Tech Trends Series #5 – Transcript

Episode details

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

clients, advisor, people, technology, advice, bit, data, talking, future, digital, qr codes, understand, tools, apps, starting, industry, engage, good, long, business

SPEAKERS

Hayley Pearse, Cara Graham, Fraser Jack, Patrick Flynn, Matt Heine, James Sutherland

 

Fraser Jack 

Welcome back to the XY adviser podcast. I’m Fraser Jack and we are talking today around the evolution of technology. Where to from here we all sort of know what the last few years has brought us so far. But it’s really exciting to think about what the future could hold. So let’s get let’s get stuck in to this episode. Welcome back. Patrick Flynn.

 

Patrick Flynn 

Great to be back.

 

Fraser Jack 

Now we’re talking all things around the evolution of technology and innovation. And now in this particular series, let’s let’s start, let’s have a chat to you about it. Let’s start with something maybe small, and then work our way to some of the more outrageous outcomes that could end up with

 

Patrick Flynn 

cool. So let’s maybe start with client engagement as an example. So this, where are we seeing, you know, continuous trends. A lot of this stuff builds off stuff we’ve been saying for a long time. So for example, anybody who’s had one of those clients where you say, you know what, he should Kitty, go play with that. I’ll manage your broader portfolio. But you know, you can stick 2% of your portfolio, or 20, grand, or whatever it is, into whatever crazy idea, whatever you you know, whatever you want, I’m not going to be thinking about that I’m managing everything else, but it helps you scratch that itch of play money. I think we’ll be seeing more demand for things conceptually similar to that. So that stuff’s been available for a long time, people have been able to have their own standard standalone stock broker in the past, or they’ve been able to use an E trade a long time ago. And now calm sec and whatnot, they’re all very easy to use. That’s something that is going to increasingly change over time where people find implementing stuff very easy. And that’s often been a saving grace for us in advance where it used to be the value of what we said used to be super valuable, because Google wasn’t around, or Google wasn’t very good. So you couldn’t Google anything that we’ve done. Naturally, every advisor knows that there’s a lot of stuff an advisor can add value to. But clients don’t know that. So if they think that they can Google things themselves, and it’s just as good, then in their eyes, it’s just as good. If I need to go to a heart surgeon, I can’t tell a good heart surgeon from a bad heart surgeon, I have no way of validating that. And clients have little way of validating that in terms of technical expertise. So we’re always already on that trend. But a saving grace for us for a long time was Yes, sure. You might be able to search much of this stuff on the internet. But we are helping you with stuff that you would never have found on the internet. But then we’re also here to do the execution, the ongoing management stuff that you’ve never been able to do before. One thing that’s definitely going to change over time around client engagement is it’s getting easier and easier to do things, it’s easy to roll over your super than ever before. It’s easy to buy some shares than ever before, it’s easy to do a lot of this stuff than ever before getting a digital will there’s now plenty of digital build type services, you can do all of these things now yourself easily. So when we’re trying to charge the kinds of fees that used to be totally reasonable, given the amount of work that we were saving a client, we won’t have that anymore, so we need to be smarter about client engagements.

 

Fraser Jack 

It right because there’s certainly going to be a lot of, if we go back to the data conversation, there’s a lot of businesses now that are going to know a lot of data about our clients, and couldn’t possibly be serving up opportunities or options for them.

 

Patrick Flynn 

And even in the first chat, you know, if your existing Superfund is saying, hey, consolidate, just click a few buttons and you can consolidate, then that’s a heck of a lot easier. As in you know, they might just do it as opposed to coming to us with four or five funds in the feeling a little bit lost and don’t know how to get started and stuff like that. And every fund was, you know, requiring you to you know, provide certified copy Have your DNA to be able to roll over, they can’t do that anymore, which is good for good for consumers, but also takes away a point of value that we’re used to.

 

Fraser Jack 

Yeah. Now when I think about the things that are closer to us, or we mentioned the smaller things in the evolution, you know, things like QR codes and digital signatures, or multi factor authentication have sort of taken on fairly rapidly recently. But how do you see that evolving?

 

Patrick Flynn 

Well, QR codes is something I’ve been using for a long time. I use them in essays in any soI templates were designed, we use them there, because they’re a really good way to cross the divide between print and digital. For as long as we are printing out essays and going through them with clients in person, if we want to refer to anything that’s external, a QR codes a really good way to effectively have a hyperlink in a printed document. Because if something comes out with a bit of blue underline, there’s no amount of tapping with your finger that you know will get you anywhere. We were probably way ahead of the curve and QR codes. But COVID has been a real boon for QR codes. Now everybody has a QR code reader. And yeah, even for the last couple of years, everyone is phone integrated phone app has been able to read QR codes, even if you don’t have the government scanner, you just open up your camera and you can pull up a link, it’s really good for crossing that divide from print to digital. I do think that that’s probably more of a short to medium term tool. Because hopefully, and I mentioned most of the listeners are in the same boat, hopefully, we’re not printing too many documents down the track, or the printed versions are the only ones that we’re supplying to clients, you know, fingers crossed is a video based version or a hybrid based version, where you know, all the document that you’re presenting isn’t necessarily the whole document, but a supporting information is emailed there. And then all of that all provided through your secure client portal. And everything can be hyperlinked through there. And as that evolves over time, I think QR codes will become less and less relevant for advice businesses, but it’s a pretty funky tool right now, especially when you want to build supporting documents or supporting information into anything, maybe your marketing material or advice or whatever reference to the E signatures part, I think that’s just pretty clear, it’s here to stay. I really hope more providers can be more flexible with the use of these signatures. And sometimes it can be a little bit clunky, because when an advisor sends in a signature, a document for a signature, trying to validate that to a provider is a little bit different. Because you know, they’re kind of depending on you to send the original thing, I do see one day down the track, not right now, there being something that’s a little bit more flexible, where you can integrate a provider’s envelope or a product envelope with one of your envelopes. So it can be your ATP, which goes back to you. But then in the same envelope or the same process and experience is the products, you know, consent forms or application forms or whatever the case may be. And that’ll go back to them. And then everybody gets everything they need, and the client just gets one envelope. That would be something that’s very cool, which, you know, fingers crossed one

 

Fraser Jack 

day we get. Yeah, fantastic. And what about something like multi factor authentication?

