Why the branch of the future should still be about people, and less about technology

When I started in this business in the early 1990s, banks and other financial services firms occupied some major real estate all over the country.

Anyone who walked down Fifth Avenue in Manhattan at that time probably recalls the massive branches on nearly every corner. Even in the suburbs, where urban sprawl led to a ton of new housing developments, bank branches were popping up like gas stations.

The landscape today has changed drastically. Clients don’t really need to spend as much time at brick-and-mortar branches as they did a decade or two ago. Pretty much everything they need to do can be done on their computer or smartphone. As a result, many of those stately downtown branches have shuttered or downsized, and several of those outside the urban core have been redesigned and repurposed.

But what about the wealth management industry? Branches in our business have never served that same transactional purpose. Should they be rethought and redesigned, too?

The answer is definitely yes! But how that looks varies greatly, depending on the firm and the business model.

Several wealth managers have decided to shift their client experience to a purely digital one, downplaying the role of their advisors and downsizing the physical space they occupy. Others have held on to their real estate and changed the look and feel of their offices, but not necessarily the experience for anyone working or walking into them.

I’d argue that what we at RBC Wealth Management—U.S. have ended up doing is the best model for both clients and advisors, even though we’re just now starting to roll it out in earnest.

I’ll be honest, many of our branches at RBC Wealth Management have long been in need of updating. Floor-to-ceiling oak cabinets, big bulky office furniture, and I think I’ve even seen shag carpeting somewhere. HGTV’s Property Brothers would seriously have a field day with some of our locations!

While we’ve done some refreshing here and there over the years – the shag carpet is thankfully now gone – we’ve been reluctant to do so across our footprint.

That hesitation isn’t because of the investment – which, by the way, is huge considering we have nearly 200 branches today. It’s because we knew it couldn’t just be cosmetic. Without knowing what purpose our branches would serve in the future, an enterprise-wide remodel just didn’t make sense.

But now we know.

While some of our competitors were doubling down on technology at the expense of their advisors, we doubled down on the client-advisor experience. We didn’t ignore the forces at play that led to the creation of robo-advisors, but we also didn’t accept that robo-advice was the only future.

Instead, we put our chips on a hybrid model centered around a digitally-enabled HUMAN experience. That model works not only for the way advice is delivered today, but it’s also one that is capable of staying relevant in the future.

I have a little note on my desk that I typed up for myself a few years ago that encapsulates that model and why it’s so important.

It says: “Being human is more important than ever before. People trust humans…Our differentiation is our relentless effort to improve the human experience.”

I have it sitting right in front of me every day to ensure that it drives every decision I make.

And it was sitting there when we decided to design our branches around the human experience between our advisors and their clients rather than around technology alone.

Modern, bright and welcoming from the moment clients walk in the building, they feature cutting-edge, interactive technology that enable clients and advisors to take a holistic look at a client’s financial picture and make real-time decisions about the future that clients can see and touch.

They are built with hospitality in mind, featuring common and private spaces that offer clients some of the comforts of home. They are places to actively explore a client’s needs, wants and wishes. They are places where tough conversations around end-of-life decisions, care for children with special needs or even succession plans for a business can be had.

We call them Wealth Centers, and they are designed specifically with the client experience in mind.

We’ve opened several already, including in Dallas, Chicago and San Francisco, and have a few dozen more planned for 2020. Only a handful will be brand new branches. Most will be renovations or refreshes, and for many clients the changes will be subtle in terms of what they see when they walk into their branch.

The difference will be in how they are able to connect with their advisor in a deeper and more meaningful way while they are in the branch and how they feel about their financial well being when they walk out.

RBC Wealth Management, a division of RBC Capital Markets, LLC, Member NYSE/FINRA/SIPC.