MIT research fellow Michael Schrage has mind-blowing thoughts on the future of advice

Between Now and Success

11-04-2016 • 1 hr 1 min

How well are you using advisor technology to automate your business, augment your work as an advisor, and segment and personalize the value you deliver to your clients? Have you thought strategically about your business model and how you use technology to support it in a profitable way?

In today's show, I chat with Michael Schrage, who is one of the world's most provocative thought leaders on innovation. He's also a research fellow at the MIT Sloan School’s Center for Digital Business, a columnist for Harvard Business Review, Fortune, CIO Magazine and MIT’sTechnology Review, and the author of multiple books. Perhaps no one knows more about how to maximize return on investment from innovation processes than Michael.

I first became aware of Michael nearly 20 years ago when I read his article, The Relationship Revolution. In the article he said we should think about technology as a way to enhance relationships, and not just a way to add value to information. It stuck with me.

Our conversation covers several topics including:

  1. How to align using advisor technology to automate, augment, and segment and personalize the work you do.
  2. The importance of figuring out your business model (e.g., a highly automated mass market model like Betterment, a high-end, hands-on boutique like AdvicePeriod) and how you use advisor technology to support it.
  3. How you can use advisor technology to gather information that leads to insight that allows you to deliver greater value with greater confidence to your selected clients.
  4. How advisor technology can deepen your client relationships instead of just "scaling" them.
  5. How to use data to optimize what's in the best interests of your clients.
  6. Why robo-advisors are not commoditizing investment management--despite what many people believe.