 

Patrick Flynn 

Well, again, as things need to get more secure, we’re going to see that everywhere in terms of you know, any client portals that we have, it becomes a little bit of a frustration for us when we’re just doing some administrative work around product management and stuff like that clients, just facilitating something as simple as a deposit of withdrawal, that stuff becomes more relevant. The area that I’m seeing this change a bit more on is around that digital security, and making sure you have a process in your business for if a client calls up and requests a withdrawal. What do you do around that? Or if a client sends you an email and requests a withdrawal? What do you do around that? Do you just accept what they’ve given you over that single medium at the time? If it’s an email, then I know some practices are doing this already. They will say great, I’ll give you a call just to verify before we process that withdrawal for you. And we should be starting to think about some things like that where we are implementing what is effectively multi factor authentication, even if it doesn’t mean that they automatically get an SMS. The concept still applies very heavily and advice.

 

Fraser Jack 

Yeah, fantastic. And as you mentioned before, you’ve taken it back to having a policy and a process in place.

 

 

unsurprising tell us about

 

Fraser Jack 

some of these weigh out types of technologies that are around it. And you know, we’re talking about the VR or AR or digital human type thing. How do you see it? Are we close to that or is it still a long way away,

 

Patrick Flynn 

it’s still a long way away. But when we talk about Robo advice in particular, we just I just see a lot of misconceptions in terms of Robo. So lay there look at the US model where those advisors that have been disrupted by Robo Providing or getting advice from a tool that’s very different to the type of comprehensive advice that we get over here. If you look at the advice of the consultants, peers to myself over in the US center, and advisor in the US, they’ll say, Well, you’ve got to be holistic now, don’t you? The pivot is to being holistic. Now we’ve been holistic forever. So we don’t need to make that pivot. So we do feel a lot safer, because a lot of the stuff that we do is far less transactional, that will get us through a significant period of time. And you know, where most of what we do certainly at the smaller practice, and is very heavily relationship based. That’s, that’s working for the medium term. where this could go long term, it’s really hard to project a hand. But there’s three particular tools, which, when I see them sort of converging over time, is kind of nuts. So there’s a piece of software, it’s an app, you can call, you can get it’s called replica with a K, Ra p Li K, that is a piece of software that’s designed for people who feel lonely, or have got mental health issues or whatever, that has some crazy, you know, kind of cheering test success level type stuff in there, where if you’re engaging with that tool over time, one, it gives you all these prompts about your Hey, how are you feeling today? And then if you say something, it’ll tell a response. And it’s effectively a chatbot. But there there are times where I’ve used it, and I’ve just said, Well, well, that’s not a chatbot. That’s some kind of AI, referring to something somebody else has said that somebody else has responded to, and then repeated that algorithmically. And they’re putting that together, because no computer crafted that sentence that came from AI, putting together human responses. And it’s pretty nuts. So with a tool like that, part of the reason why it’s pretty funky is because it’s built for people who are lonely, right? So it’s built to replace those conversations. And people might say something to their replica, that they would never say to another human. Right, that thing that they might say is, I just don’t know where all my money has gone. Or I feel like I don’t trust, I can’t trust anybody. Or, you know, I just get confused whenever I talk to anybody about anything with the dollar sign in front of it. And they’re not not not framing in exactly those ways. But you can see them saying those things. As well as saying, I feel lonely, I don’t feel like there’s anyone I can talk to generally, I don’t know where my life is going, or those sorts of things, things that that never say to another person. So that’s pretty cool. Because you can see, and again, I talk about trust a lot. You could earn trust with a piece of AI there that you might not actually get the chance to build with a lot of other people. Now I know there are financial advisors out there who really break down walls with people. And that was something I could never have done. But if you’re really good at that, then you can replicate that. But for those that perceive themselves as technicians first, then something like that can break down some of those walls. The other two bits of software in there. And this is all going to come together, so don’t worry. But there’s one called soul machines. It’s a group in the EU in New Zealand, and they’ve created some very realistic looking AI. So it looks like you’re talking to a person they craft, a person from facets of different people looks like a real face can’t the the audio isn’t great on that tool. But Westpac did a pilot with it a couple of years ago. And it looks pretty cool. New Zealand used in a pilot, especially around breaking down interactions around COVID, where they felt some people might be a little bit more comfortable getting frequently asked questions answered by something with a face as opposed to just a chatbot. Now the visuals of that are really cool, the other parts of it not quite as strong. And then you’ve got a there’s a Brisbane based firm called replica studios. Now to keep it confusing. This is replica with a C. But replica studios, they do AI for voice acting, use for game developers. So if you if you’re a you know an indie game developer, you might not have the big budget to employ real live voice actors. But you can get these voice actors to say something in a really cool voice you know, the booming sorcerer or the you know, bulky barbarian or whatever it might be. And if you just go to us simply google replica studios, they’ve got a version you can play on the website, and you can see how they’ve changed the different emphasis in different words in it. And you can hear that that conversation evolve. So one of my friends referred to it as it certainly starts out with a bit of that AI sound. And if you you get that AI sound, but it really starts to unpack once there’s a bit of emphasis here and a bit of time there and you can watch them as you specify. Put a bit of time or apply this bit of emphasis there. And it stops being such a neutral comment because nothing we say is actually neutral in the real world, you start to feel that come together. Now imagine you had all those three in one at all that you can talk to any time and you feel bill you can build trust with that looks like a human and sounds like a human, then something like that gets a Charles Schwab in the US, or a Commonwealth Bank, or something like that behind the tank, hey, you’ve got your digital financial advisor that you can talk to money about, they won’t ever judge you, they can give you this, they can give you that and they can do all the stuff that we can do. That’s a long way away. But that’s where I see this going. So if I was to be afraid of AI, it would be something like when those things start coming together, where you can build trust with something, and maybe it’s a standard version. And then you get the financial advice add on. After you’ve already gotten the mental health add on and you’ve gotten the body mind and soul add on and you’ve gotten the nutritionist add on. And maybe you know any other add on you might get you can get the financial advice, add on powered by CBI.

