AI could replace many of the tasks performed in entry-level work, but RBC WM’s Head of Training and Development sees opportunity
Businesses around the world are seeking applications for AI and finding them in traditional entry-level tasks. A Bloomberg study cited by the World Economic Forum last year found that artificial intelligence could replace up to 53 per cent of the tasks performed by market research analysts and 67 per cent of the tasks compared to sales representatives, while managerial tasks are far less threatened by AI. Hiring of new graduates has slowed in the US, too, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics. Experts and politicians have noted that AI’s relative applicability to entry-level tasks has made those first jobs in industries like financial services more scarce. Since many advisors begin their careers as bank tellers and call center workers, the question for this industry is how to train the next generation of advisors from a shrinking pool of entry-level roles.
Natacha Savard takes an intentional approach to advisor recruitment and training. The VP and Head of Training & Development at RBC Wealth Management Canada explains that advisory roles attract a specific kind of person, one who is willing and able to grow a business as an entrepreneur. Rather than viewing AI as a threat to her firm’s recruitment, retention, and training, Savard argues that RBC can use AI to help attract, retain, and grow the next generation of advisors.
“The intention is really, to find efficiencies on things like administration, summarizing meeting notes and research reports. If we find those efficiencies, I think it allows people to spend more time with the client,” Savard says. “I don't know that it will replace jobs. I hope it makes the jobs less administratively heavy and gives us an opportunity to hire talent that's more client facing.”
Speaking for RBC Wealth Management, Savard says that the firm’s investments in and application of AI is meant to help roles evolve to be more client focused, rather than replacing jobs entirely. She notes that her firm has focused on direct recruitment from universities, as well, with an advisor training program call the President’s Club which brings in between 100 and 125 new advisors every year for the past 75 years. What AI enables RBC Wealth Management to do, in Savard’s view, is give those new associates more time with the clients and less time dealing with administrative work.
Savard believes that AI cannot replace that client facing work in wealth management. While an AI bot might replace a website chat function or even the frontline functions of a call center, the relationship between a client and even a junior wealth management associate is built on a foundation of human understanding and trust. The complexity of serving a high net worth client, she adds, requires a level of emotional and practical intelligence that only human advisors can provide.
While human connection sits at the core of how RBC Wealth Management will continue to recruit and train, Savard notes that new generations of advisors are coming into practice well equipped with AI knowledge and expecting high quality AI tools. She notes that RBC’s investment in its own generative AI tools has helped with its recruitment drive among talented young graduates. As an increasingly AI-native cohort joins the industry, Savard believes that her firm’s Borealis AI tool can help convince those young people to become RBC Wealth Management advisors. However, she doesn’t lead with that tool in recruitment and training. Savard prefers to focus on the human side of the business and show her AI-native recruits how the tool can support that core goal.
RBC Wealth Management may be better positioned to maintain its talent pipeline than many other firms in Canada. The brand presence of RBC alone makes it a magnet for young talent curious about financial services. Savard argues, though, that her firm and others need to keep educating the next generation about wealth management and the careers they can build in this industry, no matter how many tasks AI eventually automates.
“It's no secret that in business schools, they talk about capital markets, investment banking, and those very specific types of roles, but very few young people graduating understand wealth management. They don't even know it exists,” Savard says. “I think we have to continue to be out there educating people because careers in wealth management are very rewarding.”
