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March 15, 2011 at 08:55 AM
This is the first in a six-part series designed to present best practices to advisors on how to choose, implement and monitor new technology for an advisory firm.-Ed.
Most financial advisors implement technology solutions with the ultimate goal of increasing profits, efficiency and the value of their businesses. At ActiFi, we've helped advisors make many decisions on selecting the best technology solution for their practice. We've been called in by advisors when they don't get ROI from the software they purchase, and through years of experience, we've adopted a set of best practices in selecting and implementing the “right” software for your practice.
Consider this common scenario among advisors. After many months of consideration and research, you purchased a new CRM system. You were optimistic that many of the operational issues your firm had been facing would disappear and things would never fall through the cracks again. However, six months into the deployment you’re not receiving the benefits you had hoped. Sure, you have noticed some improvements, but the workflow efficiencies have not materialized. Did you just spend thousands of dollars in out-of pocket expenses and opportunity cost for what seems to be a glorified contact manager?
Unfortunately—according to numerous studies—when implementing technology programs, advisors failed to meet their business objectives between 60% and 70% of the time. The reason is rarely technical.
Rather, the main reason advisor technology initiatives fail is because there isn’t a process in place that interprets a vision and puts it into a plan, where everybody understands the goals and their role, and the people have the resources to succeed. It’s interesting to note that most projects do not fail because of lack of time, money, or technology. Rather, it’s lack of process.