 

Fraser Jack 

And because you’ve already because you’ve already done the the trust in the other ones, you automatically trust the the the digital even,

 

Patrick Flynn 

rightly or wrongly, I can see people being more comfortable with that down the track. And that’s that’s a pretty crazy thought. But there might be 10 years away. But I wouldn’t say that that’s 30 years away.

 

Fraser Jack 

Yeah, fantastic. A Patrick Flynn thanks for coming on this series. If somebody wants to continue the conversation with you what’s the best way that they can reach out to you

 

Patrick Flynn 

just go to Patrick Flynn dot info and there’s a little book a virtual coffee with me button in the bottom right. And as part of that, you know, website client experiencing, just click that and you can see when I’m gonna when I’m available and book a time. Otherwise, you can just drop me a link on the site there as well as a spot where you can contact me there too.

 

Fraser Jack 

Fantastic. Patrick, thank you so much. Really appreciate it. Absolute pleasure. Thanks, Bryce. Welcome back. Haley piers.

 

Hayley Pearse 

Thanks, Fraser.

 

Fraser Jack 

Thank you for catching up with us. Now, of course, this is the last episode we’re talking about the evolution where to from here when it comes to innovation and technology. And I’m just, you know, I just I feel it in my bones that you have a lot of information here about what the what the history could look like, tell us about where you think the evolution of technology is taking us?

 

Hayley Pearse 

Oh, look, I’m gonna let you down because I think we I touched on it before I think we as a profession have innovated awful in that we’ve we’ve really tried to improve things that aren’t right in the first place. But what that means is there’s so much opportunity for us. The you know, open banking, for example, there’s, there’s so much opportunity there. There’s some great tools in money, soft frollo that are taking part in these these new types of technologies. And it will be really interesting to see where it goes from there. You know, I spoke earlier about QR codes, there’s all these these these pieces of tech that are out there that we’re not using that. And it’s largely because we’ve got so much other stuff to focus on. There’s so much legislation and red tape that we’re focusing on at the moment that it’s distracting us from the tools that can make life easier. And I wonder whether, after all of this, if there will ever be a time where the legislation within our industry won’t be tampered with. There’ll be a space where advisors can look at their processes look at their engagement and started to incorporate different tools into that that process.

 

Fraser Jack 

Yeah, it’s been interesting, obviously, the last few years of all the all of the trying to implement all the changes, but also, you know, in a way where technology I think people started building things from scratch where they could have decided instead of implementing things in that space, talk to me about how you see, you know, client engagement kicking off in the future.

 

Hayley Pearse 

Yeah, I think, and I’ve spoken about it again, not to sound like a broken record. But the forms with providers is a huge one. Because I mean, you look at just the consent process in itself, a client has to sign our consent form, and then they need to sign the consent form for the product provider. Now if they’ve got multiple products, there’s just so much paperwork. The whole idea of that form of the consent process was transparency for the client to engage them in the fees they’re paying for the services they are entitled to the number of clients that are said Why am I signing the same thing twice. It does this mean I’m paying double the fee, I can have all the videos and all the phone calls I like but the fact that there’s two forms that do the same thing, completely disengages the client from the purpose of with each win that form was intended. So I think engagement going forward, as I hate to sound like it’s an administrative thing but I feel like advisors with with everything that’s coming out with it. Now, we are pushing to find out more about the client, we are pushing to engage with them more, there are tools to do that. I think it’s the back end or red tape, the administrative stuff that things need to change, they need to innovate. And it’s not. It’s not, you know, putting a bandaid over something, it’s looking at the process, what’s not working, let’s improve that. I mean, the the fact that advisors are, you know, this, this cash flow industry that has emerged from financial planning, they looked at the market where the problems were and they emerged with this, they innovated they created this new market, they listened to what was there? I just feel like there’s a gap at the moment, with with the behind the scenes of advice.

 

Fraser Jack 

Yeah, you’re absolutely right, it’s about catching up in a lot of areas. Talk to me about the the, you know, the, you mentioned before the selfie on the phone, one of the things you’re seeing in that space around, you know, e signatures and multifactor. And those sorts of

 

Hayley Pearse 

things. Yeah. So that, you know, definitely the E signatures makes such a difference. But just because we have legislation around the the fact that they are accepted doesn’t mean that they actually are accepted everywhere, or that people know how to use them. I think where they can develop is the two factor authentication, if someone can sign off using their actual fingerprint, or their you know, we, we have our face recognition to unlock our phones, those things are a higher form of identification, then ink on a piece of paper. And there’s some there’s some real opportunity there with with confirming things for clients, I mean, this wife kind of concerned for me in SMS that, you know, is approved with a fingerprint, you know, I think there’s opportunity.

 

Fraser Jack 

Absolutely, I love the facial recognition come in to imagine if we could just look at our phones and and approve the form.

 

Hayley Pearse 

I mean, COVID was a really, really great test run for the snuff. And it was possible, they were providers that accepted a selfie with someone holding their ID, they accepted that. But as soon as COVID seemed to come, you know, be getting better. Or that requirement wasn’t there, that facility was turned off. Like That was fantastic, you know, to be able to certify someone’s ID over a video call, like that’s, that’s great, that allows us as a business to service clients all over Australia. And that also makes the whole AML obligation much easier. Because not every advisor sits down face to face with their client, grabs their ID and goes out to the receptionist and says, Can you please photocopy this for me, but that’s just not the case as much anymore. So that things have to change in line with with what’s happening.

 

Fraser Jack 

Yeah, fantastic. I love that idea of I love that idea. During the video selfie, this is me, this is my idea. And you know, this is a you know, a true copy of the original, which which everybody can cite on this videos.

