Collaboration key to leveraging AI and machine learning in financial advice

Greater collaboration across the Australian financial services industry is required in order to help financial advisers leverage the full potential of artificial intelligence and machine-learning technology, according to education provider Kaplan Professional and regtech pioneer Red Marker.

Matt Symons, Red Marker CEO, said there needs to be a mindset change in how AI and machine-learning tools can best assist the industry.

“It is important both dealer groups and vendors progress with realistic expectations, particularly around the ‘pre-work’ that needs to be done to ensure financial advice can become an ideal candidate for automated solutions,” Symons said. “If the financial services industry wants to increase the likelihood that effective statement of advice (SoA) review solutions emerge at a faster rate, then we need to come together and collaborate… working together is going to be key to developing highly reliable, automated review solutions.”

The two organisations said that before the industry could leverage AI and machine learning in financial advice, existing pre-conditions needed to be in place, including managing expectations, recognising the limitations in training data, and resolving diverging approaches to SoA construction, automatic programming language, and product comparison logic.

“Unless you have standardised inputs, you won’t have standardised outputs,” Symons said.

Brian Knight, Kaplan Professional CEO, said the industry should use the next 12 months to come up with “clearer and crisper” documentation and procedures.

“It needs to be down to the level where the industry can utilise these technologies to assist those on the frontline, while training the next generation and retraining existing advisers on their exact obligations,” Knight said.