As always, we had an excellent time at FSI OneVoice! We’re finally back to our usual daily routines, so we figured we’d look back and share the FSI OneVoice Conference Highlights from New Orleans.
First and foremost, we loved spending time with our current (and future) customers! The Docupace booth was constantly buzzing with awesome conversations between old friends and new contacts.
In particular, we were pleased to introduce our new President and COO David Ballard to our customers. He’s made customer success his number one priority, and getting facetime with so many Docupace users was invaluable.
CEO Mark Tapling and Chairman of the Board Michael Pinsker were also in attendance, and both were thrilled to see so many familiar faces at the conference.
Docupace also hosted a dinner at the award-winning Palace Cafe, which was both fun and delicious!
FSI OneVoice is one of our favorite conferences because the organizers always do a great job identifying which topics the industry is buzzing about. This year was no different, and our group got to attend some fascinating workshops and panel discussions.
Here are some of the key takeaways from those events:
Cybersecurity continues to be a hot topic.
There was a lot of technology talk at this year’s conference, and much of it came from the perspective of security and compliance. More than ever, wealth management folks want to know for sure that their information technology is safe, secure, and following all the rules.
With the SEC and FINRA both stepping up enforcement of data security regulations, cybersecurity is quickly becoming a top priority for C-level executives in the industry.
At Docupace, we’re staying on top of the cybersecurity wave as well. We recently announced a partnership with Entreda that integrates comprehensive cybersecurity monitoring and management software into the Docupace Platform.
Diversity is finally having its moment.
It was great to see more conversation happening around diversity in the wealth management industry. It seems like people are finally admitting to themselves that diversity promotes success. Case in point: one of the most-talked-about events from day one was the “Advancing Women in Leadership” workshop.
Digitization stragglers are catching up.
At Docupace, we deal in digital. Since our founding, we’ve been on a mission to eliminate paper documents from the offices of broker-dealers and RIAs, and in the past few years, others have come to share that goal with us.
That’s why it’s so surprising when we learn about firms that still haven’t pulled the trigger on digitization.
Taking the pulse of the conference, this much seems clear: everyone finally agrees that digitization is a must. Everyone wants to stop storing paper files and learn to onboard clients and advisors electronically in order to increase efficiency.
For the stragglers, it’s only a matter of time before they catch up.
Fewer vendors, please!
One of the more surprising takeaways from FSI OneVoice was the volume of the conversation surrounding vendor relationships. Topics on the schedule included vendor management and buying vs. building technology (spoiler alert: the answer is buy).
One of the central themes in these conversations was vendor consolidation; a lot of C-level executives expressed a desire to have fewer technology vendors on their roster.
That’s understandable. With technology becoming more important to the industry, many firms are having to manage 10, 15, or 20 separate technology providers. Each provider means new workflows, new points of contact, and new security concerns, and their products don’t always play nicely with one another.
One solution is to simply build your own technology solutions, but realistically that’s only available to the biggest firms. The rest are out looking for vendors that can solve more problems in one go.
Docupace is perfectly positioned to be that vendor, which is one reason the conference went so well for us. We can’t do everything a firm requires, but we can bring total vendor count way down. By offering one platform and one support process for automating document storage, client onboarding, advisor transitions, and more, we can help customers cross a huge number of items off of their digitization to-do lists.
As for the things we can’t do? We offer an open API and an ever-expanding list of integration partners to make sure the relationship between our tech and others’ is as seamless as possible.
That’s all for the annual state of FSI OneVoice address. You can find out about all upcoming events we’re hosting or attending on our News & Events page!