 

Hayley Pearse 

We We We toyed with the idea of you know, when we do new portfolio calls, we understand that people are a little bit like, Who are you have never heard of you before. And that can just be not being engaged with the process. So we toyed with the idea of sending them, you know, with their welcome letter, a magnet for their for each with all of our contact details. And it had like a code word. So every time they called us, we could say, Hey, hey, john, what’s the code word, and he could walk up to his fridge and say, pineapple, something like that just as a way of going yet you’re john, and you’ve got that magnet. And I know you’re my client, little things like that. Because what I understand of the legislation is you have to be seen to be making efforts to do this. It’s not as just simple as ticker flick, you have to be making the effort to pursue more information to acknowledge your client is who they say they are to confirm they have informed consent, you know, little things like that. I know, obviously, as Eagle probably just offered that idea, but it just shows that we’re doing what we can to engage to confirm with the client. And I think that that, whilst it might not legally speak volumes, I feel I could does.

 

Fraser Jack 

It’s an interesting one, isn’t it? I love that idea of a code word. I don’t know. I don’t know how that’s gonna work for each client. But I think it’s an interesting one, there’d be a lot of different pineapples around variations. But you know, I agree that there could be something that does, you know, a number or whatever it might be an identification process to say, Hey, this is john is this really john? gives them a little bit of a feeling that that you know, you are taking it seriously.

 

Hayley Pearse 

Absolutely. And that, you know, banks are using that with the two factor authentication, having a code on your phone, as well as your password like that. That would be a really great tool as opposed to a signature. You know, I feel like as I said before, advisors have come so far in innovating and developing how they give advice, but we are one part of this industry. We’ve all got to start moving forward together.

 

Fraser Jack 

Thank you. Exactly right now talk to us about the future. What are the, you know, 10 years from now? What does it what’s advice look like from, from a financial advisor we still face to face. So we were getting, you know, digital, how are we engaging?

 

Hayley Pearse 

I think it’s really hard to predict what’s going to happen COVID COVID surprise me. But it’s really hard to say what the future will look like. One thing I do know is there is more opportunity than ever, people are more digital people are more willing to ask for help people, some people do have more cash available to be able to leap it opportunities. Just as I said before, seeing advisors offer more in the cash flow space. It might be a little while before there’s another pivot within the industry. But I know it’s possible. And I’m really excited. I think, you know, a kaboodle. Sometimes I envy hearing advisors talk about looking after a particular niche. And I think that would be cool. But I just love the challenge of looking after a range of clients. It really keeps me on my toes. And I know why people niche, but it is I think, as an advisor, good to be able to get that that broad spectrum because I deal with people that that don’t know what technology is they’re actually afraid of it on the other side, people that lean in, like we’ve got clients in our CRM that are our cheerleaders, that we tagged them as such, so that when we want to try something new, they’re the first people we contact to say, Hey, can you give this a try and give us our feedback, give us your feedback. Now, they’re not always willing to give positive feedback. But that’s good. I want to know if it’s hard or if it’s crappy. So I think the future should look a bit more like that people not being afraid to ask their clients for that sort of feedback to test new ideas, because advisors had to stay within some very constrained, you know, legislation and people you know, to read octobe, and people a little bit afraid to do anything. I think we can’t be afraid to try new technologies, if it’s seen to be helping the client. You know, because it’s out there. There’s, there’s so many apps out there can be overwhelming without a doubt. Not everyone naturally leans into new technology. But just trying one thing is a benefit.

 

Fraser Jack 

Yeah, fantastic. There’s a great way to lean in innovate, test, and then innovate again. Haley, thanks so much for coming on the series. Really appreciate it. How can people get hold of you if they wanted to continue the conversation?

 

Hayley Pearse 

Yes, so you can put me an email, or even contact us on our website caboodle. fs.com that I you.

 

Fraser Jack 

Thank you so much, Haley. Thanks, guys. I

 

Hayley Pearse 

really appreciate your time.

 

Fraser Jack 

Welcome back. James.

 

James Sutherland 

Nice to be back. I think this is the last one. In fact, we’re

 

Fraser Jack 

in the final episode, we’re talking about the evolution of technology and innovation. And what’s the possibility the future? This is a this is an open book. What do you what are your thoughts on the idea with the advice profession could go?

 

James Sutherland 

Well, if you look at the standpoint of where we should go versus where we probably haven’t gone anywhere, because the future is where we’re all going to be asked as to how we embrace that, how we embrace the tech, how we how we embrace the the ability to be able to connect in different ways. I think in in that previous episode, we mentioned about the digital natives, you know, the name of the van life people, if you wanted to have a they want to be to be able to get the information of the data they want. I see advice is going to be in my way of thinking, particularly with the digital native van lifestyle people, small incremental bits at a time, not the be holistic, this is what you need to, you know, eating an elephant one bite at a time. I think advice has got to go down that path.

 

Fraser Jack 

It’s interesting as it were, from a consumer point of view, we tend to do that now with the content, we’ll do the little bit here in a little bit there. And we’ll move on, we tend to be busy, and we’re just taking on small bits of time. Yeah. How does that happen? From an advice point of view? How do we manage to get those small, incremental pieces of of the puzzle? Is it a 12 month financial plan? Or is it a system a process? So we were talking about group financial planning? How do we scale?

 

James Sutherland 

No, I think you scale by by by using scope, and working out what the client’s immediate needs are, because what their needs are today is going to be different in what their needs are in six months, 12 months, three years. And even that can change. Look what’s happened in the last two years or less. And so that the plans about what we’re trying to achieve today, and how we deliver that information is is the intermediate is the the immediacy of what people want, and and McConnell need to give it to them, you know, who in some instances vices, advice, phones have become roadblocks because they want to deliver And a certain way, and I can understand why they want to do that because of the compliance regimes of licensees, etc. We just need to find that, that that ability to be able to take those roadblocks away as many roadblocks as way so we can can deliver those those bits of advice that clients need and still be compliant. for them. The way we deliver advice, we’re obviously going to change we’ve spoken before about video definitely, that’s going to be a way of an advocate to to continue online meetings. VR is another one, there’s a new headset that’s being released or been talked about where people can actually use glasses to be able to have streaming TV, so they can just lay back and have the small LCDs inside the glasses to be able to watch TV, lovely

 

Fraser Jack 

enterocyte. Yeah, from anywhere in anywhere VA mentioned, there’s obviously your virtual virtual reality, you got augmented reality that is a variation of that. And also, the digital humans an interesting concept to be seen into that.

