Advice businesses integrate AI their way

Advice practices and licensees are taking varied approaches to innovation with some investing in education and structured programs, while others support the rollout of file note capabilities as their first foray into AI.

Those more progressed with AI are leveraging RPA which has become an area of considerable experimentation and growth.

Vital Business Partners (VBP), which supports over 260 firms and employs 1,200 staff in the Philippines, is partnering with a growing number of advice practices to leverage this capability to deliver key efficiencies.

“It’s AI, just not the AI everyone talks about,” said Nathan Jacobsen, CEO VBP.

Licensees are early on their AI journey

Fitzpatricks Advice Partners has created a panel of AI champions to help inform the group of what is available in the market. It is also sending a group to the Australian Graduate School of Management to deepen their understanding of AI.

General Manager of Advice Jasia Fabig said the disparity in the willingness of advisers to adopt AI, makes it challenging to take a uniform approach.

“We’re just trying to get advisers to use copilot or similar, to do file notes, and we still have some advisers who are reluctant because they think that it’s not accurate enough for them.”

A focus on guidance and practical support

Entireti is focused on safe, practical applications such as AI-assisted file note drafting, making it clear that advisers are responsible for this content. They’re also experimenting with prompt libraries and avatars, but cyber incidents are also high on their radar.

“We are trying to give them the right guidance and support and to allow safe use, because everyone is testing and learning a little bit on this one and we’re just trying to get really focussed on practical applications for solutions,” said Nick Hilton, Executive General Manager Advice Delivery, Entireti.

It is also considering AI from the perspective of its licensee management function, which like the advice process, involves several repeatable tasks. AI could enhance the way the licensee is run but also drive down licensee fees.

A safe space to test, learn and share

HUB24 takes a test-and-learn approach, prioritising governance and transparency. It has embraced open-source models like Llama, Microsoft Phi-4 and LG’s EXAONE to meet potential regulatory requirements around transparency, privacy and data storage.

“Microsoft has been brilliant at publishing what goes into their models,” said Dr Evan Morrison, Head of the Innovation Lab at HUB24, highlighting the need for transparency.

Sharing ideas and insights, naming the systems it uses for standardising control framework, and admitting to ‘whoopsies’ or where it could have done testing better, are also key to HUB24’s AI approach.

For this reason, HUB24 focuses on working with network partnerships and external vendors to get exposure to the experience they can provide.

For most of the industry, such safe experimentation and testing is out of their realm.

“There’s a whole lot of advice practices that probably aren’t going to do anything and thinking, we’ll wait for the platforms to catch up to Microsoft and the Googles, and they will come through with some really interesting solutions,” said Jason Entwistle, Director Strategic Development, HUB24.

Automating with purpose

The right level of automation varies from business to business.

Yarra Lane CEO Nicholas Perrett believes automating Statement of Advice (SOA) production may not align with how some firms showcase value, who prefer to retain the personalisation and brand opportunities it provides.

However, Fabig suggests clients may not expect or want, that level of manual control.

“I feel like we’ve put lots of effort into it and it’s got to look and feel a certain way, but that’s not necessarily how the market wants that type of commodity delivered.”

AGS Financial CEO Paul Bolstad agrees and believes current attitudes to AI is how many advisers used to think about Separately Managed Accounts (SMAs), that they took away some of the value they traditionally delivered as investment advisers.

“If you have a robust investment team the efficiencies of using SMA’s is huge. The advisers job moves from putting together the client’s portfolio to explaining and educating the client on the reasons for any changes.”

He said this shift is a ‘big time saver and efficiency gain’, similar what can be gained from rethinking approaches to SOAs.

“Most clients aren’t interested in all of the detail within an SOA. They just want to know what advice is being provided.”