Guest comment: No shame in client services
Process, process, process... or is something changing in the world of client services?
Chris Sevenoaks, consultant at recruitment specialist Finance Professionals City, considers.
Mention the phrase 'client services' and watch the enthusiasm drain from an audience's face. With due respect to those who work in this oft-maligned area of financial services, it's a job title which has suffered more than most from the assumption that those who have it are process-driven, without any particular depth to their technical skills or knowledge.
Worse, the belief persists that those in client services are either not talented enough to be 'near the investment process', or merely content to hover in the background, ensuring that client queries are answered without investment analysts or managers being unduly disturbed from their task of actually making money.
Harsh or fair? Well, whilst there's no denying that in certain environments client services more or less merits a less than effusive reaction, it would appear that something of a culture change is afoot.
Specifically, within asset management and absolute return investment management, the role of client servicer is not as straightforward as it once was, as evinced by the variety of titles the role can now engender. Take your pick from investor relations, relationship manager, client relationship (CR) manager, product specialist or business development associate - or, better still, at the more senior end of the market, choose your own title; more of that a little later.
From client relations to product specialism
Within larger asset management houses it's perfectly common for the CR individual to take a product specialist with them to client meetings, so that the more baffling investment options can be clearly and fully presented.
However, within absolute return houses, there is a growing expectation that the CR representative should have no need of auxiliary technical backup. Indeed, with the main objective of acting as the interface between the client and the fund manager, the individual will reasonably be expected to act as a de facto fund manager, allowing the genuine article to continue in his/her quest for alpha.
Successful investment/asset managers have some extraordinarily sophisticated investors these days and, as a result, it takes a sophisticated professional to deal with their enquiries and to proffer advice.
Some may describe this as 'advisory' whilst others may describe it as 'relationship management'. But, in the final reckoning, it is actually 'specialist' and, as the individual is prescribing product offerings to the client on behalf of fund and portfolio managers, it's fair to say that the role and title of 'product specialist' is inexorably on the rise.
So next time you flinch if you see a role described as 'client services', remember to look behind the semantics - yes, you might be providing a service to your clients, but there's a lot more to it than the phrase implies.