 

James Sutherland 

I’ve read a bit about it, but I haven’t seen much of it put it that way. Not yet. Anyway, I think, who was released, Amazon released their little robot this week. So if you’re listening to this in a couple of months time, sorry about that, as $1,000, and it’s going to be able to monitor and help. I would imagine they’ll have things in the future without monitoring their spending, they’ll be able to give up an update about where their bank accounts are up to what the market is doing, where things where their investments are at, they’ll be able to be able to get those at a at a at a beck and call, so to speak.

 

Fraser Jack 

Yeah, amazing. What are you seeing in the space of things like canon digital signatures and multi factor authentication?

 

James Sutherland 

What digital signatures has become part of the wifis digital signatures? brighouse DocuSign. First, well, absolutely. That’s become part of our our world to try and get advice back and forth with lockdown as being really the only way that we’ve been able to get documents done. From a authentication point of view, I think we haven’t even touched the surface on that. They’re saying that everything we do needs to be to try and bring in as much authentication as possible to factors. And how which ones right? Do you use these my bodies? Or an authenticator? Who knows? I prefer to prefer the latter than the former.

 

Fraser Jack 

Yeah, I prefer the multi factor authentication. Tell me about the any anything you’re seeing in the world of apps, or when it comes to advisor, client relationships or advisors creating apps? Have you seen anything?

 

James Sutherland 

Now? I did? I think we’re still using the ones that are they, because it costs a lot of money to create a decent app. Let’s face it, it’s not a it’s not a it is getting cheaper. But there’s there’s businesses and people that have got one gonna say more smart. But that’s not necessarily right. But you know, you’ve got the my prosperities, you’ve got the map my plans, you’ve got those sorts of texts that are out there. Cash Flow coaching, cash flow analysis, applications, as well. We, from a delivery of advice point of view, I don’t think I think apps have got there is an opportunity to be able to get more apps out there.

 

Fraser Jack 

Yep. And what about the way you mentioned data in a previous episode? How do you see the evolution you know, of data and be able to mine opportunities? And with regards to structured data?

 

James Sutherland 

Yeah. The bigger the data set, the better it is. If you’ve if you’ve if you’ve from an A for sale point of view, from a licensee point of view, you’ve got a better opportunity than you have for then a good advice practice. And what is it the average advisor these guys these days, look around look after around 100 clients, so it’s not a big data set to be able to use. But if you collectively gathered that data, that might be something you could look at in the future where a group of advisors can gather their own data as a collective, to give them a better opportunity to be able to see what that what their data set looks like. So obviously can get data sets with it. And I think people like the Zippo and work sorted, I get our labeling people to be able to get their data. And then you’ve got you’ve got businesses like or applications, which hasn’t even been remotely used at the moment, like Power BI. And I see where there’s a firm called EFT tracker. They’ve created a, a whole website around Power BI and they they’re scraping data from a range of different places to be able to allow people to look at EF T’s in a dashboard. dashboard. Yeah, yeah.

 

Fraser Jack 

Now, now, you know I’ve had conversations over many years around licensing and the Evolution of licensing you know, is it you know that especially mid tier or mid size licenses we’re seeing a lot of shifting in that space now based on all of the things we went through you know creating efficiencies in the size of what’s on the requirements these days How do you see the evolution of licensing going

 

James Sutherland 

well there’s that there’s a school of thought that says that the actual licensee will be known to be no more and there’ll be individual licensing with esic I think we’re at least five years away from that I think that they and even if that was going to be the case and i’m i’m happy either way, advice Sims are still going to need some way to go to to be able to help them with their payment systems getting keeping up to date with compliance which is an ever evolving beast as we know the even the tech you know when what what the the economies of scale around tech bought tickets that can be used so I think that the licenses will probably evolve just as much as as the licensing will evolve. Yep,

 

Fraser Jack 

fantastic. James thanks so much for coming on the series really appreciate your your guidance and information and wisdom. Tell us about where people can get hold of you if they wanted to continue the conversation with you about the work you’re doing with with the practices licensees and in this space.

 

James Sutherland 

Your LinkedIn is probably the easiest way at the moment they can just reach out through me through to me on LinkedIn that’s probably the best place to get me fantastic Twitter if you want to I don’t I don’t check as much these days is too much anger on Twitter.

 

Fraser Jack 

There enough LinkedIn is a good spot. Thanks, James. Southern really appreciate your coming on the show coming on the series. been a pleasure. see you man. Thanks for joining us again that Kara Graham we are in the final episode of this series of all things technology and looking at you know, how we can become efficient and effective with technology. Talk to us about the evolution we’re talking about the history authority, we’re talking about the history of history, we’re talking about the future where to from here, what are your thoughts?

 

Cara Graham 

Yeah, well I think the future is is really about a bit of hybrid model or a bit of a blend between the digital experience and the human experience you know, we can use technology to really I guess speed things up and and get rid of some of the administration or at least reduce I think it really is maybe a bit extreme from there but then obviously you don’t want to lose that human touch you know if you want people that can understand you you know that can adapt to you as well you know a big part of advices is around managing people’s behavior. And you know, while technology can be great in you know, automating things you know, you still need a I think a human element in there to say hey do we need to pivot Do we need to change this person you know, need something a little bit different to make sure that they can they can adjust and adapt to their behavior in the best way possible. And and I just think that there’s so much cool stuff coming out in terms of you know, some of the sort of micro investing or some of the robo advice apps and and different different things coming through that you know, we as advisors, we just we shouldn’t be scared of Robo advice you know, Robo advice can complement some of the areas that we do because you know, clients are still going to want you know, a human human element there to to provide that check and balance but you know, if we can use some of these apps and some of these platforms to just make things that much more efficient and that much more accessible i think that’s that’s awesome you know, we want to make sure that as as things evolve over time that we can make sure that we’ve got a really affordable offering that still life changing to clients you know that’s that’s going to provide the greatest outcome to you know, to both asking our clients in the long run

 

