As Charles Schwab pushes forward on its plan to complete the conversion of TD Ameritrade onto Schwab’s platform over Labor Day weekend this year, there are several steps that advisors at TDA must take to “optimize” their businesses during this transition period, according to the consulting firm F2 Strategy.
F2 Strategy is in the middle of releasing an independent five-part Insight Series to support TD Ameritrade Institutional firms as they transition their technology to Schwab Advisor Services after Schwab completed its $22 billion acquisition of TD Ameritrade in October 2020, forming a brokerage firm with over $6 trillion in client assets.
The series began on March 2 with Part 1: Preparing Your Business for Change, which covered a variety of areas advisors need to attend to during the conversion and best practices to optimize their businesses during the transition.
The next installment, Part 2: Preparing for Operational Change, was posted on F2’s website on March 9, offering advice on preparing operationally for the change and providing a timeline and to-do list for firms undergoing the changes.
Part 3: Preparing Your Clients for Change, followed on March 16, and Part 4: Preparing Your Vendors for Change, followed on Wednesday. The final part is expected to be posted on F2’s site next week.
See the gallery for 12 actions that F2 said Schwab and TDA advisors should take amid the transition to one platform.
1. Clean house.
“Your conversion process is an AMAZING time to do some spring cleaning,” according to Doug Fritz, F2 CEO and co-founder, and Lisa Asher, F2 manager.
“Eliminate old, outdated processes that drag down efficiency or weigh on the client experience,” they said in the first part of the series. “Your goal during this conversion period should be to use your time wisely to come out of this conversion a better, more efficient and technology-adopting company.”
2. Figure out what you want to achieve and what must be done to achieve it.
“Have the courage to consider ditching the old tools that you’re used to in favor of the new, integrated ones,” according to Fritz and Asher. “There is a high likelihood that integration and ubiquity within the new custodian framework will outweigh specific tool functions you grew used to over the years.”
Specific areas they said should be addressed include workflow documentation and efficiency; new capabilities, like digital onboarding; data cleanup; and third-party integrations management.
3. Examine your holistic tech strategy.
Questions that Fritz and Asher said advisors should ask themselves include: “What does your client experience look like today and what could it look like tomorrow that would make it even better? … If you are considering a change to your technology, do so in a way that does not interfere with the conversion or add complexity where it may not be needed.”
Also ask if clients are using TDA’s AdvisorClient. “If so, why and how often?” they asked. Also: “Do clients have access to other client portals and if so, why and how often are they accessing those? Does this conversion give us an opportunity to consolidate the number of portals a client accesses and streamline their experience?
4. Manage the change.
“There are three areas of change management to address: internal processes, external client expectations and internal staff,” according to Fritz and Asher. “To manage change in each of these areas, firms should employ several tactics,” with the first one being “leadership centralization,” they said.
“To maintain maximum effectiveness for change management and progress quickly, centralize the process by appointing one team member or a small group of team members as the leader of this transition,” they suggested.
They added: “Top level accountability that can provide client and internal advisor perspective is a critical component. A chief operating officer or director of operations would be the ideal person for this leadership role.”