How advisors can build more dynamic financial plans

Envestnet Inside WealthTech – First Command

Blake Wood: Welcome to Inside WealthTech. We're live here at Envestnet Elevate in Phoenix, Arizona. My name is Blake Wood, Head of Strategic Partnerships.

Joe Spatucci: And I'm Joe Spatucci, Strategic Relationship Manager. And with us, we've got a good friend and our partner, Mr. Tim Ryder, who is the Senior Vice President of Wealth Solutions, First Command Financial Services. Thank you, Tim, for joining us, of course.

Tim Ryder: Thank you for having me.

Interviewer: Yeah, excited to have you here.

So, first question. Give us the elevator pitch for First Command Financial Services. Unique perspective. I know that it's a very unique organization that we're working with, that we're partnering with. Tell us a little bit about the wealth management structure, a little bit about the pitch that you would give a person who wanted to know a little bit more about First Command.

Tim Ryder: So First Command has been around almost 70 years now, and we serve our nation's military, active military, and veteran families. And First Command's mission and unique opportunity is to serve, really, those who serve.

And so we are much like other investment firms in terms of the tools and capabilities we deploy for our clients. We're much like other investment firms in terms of the tools and capabilities we give our clients, but we're uniquely positioned to help them with the challenges that come with active military life or with veteran life.

Interviewer: Awesome. Love it, love it, love it.

And as you noted, First Command has a long history of serving military families, a client segment with a unique financial presence in that particular space, mobility, long-term financial planning, right?

How does that mission, I would say, help shape the way that you think about wealth solutions differently than a traditional retail wealth management firm in the industry today?

Tim Ryder: Yeah, I think that when you serve first responders or people that are in a position of service, especially when decisions made around some of those lives might not be their own, it fundamentally kind of reframes how you have to approach wealth management in some ways.

Some ways are just like everyone else, but as an example, a more traditional client might have a more linear path in terms of geographic relocation choices and college and future for children, whereas someone serving our nation may get deployed.

What happens when that deployment gets extended or when something happens to that family? They get relocated every couple of years.

And so planning today is dynamic, and that's why we've embraced MoneyGuide.

It used to be, so everyone in First Command gets a financial plan. We're a planning firm first.

And those plans, though, are not static. They're not paper, and they change quickly.

And sometimes, because of those events that happen in our clients' lives, we need to alter or shift those plans.

So I think the first thing that really comes to mind is that the dynamic approach that MoneyGuide gives us with clients allows us to adjust those plans as we go.

Interviewer: Makes complete sense.

So Tim, as wealth management solutions, I would say, become increasingly complex, which we all know they are becoming increasingly complex in our industry, right, from managed accounts to income strategies and alternatives, which we heard a lot about already this morning, how do you determine what level of sophistication generally to improve the client outcomes and risks that your clients will experience alike?

Tim Ryder: Yeah, it is a sophisticated industry, and you need to have sophisticated solutions in order to handle your clients' unique challenges.

But I guess from my perspective, sophistication isn't as powerful if it doesn't drive action.

And so you still need to find ways to make sure that your approach with clients is simple and addresses the needs they actually need taken care of.

And so the sophistication of the tools is intended to help make their life easier and simpler and allow them to accomplish the goals that they want.

At the same time, our approach is built around making clients' lives easier.

And so if the solution helps us make something simple for them, even if it's a sophisticated means by which their solution, their problem is handled, that's table stakes for us.

Interviewer: Well, you talk about making life easier, right? And what we've heard this morning obviously is around AI, artificial intelligence.

I mean, it's the buzzwords, right? It's kind of what we're hearing in the industry right now. Everybody's talking about that.

As we, I would say, handle analysis through AI and recommendations and even financial planning workflows, what becomes the advisor's most important source of value five years from now?

Tim Ryder: Yeah. I think that AI is going to be an enabler to help client interactions and solutions become more effective.

The advisor, if anything, becomes more powerful in my mind.

If you've been in this business for a while, you've seen a few ups and downs in the market. And like any of us, when the market goes down 30%, you want your advisor's empathy. You want their understanding of your family's life goals and the impacts that this creates.

So I think AI is going to bring out new insights. It's going to help us actually get predictive with clients, right?

I don't think that even client discovery will happen the same way anymore. I think that AI will help us find clients who need our services faster because of the way we can get predictive with it.

So I think it's an incredible tool, and it's going to become more powerful in this business.

