Innovation News Items

Adjusting Advisor Mindsets & Scaling Practice Mgmt with latest Learning & EduTech tools

Bill Hortz's picture
Practice Management Leaders invited! - Please register for your Practice Management 3.0 Mastermind Group call set for this Friday 6/29 at 12noon ET here -https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/3871607332015143427 -    If you can't personally make the call, please feel free to designate someone from your practice mgmt team to sit in on our meeting. Feel free also to invite other practice management leaders and supporters to join us! 

 

Guest speaker is Zsolt Ola - an innovative Learning&Development professional and author of "Engage the WorL&D". He has expertise in  e-Learning, microlearning and workforce curriculum development with a background in engineering and instructional design. Here is his YouTube intro: https://youtu.be/eIYagyCQ-Xg    I shared with him some of the financial services practice mgmt leaders challenges in working with our population of advisors, mindset issues, and your scaling needs. Zsolt will be sharing with us the latest advancements in learning design and technology and, most importantly, sharing a few cases studies of similar populations with the techniques and results they successfully applied. These learning tools can help to prepare your group of advisors for the future, changing advisor' attitudes from "I don't need learning. I've been doing this for a while" to "wow, I never knew you can do that!".

 

  We will also provide a brief update from our last call on the following new partners and practice management initiatives for 2018: 
Your NASDAQ.com content contributor opportunity 

 

  new #PracticeMgmt hastag and practice mgmt leadership promotion every Friday on Twitter 

 

  New Practice Mgmt Survey with Financial Advisor and Cannon Financial

 

  Successful FinTech Practice Mgmt and entrepreneurial training tools being collected for you  
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Day 2 Report on the 2018 Ultimus Fund Solutions Conference

Bill Hortz's picture

Ultimus Fund Solutions - one of the largest, independent mutual fund services and middle-office technology providers for RIAs in the country - conducted a full day of informative sessions and panels for their asset management clients yesterday at the beautiful art deco Hilton Cincinnati Netherland Hotel.

The conference theme of Momentum was articulated in the welcome remarks by Bob Dorsey, CEO & Managing Director of Ultimus. He emphasized that to build and maintain momentum in your business, you need to realize that it is a dedicated, long term, multi-year process. You cannot take a few steps and believe it will create immediate success. He illustrated his points by describing the steps that Ultimus took to grow and build the momentum of the firm.

Day 2 of the Conference had twelve different general and breakout sessions with industry experts covering the most important trending topics in the asset management industry covering the compliance, regulatory, tax, cybersecurity, distribution, fund governance, and technology areas.

Some examples of discussions included:

Dina Tantra from Ultimus, Mike Wible from Thompson Hine (Managing Partner - Columbus office) and Marty Burns from the ICI (Chief Industry Operating Officer) discussed regulatory hot topics like the anticipated proposal for an ETF Rule and the recent SEC rule proposals on best interest standard for broker-dealers with retail customers and the standard of care level for investment advisers. On the latter they encouraged Investment Advisors to comment and to stay tuned for clarifications on a very complex and confusing set of proposals.

Todd Cipperman, Principal of Cipperman Compliance Services reviewed his list of top 10 compliance trends in the industry and provided 10 action items for asset managers to best position and protect themselves from the recent trend in regulatory actions.

Adam Kornegay and Jace Schuppan of Ultimus led a panel discussion on the use and business applications for asset managers on different fund structures including private funds, CITs, interval funds and retirement share classes.

Kevin Guerette from Ultimus led a panel of money manager analysts which included Andrew Miller of JPMorgan, Andrew Kitching of Commonwealth, and Ted Finlay of Fifth Third Bank to discuss their investment due diligence process on asset managers and requirements to get on their investment platforms.

The day was capped off with a networking reception and dinner for guests at Paul Brown Stadium on the Cincinnati waterfront.

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Day 1 Report on Ultimus Funds Solutions 2018 Conference

Bill Hortz's picture

Ultimus Fund Solutions - one of the largest, independent mutual fund services and middle-office technology providers for RIAs in the country - kicked off their 2018 Client Conference yesterday by inviting their asset management clients to their headquarters in northern Cincinnati.

After a welcome luncheon and tour of their facilities, a number of departments did brief presentations:

Bob Dorsey, CEO & Managing Director provided a quick update of major news -

Ultimus has closed an agreement to purchase Woodfield Fund Administration, LLC, a Chicago-based administrator specializing in hedge fund and private fund services. They currently have 58 clients, including 70 hedge funds and 61 private equity funds, for a total of 131 funds and $11 billion in assets under administration. Ultimus clients, investment advisers and fund managers are now able to access a complete range of services from one combined company, including a full suite of ’40Act, private fund, and middle office administration services.

Gary Tenkman has recently been promoted to President of Ultimus Fund Solutions. During his four-year tenure as COO of Ultimus, the firm has doubled in size, making them one of the largest independent mutual fund service providers in the country.