Fraser Jack 

couldn’t agree more now affordability that is a big part of this accessibility you know being having access to these things as it is is another and you mentioned you know the human element and I when I think when I when you say that i think that you know the two parts of our brain we have emotional thoughts and feelings and then you know, there is the the technical side which which is which seems to be where a lot of the technology is focused on being able to calculate and compute things and work out what might be best and all those types of things within the as you mentioned, the human element is often dealing with the emotional aspects of that and it’s I think it’s a long way off before technology can take that well you know,

 

Cara Graham 

you can add a reminder you can dismiss an alert on your phone, but you know, when somebody you know, calls you or you know, face you and says, okay, we said we were gonna do this, and it hasn’t happened yet. What do we need to do to make it you know, to make it different, again, that’s just a much better call to action they going off, you know, early June is approaching or I said I would do this from there. And, you know, our job as advisors is to empower people to make good decisions, but then also to hold them to account. You know, we’re obviously really accountable to all the things we deliver on. But you know, we need to hold our clients to account, you know, you can’t just engage an advisor and put your feet out, you engage in advisor, and they’re going to make you work. So that you can be in a better position in the long run, everything, everything takes sacrifice, and, you know, change is hard. You know, we’ve been talking about changes in business, but for briefly very hard, but you know, clients don’t like change either. So we need to be there is that that impetus for change to say, Well, why are we reverting back to old behavior? Or, what else do we need to do? Or maybe we haven’t got, maybe we haven’t got the message sort of fully delivered or funky. And so we need to go back to the education stage. From there and you know, as a human, we’re going to be able to read them, we’re going to be able to adapt, you know, we’re going to figure out, okay, has somebody misunderstood what we’ve said, you know, when computer’s not going to figure out, if somebody is not getting it, they just want to move on to the next, you know, the next question the next segment. From there. So you know, there’s the need for advice, and the need for human element advices is never going to go away. But if we can get technology to do some of the, you know, let’s call it the basic stuff, we’re awesome, we just need to embrace that, in my view,

 

Fraser Jack 

100% technology can provide the information and the human can to provide the understanding by the tail of it. Tell me about your arm that, you know, we talked about some of the technology that you’re using in the business throughout the throughout the series? Where do you want to see some of that go? What are your ideas and thoughts around the future of how technology can make you can improve your business?

 

Cara Graham 

Well, I think that we we just want technology to remove, remove some of the manual component systems, I think, you know, far too much, there’s still a lot of fake data entry, you know, I think data entry rubbish, in rubbish out is often the same data entry is just so critically important. From there, you know, can we get, you know, the client sort of doing some of that, rather than necessarily the client, adding it in, and then somebody else processing it from there, you know, and I think we’ve, certainly I know, our business, we’ve come a step forward, but I think we have a long way forward to that, you know, I think, you know, certainly going to be better technology to make some of the modeling components more alive and accessible, you know, we use x tools at the moment for our modeling, which I think is really great. Now, clients love, love the modeling, we get really good outcomes from that. But it is clunky. And it isn’t something that I think works particularly well live. But I think it would be awesome to sit there and again, much more efficient to sit there and rather than walking away with the changes we’re going to make and come back to them on is to be able to do them in a nice, easy, quick way, you know, right there in the meeting. And, you know, maybe there’s some other instruments that we’ll be learning about when I listened to this podcast series, we can be assisting from there, but you know, I think it’s, yeah, really just removing some of the manual, some of the duplication of work, then technology is surely surely going to help them. You know, one of the things that we often say to our clients, as well as that our, our role isn’t to be their advisor forever, our role is to be their advisor for as long as we can add value, you know, and I think what we need to accept as advisors is that, you know, year to year, sometimes that value is going to go up, and sometimes that value is going to go down. So we need to have quite a nimble engagement process with our clients, and we can kind of, you know, scale up and scale down as needed. And again, you know, being able to use some technology use some, you know, Robo advice, potentially, from an investment point of view, for some of those types of things. It just puts the power back in the client, and, you know, we’re still there from an unbiased perspective, but but they’re in control, you know, and that’s ultimately a good thing.

 

Fraser Jack 

Yeah, something that could be more lower cost, lower touch that, you know, be in place for, you know, a year or two until the college ready to come back and make any other major changes.

 

Cara Graham 

Yeah, that’s it. I mean, you know, we work with a pretty wide variety of clients, you know, from the mom and dad, but to the ultra high net well, and, you know, I don’t think it comes as any surprise, the profitability is much higher on the ultra high net worth a much more high touch and you know, there’s a lot more work involved. But it’s, you know, when you’re sort of working more on a quantity, I don’t really want to say not low quality, because we do obviously provide a high quality of service to all of our clients. But I guess it’s almost just getting busier, without necessarily getting more profitable. And I think that’s certainly something that we’ve kind of looked at and assessed as a business. As well as you know, what, what is providing us and our clients with the best outcome, you know, you can’t necessarily be everything to everybody. So how can we make? How can we make some of that, you know, more simple advice more cost effective and you know, be able to continue working in that market as well. Because you know, there’s a lot of people that need advice. And and, you know, we don’t want to just make the rich richer, we want to be able to provide advice to Australia. And that is really important to us.

 

Fraser Jack 

Well said, Kara. If somebody wants to continue the conversation with you, what’s the best way for them to reach out or find you

 

Cara Graham 

so they can find me on LinkedIn, I would suggest that probably the easiest one power gram from Tw de Australia, feel free to send me a message or connect, you know, happy to have a chat, have a chat or share some insight or learn some lessons even

 

Fraser Jack 

Wonderful. Thank you for being involved in the series. I really appreciate it.

 

Cara Graham 

No worries, it’s gonna play the bank.

 

Fraser Jack 

Welcome back to this final episode. Matt Heiner,

 

Matt Heine 

as always great to be speaking to.

 

Fraser Jack 

fantastic to have you here. Now we’re talking about the evolution which i think you know, I beat down a few times and many conversations over the years. When it comes to innovation and technology. Tell us what you’re seeing in the space.