But I couldn't be more clear that the advisor's relationship with the client will remain central.

Interviewer: Yeah. Yeah. I would agree with you.

So looking ahead, right, three to five years, how do you see wealth solutions evolving for advisors serving the mass affluent and even empowering high net worth clients today, particularly around personalization?

We hear, anytime Dana speaks, we hear about personalization, right? We hear about the retirement readiness for clients today and how your advisors can work with them with that holistic financial wealth wellness program.

What's your thoughts on that?

Tim Ryder: Yeah, I think that the client experience needs to remain as simple as it can be.

And you need to hear your clients and where they're trying to go.

I think now more than ever, we've gotten away from this traditional kind of path to retirement and what life looks like. It looks different for everybody.

And especially if you're in a position where you are moved to multiple locations, maybe deployed in different places around the world, you start a second career.

Now you have potentially concentrated equity positions that you need to protect because you're getting stock ownership in some of these companies that you're working with in a second career.

I think that wealth solutions will always need to be customized so that it meets the client's needs and much, to use the buzzword there, but it's up to firms and clients to keep that approach as simple as possible.

Because at the end of the day, the value that that advisor provides is knowing the client and their goals and dreams and establishing that relationship based on trust that a client believes that they are capable of helping them get where they're trying to go.

Interviewer: Makes a lot of sense. Great perspectives. Thank you.

And now the fun part, my friend.

Tell me about what you're reading and what you are watching that you'd like to recommend.

Tim Ryder: Oh, good. Yeah, good question.

I know you don't have much time to read, but on some of your flights.

Yeah, no. The name of the book is right on the tip of my tongue, and I apologize. Housel is the author. I'll have to look it up. But it's a follow-up to The Psychology of Money. And it's, the name, I'm freezing on it at the moment.

Interviewer: It's okay. It's okay. Sorry, guys.

Tim Ryder: I'm letting you down.

Interviewer: You gave us enough to look it up.

What about what are you watching? Anything cool? Any Netflix series? What are you watching?

Tim Ryder: I'm not.

Yeah. I mean, I'm sorry, guys.

Interviewer: It's okay. It's all good.

Look, I'm not a big TV watcher either.

Tim Ryder: Yeah. I'll record some Dateline and some stuff like that. But that's about it.

I'm more of a reader.

I mean, obviously, I keep up with our financial networks and what's going on, obviously, with the Fed and markets and earnings and where markets are moving.

But yeah.

Interviewer: Got it. Got it. Very good.

Let's jump into the last part of this segment here, the speed round segment.

We'll just bounce around, ask a couple of questions, quick answers, and wrap it up.

Sound good?

Tim Ryder: Sounds great.

Interviewer: All right. So we'll start off with client loyalty driven by trust or performance?

Tim Ryder: Trust.

Interviewer: I would say trust as well. Yeah. I think that's absolutely right.

Retirement readiness, numbers or behavior?

Tim Ryder: Behavior.

Behavior drives the right numbers. If the behavior is right, it drives the numbers.

Interviewer: Wealth solutions, more important to have simplicity or customization?

Tim Ryder: Oh man. How about simply customizable?

You need the personalization, but it needs to be a simple approach.

Interviewer: Very good. I like that.

All right. What's one piece of old wealth management that you'd throw out tomorrow?

Tim Ryder: One-size-fits-all portfolios and one-size-fits-all goals like retirement.

Interviewer: Love it.

In 10 years for advisors, getting that prospect and turn them into a client and a partner for life, are they going to be winning that over porterhouses or through podcasts?

Tim Ryder: That's also maybe a little tricky question.

I think podcasts are going to be definitely a greater source of engagement.

But I'm going to go back to the AI portion of the conversation and say that I think advisors are actually going to be better equipped to reach out to clients that they know need their services before they've ever been able to do that in the past.

So relationships will be built over porterhouses and ballgames and really client events themselves in their personal life.

But they'll be able to find them much more capably than they've ever been able to do.

Interviewer: Awesome. Tim, that's all we have for you today. Appreciate you stopping by and spending time with Joe and I this afternoon.

Tim Ryder: Thank you. Appreciate it.

Interviewer: Thank you, Tim.

Tim Ryder: Yeah. Thank you for the opportunity.

Interviewer: And that was Tim Ryder, Senior Vice President of Wealth Solutions with First Command.

And this has been Inside WealthTech.