The goal of Ultimus when founded in 1999 by Co-Founders Bob Dorsey and Mark Seger was to be the best administrator in the country with a cornerstone of exceptional client service. The firm is proud to have won the #1 best administrator recognition by the Global Custodian Industry Leaders Award for the past 3 years in a row. As the firm grows, Bob pledged to continue this commitment to be the most trusted business partner to investment advisors and fund families by providing a highly valued suite of professional services and exceptional customer service.

Other presentations reviewed achievements and future plans from the tax, fund administration, fund accounting, compliance and transfer agency departments.

Common themes emerged that included:

1. The dedicated use of technology to achieve straight through processing freeing up personnel to do more analysis and less data input functions.

2. Development internally and with vendor partners on building APIs throughout the firm so all systems are able to talk to each other.

3. Firm has grown by purposely bringing in highly experienced professionals in all areas of the firm.

4. All departments in Ultimus are organized as teams and work in a collaborative way across departments which allows knowledge sharing and helps with talent retention through fostering comaraderie and a an active learning environment. 

So at Ultimus everyone and everything is talking and working with each other - from people to systems.

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Institute for Innovation Development Teams Up With FEI

Bill Hortz's picture

Tampa, Florida May 1, 2018 - The Institute for Innovation Development has been selected as the preferred provider of business innovation development services for The Financial Engineering Institute’s (FEI) network of over 2,200 wealth management professionals. 

“We are excited to add the Institute for Innovation Development to our Expert Sourcing Team,” said FEI President and Managing Partner, Nick Gregory, ChFE, CEBA, ChFWA. “With the accelerating rate of change in our industry, a strong understanding and creative application of business innovation resources are a growing necessity for wealth management firms to remain relevant and dynamic in addressing the changing needs and expectations of customers. The Institute’s ability to help develop and promote members’ business innovation efforts with their clients make them a natural fit for our team.” 

Bill Hortz, Founder & Dean of the Institute for Innovation Development, stated, “We are thrilled to add the Financial Engineering Institute to our Advisory Board to further explore synergies and invite their members and partners to explore our business innovation platform of top cross-industry business innovation consultants, FinTech companies, financial media partners, and active money managers with non-traditional investment approaches and business models. We are very honored to become an active member of FEI’s Expert Sourcing Team.” 

With this announcement, the Institute for Innovation Development joins an arsenal of best-of-breed expert sourcing firms to provide services to FEI’s network of wealth management firms, investment and insurance advisors, attorneys, and CPAs across the nation. The result is the fusion of advanced knowledge, experience, services, and products with sound engineering principles to create a synchronized hub for family and business wealth building. 

The Institute for Innovation Development is an educational and business development catalyst for growth-oriented financial advisors and financial services firms determined to lead their businesses in an operating environment of accelerating business and cultural change. We position our members with the necessary ongoing innovation resources and best practices to drive and facilitate their next-generation growth, differentiation and unique community engagement strategies. The institute was launched with the support and foresight of our founding sponsors - Pershing, Voya Financial, Ultimus Fund Solutions, Fidelity, and Charter Financial Publishing (publisher of Financial Advisor and Private Wealth magazines). For more information click here

The Financial Engineering Institute (FEI), headquartered in Tampa, FL, serves over 2,200 wealth management firms, investment and insurance advisors, Attorneys, and CPAs across the nation. FEI helps these professionals harmonize the complex wealth of families and businesses through the organization’s WealthBlueprintingTM Process. FEI is also the governing body and grantor of the Chartered Financial Engineer (ChFE) professional designation. For more information about The Financial Engineering Institute, visit thefei.com or call 888.884.3332.

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The Wealth Blueprinting Conference

Bill Hortz's picture

The Wealth Blueprinting Conference      

May 2-4, 2018

Innisbrook Golf Resort- TampaBay

Palm Harbor, Florida

Brought to you by  The Financial Engineering Institute

 

The Institute for Innovation Development highly recommends this unique conference which is designed to support advisors and managers of complex family and business wealth: multi-family offices, wealth managers, attorneys, CPAs, estate planners, investment and insurance professionals. With over 10 hours of continuing education credits, the conference will map out and help advisors synchronize their firms with the ecosystems of families of wealth and their businesses.

Topics to be covered include:

- Blueprint of the wealth management firm of the future

- Neutralizing "robo" with 6-dimensional asset management

- Converting taxable capital into charitable capital

- Embedding turnkey trust services into your practice

- Asset protection power tools

- Estate migration design techniques

- Business transition strategies & compensation design

- Engineering a OneTouch360 Family Wealth Dashboard

For more information: http://www.thefei.com/symposium (25% discounts for participants with select professional designations including AEP, AIF, CFA, CFP, CIMA, CLU, JD, etc).

Big discount for Institute members and friends! Special discount registration link here:  http://thefei.com/wbs299.php 

Plan to attend to better brand, position and differentiate your firm with HNW clients and their businesses!

Hosted by Nick Gregory, ChFE, ChFWA - Managing Partner and CEO of The Financial Engineering Institute

Contact for further questions: nickg@thefei.com

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