 

Matt Heine 

It’s a very big question phrase up for this as the session I’ve been looking forward to this is the the area that we can crystal ball. And as I mentioned, I think one of the early episodes, I can guarantee that some of these things will never happen. But wouldn’t it be cool if they did. So clearly, there’s a lot of change at the moment. pleasingly, we’re starting to see some meaningful change in the industry, although I was lamenting on something the other day, which is that even throughout the last couple of years, where we’ve largely moved online and had to go digital, still only 50% of the industry using digital signatures. Now let’s not confuse digital signatures, or E signatures with innovation, because all we’re doing is catching up with the rest of the world. And I’m struggling to understand how the other 50% actually survived over the last period. But that’s another discussion altogether. So what’s happening in the future, I think everyone’s starting to recognize that tech is important, they’re starting to understand that business model innovation is important, which means we can’t keep doing the same things. And we’re seeing this sort of roll through the industry from a pricing perspective, the way that people are offering services, the way that some firms are generating content marketing, so setting up YouTube channels, and producing regular seven or eight minute videos on a whole range of different topics to generate engagement and new business. So we’re actually starting to see change and innovation in the industry, which is fantastic. But there is a very long way to go, we are still a long way behind many other industries, even some really boring industries. So it’s time to focus. And I think we need to also understand that if we’re not making change, if we’re not thinking about these things, it might not happen tomorrow, but in the next three to five years, you will lose relevance, and you might not make it through. So let’s be really conscious of that. And let’s start to think about what our digital presence is going to look like and what our business model is going to look like in the future. So to your exact question, what what’s happening? Where do we start want to start on the digital part of the business model?

 

Fraser Jack 

Before before we get there, I just want to pick up on the signature thing because I understand agree, if somebody sends me a document, he says, I’m like, can I send it back to them? And say, Can you send it to me in a document where I can just do an E signature. And that’s the same I guess for a lot of clients, you know, like if if platforms like yours aren’t doing e signatures, then another one will be and clients will be demanding it from, from from advisors, I think advisors are in the middle of that process of trying to try to manage expectations of clients with, you know, with, you know, any particular company of any particular product provider that that may or may not be be taken those these signatures are not just the signatures but you know, like ID suit ID type stuff as well. But, you know, I just think back to my you know, I don’t know when the last time I signed something for a bank, generally it’s generally if I want to make a transaction with a bank, I just, you know, there’s multi factor, authentication or some other way.

 

Matt Heine 

Indeed, I can’t wait to throw out my printer, there is nothing more frustrating or that seems more of a waste of time than having to print something, sign it and then scan it. Anyway. Let’s hope that’s not the biggest innovation of the decade.

 

Fraser Jack 

Correct. Let’s let’s get into some of the some of the fancy stuff. When we get to the future things like and you mentioned whole of wealth being a real trend. Let’s start there with the evolution of where that might pop up. The opportunities that might be in the

 

Matt Heine 

hall of wealth is a core part of our strategic future. It’s where we’re spending a lot of time, effort, money and thinking. And we really do think it’s the Holy Grail. In this day and age. With so much data available so much connectivity, and so many services that can provide hyper personalized experiences at a mass scale. The inability for clients to understand their whole financial picture is kind of a Standing. So if we are talking about what we’re doing, but we’re seeing others, starting to sort of go down this path as well. It’s about collecting as much data as possible from as many sources as possible to give that client feature. So it might be bank feeds, property feed, so balances, but also where they’re spending. It could be information from enterprise solutions, such as class and bgl, so that they can get all their superannuation information, but all in a single spot. So don’t make people have to go digging or hunting for this information presented, make sure it’s presented really well. And I think that sort of user experience or the UX is really what’s driving success of a lot of these new sort of trading apps like your superheroes and your Robin Hood’s. They’re not overly complex. And they’re not overly functional. But they’ve had huge growth, because they’re a pleasure to use. So the challenge is, how do we get a huge amount of information and make it enjoyable and engaging and hyper personalized for our clients? But also, and then I think the next step is how do we use that data to start generating, and this is where absolutely has to go and will go to start generating sort of proactive advice and actionable insights. So rather than advisors or clients, having to arrange a meeting, look back historically through what’s happened to make plans for the future. Advisors should be knowing, almost in real time, what’s happening within their client base. So some simple examples, if we’re connected into say, domain will Rei alerting an advisor, that one of their clients has put their rental property on the market, or that they’re sold their family home, and then contacting the client to say, I’ve noticed that you’ve had a significant change in your life, is there something that we can help you with? Or have you thought about doing this with the proceeds? And then that has a huge number of rolling effects. So proactive advice, and being constantly aware and alert to what’s happening within your client base is absolutely the future. But equally, making sure the clients know when they need to go and see an advisor or when they need to seek help by generating again, ideas for them about Have you thought about this? Or is this the right time to maybe speak to a professional? Or did you know you can get a cheaper home loan somewhere. So that’s really exciting for us. And I think that’s going to get better and better over the next couple of years.

 

Fraser Jack 

Yeah, so this is a really interesting point. So starting with the data bank that we talked about before the database, the real time thing is really exciting, too, because it just means that we, you know, the feeds can all come into there, not necessarily to the software, which bypasses, I love the idea of that you sort of touched on there of the review, not becoming a review anymore, looking back in time, but actually, like really proactive advice meetings.

 

Matt Heine 

Yeah. And again, I keep harping on the point, if we look at the likes of Facebook and Instagram, they know a hell of a lot about us. And it’s no surprise that they’re delivering real time ads to us about things that we’re interested in suggesting stories that we’re interested in, you know, that’s where we need to get to as an industry, the technology is clearly available, but it just requires someone to actually do it. And that’s going to happen in a digital environment through a client portal, particularly, because that’s where clients are wanting to interact. So that that part of it that client interaction, that client portal, big part of the future, we’re going to see a huge adoption across the industry. And once we start to see that adoption and advisor start using it, we’re going to see it evolve pretty rapidly, I think. But again, and we touched on this in an earlier episode, the advent of data and data capabilities and Data Tools is going to be huge for the industry. And we need to be focused on what our plan is there, so that we don’t get left behind.

