As investment platforms face near-constant technological change, advisers and clients alike demand progress that is both cutting-edge and reliable. Drawing on lessons from NASA’s Voyager missions and the wisdom of Carl Sagan, Novia Global’s Linda Johnstone explores why platform providers must navigate between inertia and impulsiveness, ensuring innovation is purposeful, efficient, and enduring, but most importantly to be fully aligned with what advisers and clients actually want.
If you ever want a reminder of both the brilliance and the pitfalls of technological progress, look no further than NASA’s Voyager missions. Launched in 1977, these twin spacecraft were sent to explore the outer edges of our solar system – and possibly venture even further.
Since there was a chance they might encounter other intelligent beings out there, both Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 carried a message from Earth. It consisted of a collection of sounds and images capturing life on our planet, complete with greetings in more than 50 languages.
And how was humanity’s grand introduction to potential alien civilisations packaged? On a record.
It may not have been an actual vinyl record – it was gold-plated – but it was still closely related to the LPs we all used to play on turntables. This represented the cutting edge back then.
Today, of course, such technology seems almost as distant as the Voyager probes themselves. It is a perfect example of a truth that is even more relevant now than it was 50 years ago: technology never stands still. What is revolutionary one day can be outdated the next.
The sphere of investment platforms offers a classic illustration. Our industry has become home to near-relentless innovation – some of it purely tech-driven, some shaped by regulatory requirements and some a response to the needs of advisers, their clients and other stakeholders.
Finding the right balance
How should we react to all this change? In tandem, how can we ensure it is positive, manageable and conducive to good outcomes? In my view, we need what one of the principal architects of the Voyager project, astronomer and cosmologist Carl Sagan, famously called “an exquisite balance”.
In The Demon-Haunted World, his 1995 New York Times best-seller, Sagan wrote: “If you are only sceptical then no new ideas make it through to you. If you are open to the point of gullibility and have not an ounce of sceptical sense in you then you cannot distinguish the useful ideas from the worthless ones.”
I think this is where the platform arena finds itself now. In the face of so much innovation and change, it is becoming tougher – and more important – to separate what is truly valuable and lasting from what is just noise or a passing fad.
Between inertia and impulsiveness
The number one consideration here is what advisers and their clients actually want. In my experience, above all, they want efficiency and speed of execution – both of which are absolutely central to excellent service.
Needless to say, it is hard to maintain such attributes by doing nothing. Platform providers that stubbornly resist change of any kind are unlikely to survive over the long term, for the simple reason that they will soon be left behind by their rivals.
This is the sort of inertia Sagan was referencing when he warned against blinkered opposition to new ideas. The reality is that providers have to keep thinking differently if they want to stay ahead in an increasingly crowded and competitive market.
As Sagan also observed, though, it does not automatically follow that every purported advance merits attention. Many may result in inefficiency, less speed of execution and reduced service.
This is because change is never simple. Platforms that are willing to “make do and mend” will quickly fall off the pace, but rushing too far ahead of the curve can be just as risky. The real challenge is finding the right mix – investing and evolving continuously while still moving forward with care and purpose.
Measured progress is key
Advisers and their clients rightly expect their platform of choice to be near or even at the cutting edge. This is why many are expressing growing fears over the use of outmoded, suboptimal technology.
Yet they also rightly expect their platform of choice to have total confidence in its own capabilities. They are not drawn to untested technology or change for the sake of it. They want progress that feels measured – innovation that is backed by expertise and insight, improvement that is guided by feedback and rooted in stability.
There are still plenty of providers that advocate clinging to the past. Against the tumultuous backdrop of the AI boom, there are many more that are fierce proponents of “the next big thing”.
In my opinion, neither case is entirely grounded in informed decision-making. As Sagan also remarked: “I try not to think with my gut. If I’m serious about understanding the world, thinking with anything besides my brain is likely to get me into trouble.” Striking an exquisite balance really is the key.
Linda Johnstone is Novia Global’s Head of Investment Proposition.
