Advisors must embrace tech to succeed

Ensuring your office runs smoothly and clients are happy is important to your practice’s well-being, but 54% of American financial advisors don’t have the processes and technologies needed to deliver, finds consulting firm SEI.

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The firm surveyed more than 500 American financial advisors, and looked at the trend among advisors to automate essential workflow processes. SEI says workflows help make practices sustainable businesses by creating repeatable processes, capitalizing on data to identify successes and deficiencies, and optimizing sales, services, and operations to create greater efficiencies.

“The workflows facilitate a team approach, and once in place, can help transform the firm into a sustainable, sellable business,” says Raef Lee, Managing Director for the SEI Advisor Network.

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SEI suggests that even advisors who do implement workflows often don’t use technology effectively. Many continue to execute basic procedures manually, often relying on memory. More than half of advisors (58%) who claim to have workflows in place actually rely on memory, post-it notes, to-do lists, or travelling checklists to implement tasks. Further, 53% of advisors say they don’t measure their workflow processes to determine their effectiveness.

More than half of advisors (57%) say they lack confidence in their practice’s technologies. The same number say they don’t feel their current technologies or processes ensure a consistent client experience. Most advisors say the reason they’re not keeping up with the latest technology is they’re focusing on the daily challenges of running a practice.

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Staff

The staff of Advisor.ca have been covering news for financial advisors since 1998.