Charlie Phelan of Fidelity Investments - Levers of Growth for Wealth Management Firms

Nov 26, 2024

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Today, Rusty and Robyn are joined by Charlie Phelan, Head of Business Consulting at Fidelity Investments. Mr. Phelan leads consulting and business development activities focused on helping clients leverage Fidelity to evolve their businesses and drive transformational change. Charles consults with broker-dealers and registered investment advisors on optimizing their businesses including development and execution of business strategy, leverage of technology and operational best practices to drive efficiency. Charles has a demonstrated track record of helping firms maximize the ROI of the Fidelity relationship. Mr. Phelan has over 20 years’ experience in financial services, primarily focused on new business development and consulting. Prior to his current role, Mr. Phelan was responsible for leading the client onboarding team at FCCS. This included oversight of program management, transition and implementation activities to support new business. Mr. Phelan joined Fidelity in 1995 as part of the finance team. Mr. Phelan also held roles in risk management, information security and as a project manager where he was responsible for leading strategic client projects. He began his career in private banking at Bank Boston.

Key Takeaways

[04:08] - Charlie’s professional background and more on his current role at Fidelity.
[05:24] - How should firms think about a baseline for growth at a macro level?
[07:10] - What does high performance for a wealth management firm look like?
[08:40] - For the fastest growing firms, how much of this growth is from mergers and acquisitions activity?
[11:39] - What are the four levers of growth that their research uncovered and what do these mean in practice for firms and financial advisors? The first of these levers is people. What did their research uncover about people and how do “thrivers” and “survivors” differ?
[14:28] - What are some considerations for firms that help to create teams that thrive?
[17:14] - The second lever to help grow wealth management firms is their platform. In this light, what is separating the fastest growing advisory firms from the rest?
[18:38] - What are some of the strongest advisor-based technology platforms and tools? Also, where is Charlie seeing the most demand for Fidelity’s capabilities?
[20:02] - What might AI mean for the wealth management space and what are some of the biggest opportunities around AI today?
[24:04] - What are some of the market opportunities that are upcoming with the massive generational wealth transfer looming? What should advisors be doing to prepare?
[24:40] - What are Charlie’s clients doing to capitalize on this huge generational wealth transfer opportunity?
[26:08] - What are some examples of firms aligning their offerings with client needs as they evolve?
[28:58] - What is currently Charlie’s favorite investment idea?

Quote

[23:10] - “One in five women change advisors after a death or a divorce, so if either of those two things happen on the life event side, they are changing their advisor. Also, [it] is estimated that 91% of adult children found an advisor without even considering the one that their parent’s used…This one was most interesting to me…we found that advisors have only reached out to 13% of their clients’...children.” ~ Charles Phelan

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