As wealth management firms evolve, it’s natural for their technology stacks to evolve with them. But when different advisors and teams are working across multiple financial planning platforms, that technology can make planning more complicated. At Sequoia Financial Group, we’ve seen how that can affect everything from training and efficiency to the consistency of the advisor and client experience. As we implement the consolidation of our planning technology, we are on track to streamlining advisor training, reducing duplicative work, and creating a more consistent planning experience across teams.

Simplify Training and Create Consistency

When you bring in younger advisors, it’s a real opportunity for them to learn from seasoned colleagues. But that can also create friction when your firm offers multiple financial planning tools. When a junior advisor learns from several senior colleagues who each prefer a different planning platform, they’re suddenly expected to become proficient in multiple systems. That makes training more complicated and can slow the team’s ability to work together effectively.

This can also lead to duplicated efforts. For example, a junior advisor or a member of the wealth planning team might build a client’s financial plan on one platform, only for a senior advisor to want it on another. Without clear upfront agreement on which system to use, you end up rebuilding plans, wasting time that could be better spent deepening client relationships. Standardizing on one platform allows firms to focus their training and support resources, establish consistent workflows, and reduce unnecessary rework.

Support Clients Across the Wealth Spectrum

At Sequoia, we’ve made an intentional choice to serve clients across the wealth spectrum, from mass affluent individuals to ultra-high-net-worth family office clients. That means supporting everything from relatively straightforward planning needs to the more complex requirements of ultra-high-net-worth families.

When your firm has multiple planning platforms, advisors have to bounce between different platforms that might suit one client segment but fail another. Consolidating to one platform that accommodates a diverse range of financial planning needs gives both advisors and clients room to grow.

The client experience benefits as well. When a platform can accommodate a broad range of planning needs, clients don’t have to move to a different system as their financial lives become more complex. When their needs grow from simple, goal-based planning to cash flow analysis, retirement planning, risk management, tax planning, and estate planning, we can provide greater continuity with a single financial planning platform. That creates a more seamless experience for the client while giving advisors a consistent view of their planning journey.

Make Integrated Planning Easier

An integrated approach requires us to understand the full picture of a client’s financial life. When advisors can work from a more consistent planning environment, they spend less time navigating between platforms and more time evaluating the decisions in front of their clients.

There’s also an important support benefit. Advisors are inevitably going to run into questions or situations where they need to go deeper. When you’re supporting multiple platforms, it’s challenging to make sure everyone can dig all the way into the weeds on every system. Ultimately, consolidating allows the entire team to go deeper rather than splitting its focus. That gives us a stronger foundation for delivering the integrated planning experience we want to provide for clients.

Start with Your North Star

Consolidating to one planning platform can simplify training, help advisors plan more effectively, and create greater continuity for clients as their needs evolve. For firms considering consolidation, I’d start by defining the experience you want advisors and clients to have. Then evaluate which technology best supports that vision. Change isn’t always easy, but having that clear North Star gives you something to come back to when you hit bumps in the road.

If your firm is thinking through these same challenges, I recommend reading Transforming Financial Planning with Unified Technology. This eBook takes a closer look at the benefits of consolidating your planning technology and what a more unified approach can mean for your firm.

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