82,853
edits
Onboarding: Difference between revisions
no edit summary
Amwelladmin (talk | contribs) No edit summary |
Amwelladmin (talk | contribs) No edit summary |
||
| (One intermediate revision by the same user not shown) | |||
| Line 8: | Line 8: | ||
===Design thinking=== | ===Design thinking=== | ||
For all the millions that firms spend on rearchitecting their onboarding systems — the philosopher-kings of [[operations]] who have transcended | For all the millions that firms spend on rearchitecting their onboarding systems — the philosopher-kings of [[operations]] who have transcended the [[service line]] will wheel out a strategic remediation initiative, every 18 months or so, but somehow nothing ever changes — a few foundational questions seem resistant to even being asked. Such as: | ||
====What is the ''point'' of onboarding'''?==== | ====What is the ''point'' of onboarding'''?==== | ||
It not only resembles a production line but ''is'' one. You are manufacturing a product for delivery to your client. But your revenue profile is different: you don’t make your money upfront, but only once the client has its product. You are selling a ''relationship'', not a ''chattel''. This means: | It not only resembles a production line but ''is'' one. You are manufacturing a product for delivery to your client. But your revenue profile is different: you don’t make your money upfront, but only once the client has its product. You are selling a ''relationship'', not a ''chattel''. This means: | ||
*'''Cut out the [[waste]]''': You want the onboarding process to be as quick, efficient, pleasant and commoditised as possible. Here the [[Toyota Production System]] that spawned lean manufacturing techniques is a hearty analogue, and we commend our [[seven wastes of negotiation]] article. But note ''efficiency'' — in [[Taiichi Ohno|Ohno]]-sensei’s lexicon, '' | *'''Cut out the [[waste]]''': You want the onboarding process to be as quick, efficient, pleasant and commoditised as possible. Here the [[Toyota Production System]] that spawned lean manufacturing techniques is a hearty analogue, and we commend our [[seven wastes of negotiation]] article. But note ''efficiency'' — in [[Taiichi Ohno|Ohno]]-sensei’s lexicon, ''muda'' ([[waste]]), not ''cost'', is the watchword. If you save cost but introduce inefficiency — ~''cough''~ [[outsourcing]] — then you are getting it wrong. Most people are getting it wrong. | ||
*'''Build for the Future''': Your optimal outcome and your client’s is the same: ''years of trouble-free motoring''. Over the years your relationship will grow and the environment in which you do business will change in utterly unfathomable ways. You cannot anticipate these developments, but you can plan for them: design your relationship documents to be standard as possible, as simple as possible, as uncomplicated as possible, and as flexible as possible. | *'''Build for the Future''': Your optimal outcome and your client’s is the same: ''years of trouble-free motoring''. Over the years your relationship will grow and the environment in which you do business will change in utterly unfathomable ways. You cannot anticipate these developments, but you can plan for them: design your relationship documents to be standard as possible, as simple as possible, as uncomplicated as possible, and as flexible as possible. | ||
*'''Design in ''interoperability''''': Design for the positive development of your relationship in directions you didn’t expect. Make your documents as adaptable as possible. Your client may open its business in New York and then wish to move to Europe. It may start trading FX and move to equities. Have a platform that allows a client to quickly add services, or switch. | *'''Design in ''interoperability''''': Design for the positive development of your relationship in directions you didn’t expect. Make your documents as adaptable as possible. Your client may open its business in New York and then wish to move to Europe. It may start trading FX and move to equities. Have a platform that allows a client to quickly add services, or switch. | ||
| Line 19: | Line 19: | ||
But, but, but — why must it be that our onboarding process does nothing ''but'' obsess about disaster scenarios? We know of cases where even affiliated broker-dealers — entities under common control in the same financial services group — have laboured for ''years'' to conclude a simple [[Global Master Securities Lending Agreement|stock lending agreement]], horns locked over the [[indemnities]] each required of the other, neither side advertent to the fact that the risks between them would be reported at a consolidated group level anyway. | But, but, but — why must it be that our onboarding process does nothing ''but'' obsess about disaster scenarios? We know of cases where even affiliated broker-dealers — entities under common control in the same financial services group — have laboured for ''years'' to conclude a simple [[Global Master Securities Lending Agreement|stock lending agreement]], horns locked over the [[indemnities]] each required of the other, neither side advertent to the fact that the risks between them would be reported at a consolidated group level anyway. | ||
And when it comes to actual clients, every element of the onboarding process is arrayed ''against'' the client as if, until proven otherwise, each should be taken as a dissolute money-laundering gambler and fraud who will stop at nothing to subvert your legitimate interests in making a fair return out of your relationship. Now, look: the [[JC]] is | And when it comes to actual clients, every element of the onboarding process is arrayed ''against'' the client as if, until proven otherwise, each should be taken as a dissolute money-laundering gambler and fraud who will stop at nothing to subvert your legitimate interests in making a fair return out of your relationship. Now, look: the [[JC]] is not naïve enough to believe there are no institutions like that in the ecosystem. There certainly are. Most of them, in fact: we assume a broadly Hobbesian view of human nature in the wild, and wish others would too. | ||
And are [[salespeople]] wilfully blind to the risks of intercourse? As a randy goat. A whiff of a sales credit can suspend the most foundational disbeliefs in a heartbeat. But that is not the point. The point is that, even against such bounders and cads, a mute legal document — especially one you hammered out nineteen years ago and haven’t looked at since — ''is no kind of protection''. [[Don’t take a piece of paper to a knife-fight]], that is to say. ''Take a knife''. Your practical risk is best managed by, well, ''actual risk management''. | |||
This is what half of your employees — the control function — are engaged to do, after all. ''Let them''. Intraday risk is best managed by relationship management: margin, credit lines, client communication — to ''avoid'' cataclysmic meltdown, rather than by sleep-walking into it and then looking to an arsenal of weapons you prepared a decade ago to wax your client. Think Chernobyl: by the time the core explodes, ''it’s too late''. | This is what half of your employees — the control function — are engaged to do, after all. ''Let them''. Intraday risk is best managed by relationship management: margin, credit lines, client communication — to ''avoid'' cataclysmic meltdown, rather than by sleep-walking into it and then looking to an arsenal of weapons you prepared a decade ago to wax your client. Think Chernobyl: by the time the core explodes, ''it’s too late''. | ||