In the first of a two-part Q&A series, Steve Steffy, director of operations at Trilogy Global Advisors, a boutique firm and SS&C Technologies client, provides an update on his firm’s key IT implementations for operations.
(At the SS&C Deliver customer conference of SS&C Technologies in Las Vegas last month, FTF News got the chance to interview Steve Steffy, director of operations at Trilogy Global Advisors, based in Winter Park, Fla. An SS&C client, Trilogy describes itself as a specialist emerging markets equity boutique firm. Two years ago, the vendor published a case study that details Trilogy’s SS&C deployments over the years. The recent meeting with Steffy was an opportunity to get an implementation update on Trilogy’s deployment of SSCNet for data collection and SS&C Recon. In this first part of a two-part series, the focus is on the IT installations.)
Steve Steffy, director of operations, Trilogy Global Advisors
Q: What has changed since the case study was released?
A: Well, one of the things … is that we were using SWIFT to bring in our message types. We are no longer using SWIFT to do that. The custodians have really improved. Back when we were using SWIFT we were getting different types of transactions from each custodian.
We were only getting partial pieces of identifiers. One bank would have a made-up internal number, and another bank would use an ISIN [International Securities Identification Number], another bank would use a SEDOL [Stock Exchange Daily Official List].
We really didn’t need to try to map one security four ways, so SWIFT was great because SWIFT brought in ISINs, and everybody had an ISIN and it was very easy to map it out.
Since then, the custodians have a better deployment method where we can go to them and schedule the reports, where we can get the exact information we want, and bring it in at the times we want them to send it in.
Q: What is the new method? Is it an industry standard?
A: It’s FTPs [file transfer protocols]. We use FTPs with the custodians. And they’re encrypted. That’s important now as well.
Q: What is your relationship with SWIFT?
A: We use SSCNet to update our custodians and our fund accounting groups, so we basically let them handle the relationship with SWIFT. We do have a need from time to time to go through the SWIFT environment but again it’s based off of SS&C, so we do not have a SWIFT gateway. There are tons and tons of changes every year. … We’re not technology people anymore so we prefer to let those people handle it.
Q: What were some of the bigger lessons you learned from going through this process of deployment and installation?
A: One is garbage in, garbage out. I mean that’s a very common statement … If you don’t give me good data, I can’t give you good results. So that’s first — having good communication with your teammates … and my teammates are the vendors as well as my internal teammates.
When there’s a request for something, make sure that you know what the specifics are — know what you’re going to put in. Don’t just throw something against the wall and hope the other side will fix it. Work with them and get that done.
Have knowledgeable people, good training up front, and learn the system as best as you can with what you have, so that you can do your best to make the right decisions
We’ve done quite a few implementations in our time and sometimes [vendors will] come in and say, ‘Well, it’s up to you.’ But, if you don’t know the system, it’s hard for you to make the right decisions. So, it’s really having the vendor understand what you want.
Q: Is there anything I didn’t bring up that you feel is important?
Q: For the processes that we’ve built around the technologies that we’ve purchased from SS&C … we’ve been able to use the same amount of people to handle all situations. That’s been key in how we decide as firm what we’re going to do.
But the first things are always: how many people are you going to need and what is the technology going to do to help.
Q: Do you feel that the number of staff members is going to stay the same or do you feel it’s going to grow or shrink?
A: It allows us to do either. I don’t think we’re going to cut … It allows us to stay where we are as we grow and until we absolutely, positively need to make a change in that direction.
If you just have a person who has to just drag and click a transaction and then read the dashboard … it’s much different than if you have to have somebody come in at eight in the morning, go pull a file, bring it in, make sure it’s formatted correctly, send it on its way, and then manually type in transactions. We’ve eliminated all of those different steps.
Q: Have you had to re-train staff?
A: We will re-repurpose. So, what I can do is take a person and say, ‘Okay, since we can now do these different functions, I can have you now start helping the client service team with the reconciliations and show how when a client comes to gather something, how to go find it quickly and get it to them.’
So, we can repurpose and expand that way.
Q: Is the better option to keep the person and find out that he or she has talents in other areas?
A: To me, that’s the biggest benefit. I’m one that wants to have people experience more than one thing in their job, I like for them to go out and try new things and be able to have the chance and ability to do it.
So, from my perspective, if I can repurpose somebody — they know our company, they know our industry, they know our business — that’s always a bigger win than having to go out and try to find somebody to train and teach.
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