 

Fraser Jack 

Yep. Now, obviously, a big part of this is also the open banking process, I guess we can call it sort of started a while ago, and it became a thing and then it sort of I don’t know, it’s sort of one of those things that hasn’t really eventuated tell us we were up till now no open banking journey.

 

Matt Heine 

It’s a pretty complex area, sort of across it at a high level. And at some point, I understand we’ll have to become a data recipient. At this point, banks are able to share data, although at the moment, it’s really driven by the consumer. And by the, by the sort of the advice or the accounting community, if you like whereby, and there’s a number of services that have been set up that effectively use screen scraping technology. So the big difference between what’s currently available and the future of open banking is that at the moment, a site will go in, or usually credentials, effectively log into the site, pull your data out, and then display it back to you. In the open banking environment, that data will be passed back and forward securely, and will allow over time and this is where it gets really exciting. The ability to not only read, so that is collect the data from a bank, but also to write. So imagine a world in the future where from the net wealth app or your planning software, or some other client portal, a client could actually make a payment directly from that platform. But on behalf of or from any of their underlying linked bank accounts, equally, with open banking, all of the data that’s being collected by different providers is being used to make recommendations and we touched on that before so we noticed that you’re paying x for this home loan Have you considered moving where you can save $1,000 a year If you move to x y Zed bank, so comparison tools, product comparisons, and in the future just convenience and being able to write directly back to banks is where it’s all heading.

 

Fraser Jack 

You know, this is that I want to touch on this conversation around the ledger, because obviously a bank keeps the ledger they understand these are the transactions that happened and that they keep that their source of truth. How’s blockchain gonna change, you know, blockchain type technology where there’s a distributed ledger that’s stored across the globe, if you like insecure sections, areas, blocks, if you want to call it that, how’s that going to change any of the things to do with safe banking, open banking or our banks.

 

Matt Heine 

It’s, it’s a little bit like trying to predict where the internet was going 20 years ago, there’s a huge emerging market in what they call defy. So decentralized finance. And I have to admit, I’m not close enough to it I need to be. But there’s some really interesting services that have been built on the blockchain. Typically, I believe they’re using the Ethereum blockchain, now to deliver those defy services seems to be more secure and a bit more scalable. And they’re looking basically at cutting out the middlemen. So it’s not necessarily that the client is going to notice a big difference. It’s more so that there won’t be intermediaries throughout the whole process. You know, the big benefit to that is clearly that it’s going to reduce cost to the consumer, because people aren’t taking a clip the whole way along. So it might be how quickly they can access markets, how quickly they can transfer money between different participants. And how quickly, I guess in many cases, they can convert their Bitcoin into a fee.

 

Fraser Jack 

Yep, fair enough. Now, just on hold of wealth, as well, because hollow wealth works really well for a financial advisor to understand their clients hold wealth, but what about from a client perspective for a client to have all their their whole wealth in one spot,

 

Matt Heine 

I think it’s just a good customer experience, it puts them back in control of their information, and helps them hopefully, become more engaged, because they’re able to do more, but also the better understand their financial position. And it’s very hard to understand or make decisions if you don’t have the whole picture. So people typically will look at their bank account regularly, how much have I got, how much is sitting in my savings account, and they’ll want to know what their mortgages how quickly they can pay it off or not. But investments in Serbia typically live in a different environment. And so it’s sort of out of sight, out of mind. And historically, the experience was that people would only log into the website and turn the mobile each year when they got their annual statement. Whereas we think that we can create a far more engaged consult customer, if we bring them into our environment for more than just a review of their investment, super portfolio. So they’re coming in to look at their bank balances, they’re looking at their mortgage, and therefore that’s actually generating interest, engagement, and hopefully a conversation with your advisor.

 

Fraser Jack 

Yeah, and with some proactive targeted information or education that comes out from time to time, it certainly keeps them engaged. Now that obviously, a big part of this is around data. And then on the back, I guess, if we push ourselves even further out, that use of data could be used for things like digital humans, or VR or AR and type engagement. Talk to us about how that might play out, versus the the concept of somebody sitting across the table from you.

 

Matt Heine 

So, you know, face to face is definitely not dead. And I don’t want anyone to ever think that I will ever suggest that. It is important people like to deal with humans. And unfortunately, we’ve had to move from face to face to interface to interface for too long and Iran teaching to get back to how things were. But the way that we communicate outside of that initial meeting, or potentially the review meeting will change and has changed. So we need to make sure that we’re communicating with our clients and understanding how they want to be communicated with let’s not just assume that everyone’s desperate to come back into our office in the CBD or in the suburbs, because they could be very happy to sit down quickly. Once the kids have gone to bed, or after dinner, have a half hour chat with you and move on to the next thing. So that really comes down to business model innovation. How are we going to service our clients? Can we do it quicker? Can we actually record a video and send it out to our clients does it need to be interactive for those quarterly reviews, for example. And we’re also starting to see new business models evolve around things like subscription services. So it might not be a full advice relationship. But it could be a coaching relationship where for $80 a month, they get access to a great content library, certain tools. And if they want to speak to an advisor, they can reach out and have a fee for service conversation around a topical or what we call episodic advice. piece. So there’s going to be a lot of change there as well.

 

Fraser Jack 

Fantastic. Thank you so much for coming on and being part of this series. If somebody wants to continue this conversation with you what probably the best way that they can find you.

 

Matt Heine 

Yeah, first of all, it’s been great fun, really enjoyed being on the series, and hopefully it’s been of interest to your listeners. This is this is an area that we’re passionate about as a business we do a huge amount of research on the advisable Australians different segments within that and also on technology as well as sort of what’s happening overseas. So for anyone that is interested in finding out more, I highly recommend that you have a look at our website. There’s a huge amount content so white papers, short form articles, podcasts you can listen to, but also have a chat to one of the net worth bdms. Because we’ve we’ve also created a whole lot of toolkits to help businesses innovate. So we’ve got a range of workshops with innovation cards, posters to really help advisors start the journey or to improve their current position because there are some great firms doing some great things out there at the moment.

 

Fraser Jack 

Wonderful. Thank you very much. Thanks, Fraser.