Guest Contributor: Christy Bremner, Senior Vice President and General Manager, SS&C PORTIA
The asset management industry returns to growth and becomes increasingly complex, firms are competing more so than ever on a global scale and seeking alpha from new sources. The SS&C whitepaper titled Now is the Time to Invest in Technology that Enables Growth and Performance suggests the question for most asset managers now is how do I prepare my business for growth and differentiate in a globally competitive marketplace?
Unfortunately growth can be limited by operational capabilities, as well as the underlying systems and technology that support operations. While investment teams must be able to change investment strategies quickly to react to opportunities, it can be far more difficult for operations to keep pace with business changes. Asset managers need to determine whether they can meet the growth requirements by examining their operations and the systems at the heart of their middle-to-back office technology ecosystem.
Whether systems and technology are “legacy” is not the pertinent question. Legacy is vaguely defined and implies years of operating experience is somehow bad when, in fact, asset managers benefit significantly from the functionality and capabilities that can only accumulate over time. Also, a proven track record is critical to reliability and predictability of services. What is important is the ability of your provider to support growth plans. To determine whether your firm is capable of meeting your growth needs, ask the following questions:
Are your systems able to easily keep pace with your firm’s growth and increasing operations volumes resulting from growth?
Are you expanding to other markets or countries, and can your operations accommodate expansion?
Do your systems provide enough flexibility to quickly address ad-hoc client requests?
Can your systems be easily customized to meet new operational requirements? Are you able to manage your system independently and cost-effectively as you grow?
If you answered ‘No’ to any of the questions above, your organization may be relying on systems that could get in the way of your firm’s ability to launch new products, enter new markets, optimize workflows, control costs and reduce human error and operational risk. Ultimately, all of these issues culminate in a larger problem – impeding your growth plans.
Core to a modern operations system are three features. First, it is critical that an operations platform can manage trade processing for global securities as asset managers seek growth and alpha internationally. Second, systems must provide visibility into and control over assets, including robust data monitoring and reporting tools. Finally, an operations solution is only effective if it is easily manageable. Systems should be easily implemented and not require custom coding to meet specific workflow needs. They should integrate cleanly into your existing infrastructure and be simple to use by multiple stakeholders. Ideally, you want to work with solutions providers who offer multiple ways to manage the system so you have options for how to accommodate growth. Top vendors offer deployed, hosted and outsourced solutions supported by dedicated and experienced staff, providing you flexibility tailored to your unique business needs.
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