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Chuck Cavanaugh. (Photo: Citi)

Life Health > Life Insurance > Permanent Life Insurance

Clients Need Technology AND a Personal Touch: Citi Annuity Distribution Executive

By Allison Bell

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Chuck Cavanaugh sees himself as someone who cares about clients’ ability to live their best lives, both in good times and in bad.

Cavanaugh is director and head of Wealth Planning, Insurance & Annuity Distribution at Citi’s U.S. Consumer Wealth Management business.

He has a bachelor’s degree in biology from the University of Maryland and a law degree from Western New England University.

He entered the financial services sector in 1990 as an advanced planning attorney at Hartford Life. He later held positions in national accounts, product marketing and other areas at companies like A.G. Edwards & Sons; Allstate, Ameritas, Lincoln Financial, MassMutual and Morgan Stanley.

He joined Citi in 2017.

He answered questions via email about the financial services market, the distribution operation’s latest strategic moves and how he came to do what he does.

The answers to the questions in this interview have been edited.

THINKADVISOR: How did you enter the financial services world?

CHUCK CAVANAUGH: When I was younger, I believed I would be a doctor one day, due to my love for the sciences and helping people.

However, after college, I decided to go to law school instead, which drew me to a career in business, and, ultimately, planning and insurance.

Now, I can help a lot of people — not with their day-to-day health, but with the health of their personal finances. This enables them to live their best lives, provide for their families and take care of future generations. It doesn’t get much better than that!

What took up the most time and energy over the past year?

Bringing top talent to the Wealth Planning, Insurance & Annuity Distribution team has been a priority of mine over the past year.

We actively recruited for the fast-growing team and ensured that each colleague was equipped with the resources needed to feel supported and succeed.

This year we also launched a new tech platform, Covr, a digital insurance broker connecting insurance carriers and financial institutions.

The platform helps our financial advisors and clients more effectively integrate life insurance and long-term care coverage into their financial plans by providing access to many of the top insurance carriers available to them on a simplified basis.

Our financial advisors are now able to provide a broad array of insurance products to their clients directly through the easy-to-use digital platform.

What are you focusing on the most right now?

With the newly expanded team, I’m focused on driving collaboration and encouraging idea exchange among colleagues. By leveraging fresh perspectives and diverse mindsets, we’re able to improve our processes to enhance the client experience.

I’m also working with the team to ensure we have clear expectations and goals in place. This helps improve team engagement, and, when the team is fulfilled, we can build stronger, more positive relationships with our advisors and their clients.

What forces out there are helping, and what forces are hurting financial planning?

The volatile stock market, rising interest rates and worldwide political uncertainty are causing some investors to feel nervous about making decisions until the instability settles.

Financial planning is something that’s helpful in this situation and doing so with a trusted financial advisor is even better as they can take the client’s unique goals and situation into account.

According to the 2022 Insurance Barometer Study, 106 million adults in America lack life insurance or adequate coverage. Creating solid financial plans which consider the unexpected, like life insurance, can help clients achieve their financial goals and better prepare for major life events.

What do you think your market (or your specialty, or the world) will look like five years from now?

While financial planning has remained relatively consistent in recent years, we are starting to see a shift in how it’s managed. Digitization and technology will help the industry better serve clients and optimize processes to enhance our existing ways of working, but we must find the right balance between technology and personal touch.

By harnessing cutting-edge technology advisors will be equipped with a deeper level of knowledge on specific topics to further personalize plans to address clients’ unique goals. The ability to access this information quickly and efficiently will bring client service to the next level.

What, if anything, should readers or other players, such as industry groups, be doing to bring about positive change?

It’s important to create balanced teams with colleagues from diverse backgrounds to drive innovation and optimization.

Everyone brings a unique perspective to the table, opening the door for new ways of working and interpretation that can improve our overall performance. This is important to keep in mind when working with our clients as well — financial planning is not one size fits all.

Chuck Cavanaugh. (Photo: Citi)

Allison Bell

Think_Allison

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