute return strategies and more precise products- many with guarantees - to improve the chances of achieving success. Whereas in the past the industry competed on the basis of packaging products, we now join together to deliver a more reliable process and an out-come driven solution.
That's where we are today, it starts with a financial planning process where a great efficiency can be created with better packaging. It's about finding best fit solutions and has more to do with the client's life than about their percentage returns. They need to know how the cash will continue to flow.