Expect The Unexpected in 2021, Including Unanticipated Business Events

During the course of the year, a firm will undoubtedly encounter unique situations or unanticipated business events, further straining resources and bandwidth. Given today’s rapidly changing times, it’s inevitable.

Although these events often have a finite beginning and end, they are still disruptive, diverting resources and focus from your day-to-day activities and strategic pursuits. When firms are faced with an event that falls outside their normal business activity, they’re often time sensitive. It can also expose firms to increased risk if their existing systems and expertise may not be able to handle the irregularities.

Understanding the challenges

To successfully execute unexpected projects or disruptive events, business leaders will need to address the following questions:

• How will we resource the project and when do we need it completed by?
• Prior to the pandemic, we had sufficient resources and the time to execute additional projects – even an unexpected one; however, now we’re faced with a backlog of projects. How can our firm successfully navigate this event?  
• We already have a full plate of strategic projects, plus our day-to-day operations to consider. How will we prioritize a new, unexpected project? 
• How can we minimize the burden on our staff and infrastructure and return to our everyday business needs as quickly as possible?   

Outsourcing: your key to success  

Firms are increasingly outsourcing the project management and execution of these events to service providers. This allows firms to utilize the expertise of others, access to on-demand resources, reduce fixed expenses, and redirect resources as needed. By outsourcing their project, a firm can return to business as usual more quickly and easily.

What are the types of events that get outsourced? Events typically fall into four major categories:

• Notification and solicitation – when you need to tell your customers, clients or investors something. You may even need them to return a document or contact the firm. For example, a new regulation or acquisition/merger of your firm that requires extensive customer communication.
• Payment distributions – providing payments out to underlying customers related to a potential settlement or tender offer. Additionally, these events often entail a short-term increase in your call center activity stressing resources and negatively impacting response times.
• Response management – the event is triggered more organically as a result of something going on within the industry or the market or a regulatory notification. For example, a security breach requiring a comprehensive response communications plan, including sending notifications to customers and fielding phone inquiries.
• Document review – often related to a due diligence initiative or a remediation where records need to be reviewed, such as anti-money laundering (AML) or know your customer (KYC) review.

To learn more about the types of projects leading firms are outsourcing and why they’re choosing this strategy, download our case study booklet.

What to consider in an outsource provider

When considering an outsource provider, firms should take into account the following: does the provider have trusted resources, the proper systems and protocols in place to execute the event? Do they have a flexible staffing model that allows them to match resources to volume spikes quickly and easily? Do they offer multiple response channels, such as a call center, print mail, and custom web sites, to promote effective customer participation and the customer service your clients have come to expect?   

Turn to the expert: SS&C Flex

SS&C Flex has managed and executed events for many clients. Our goal is to allow clients to conduct normal business activities while we minimize the burden on client staff and infrastructure and comply fully with the event’s demands. The team has more than 30 years of experience helping investment firms, insurers and other financial institutions outsource extraordinary, disruptive events. 

SS&C Flex can quickly set up dedicated resources, technology and infrastructure separate from a client’s business systems. We can staff-up inbound or outbound call centers, coordinate mass mailings, and launch an interactive or informational web presence to communicate with interested parties. Additionally, we support due diligence initiatives, such as document review and remediation. We leverage our extensive financial industry expertise and a flexible staffing model to deliver comprehensive, project management and event response services.

Check back here for a future blog post, where we’ll look at some specific examples that show how we’ve helped firms navigate unusual events. In the meantime, the best time to learn about our services and capabilities is before you need them.

To learn more about how SS&C Flex can help your firm, download our brochure.