Change. Innovation. Disruption. Adjustment. You get the picture.
I got double doses of this, and more, by attending the inaugural Wealth/Stack conference put on by Ritholtz Wealth Management and Inside ETFs recently in Phoenix and then the 25th-annual Women’s Symposium sponsored by Raymond James in Orlando.
The two gatherings had different demographics, venues, agendas and speakers, of course. But they had much more in common than you might imagine.
Sure, there were more men in jeans at one event and lots of women in colorful dresses at another, though that’s just their superficial side. These events both emphasized important lessons in broad topics such as leadership, inclusion, respect, technology, strategy and success, as well as insights into specific front- and back-office issues.
TD Ameritrade Institutional’s Innovation Chief Dani Fava was a keynote speaker at Wealth/Stack, for instance, and (as usual) she made the complex subject of artificial intelligence easy to grasp and fascinating.
Meanwhile, Salit Nagy-Todd — vice president of technology at Raymond James — joined three other women on stage in Orlando for a discussion about what tech tools are proving most advantageous for clients, advisors and wealth teams.
A Wealth/Stack panel included two people of color — Tyrone Ross Jr., CEO of 401 and Dasarte Yarnway, founder of Berknell Financial Group — as part of a brutally honest discussion about using social media to build your brand and grow your practice as “an influencer.”