Insights
Lessons learned: Building your high-velocity back office
While there’s a significant body of existing industry research focused on operational optimization, our four-part article series uniquely explores strategies for building speed into your back-office operations.
November 2024
Donna Milrod
Chief Product Officer
Institutional investors are focused on innovation as they navigate a challenging operating environment. At the same time, they’re under pressure to reduce costs and streamline operations. The solution? A high-velocity back office.
Putting it all together
Today, increasing competition in the investment industry and growing complexity in markets is changing the back office. Speed to market with new products is critical at a time when the lifecycle of a product is shorter, product innovation has accelerated, and the sheer volume of new products has increased. Firms that have not been focused on their back office should revisit its role as more than a support function. Instead, they might consider the back office as a way to achieve a sustainable competitive advantage.
To understand the latest back-office best practices, perspectives and performance, we interviewed a range of consultants and institutional investors. The culmination of our year-long independent research is brought together here in a four-part article series, Building a High-Velocity Back Office.
What we learned is revealing. There are three key steps for building a high-velocity back office: invest in data and technology, build in agility and scalability, and consolidate providers to achieve substantial savings. The details of these steps, highlighted by institutional investor success stories and insights from consultants, provide ideas for those looking to harness their back office for growth, and we hope they will be useful.
The research confirms that State Street is on the right track. We’re focused on developing new tech platforms and functionalities, and automating processes so that our clients don’t have to. Our product offerings, including State Street Alpha®, help clients manage their investment products and business lines in one place so their operations are agile and can readily scale. And, as a global asset servicer operating in more than 100 markets, across all asset classes, with a full range of products and services, we provide a one-stop shop for all our clients’ needs.
We encourage you to read this article series and engage with us on how to build a high-velocity back office.
What's new
The power of strategic consolidation
In the final article of our series focused on the back office, we speak with consultants about the latest trends in optimizing back-office operations, particularly around outsourcing. Their valuable insights center on the benefits of consolidating providers and developing more evolved provider relationships that not only lead to cost savings, but drive innovation across the entire firm.
Read other articles in the series
A view from consultants
As products face shorter lifecycles and the volume of new offerings rises, time to market is crucial. These trends highlight the need for firms to reassess the role of the back office.
Investing in data and technology
Gain valuable insight from investors who are several years into data and digital change programs, and learn more about how they’ve overcome data management challenges.
Scaling for success
In the third installment of our series, we look at ways to construct a more agile back office that can scale when needed.
