Mr. Misbah Baxamusa, Vice President - Sales, NJ Group
Mr. Misbah Baxamusa is the National Sales Head for NJ Wealth Distributor Network. One of the oldest in team NJ, he has over 16+ years of rich experience in the financial services industry. An MBA by education, Misbah is known for his deep understanding of the distribution practices and its challenges.
It is my pleasure to reach out to you at the start of the year. The past few years of the MF industry have remained phenomenal and each one of us has been aptly rewarded for our patience, perseverance and passion. Being the start of the year, I would like to share with you few thoughts for your consideration.
Let me start by throwing some light on the numbers. The Mutual Fund industry reached at an all time high AUM of Rs. 21.26 lakh crores at the end of the year 2017, a rise of about 30% over the previous year. SIP figures offer no exception, where the industry input value has crossed Rs. 6,000 crore mark. For NJ, we reached an AUM of Rs. 57,184 crores at the end of the year, a rise of about 68% over the previous year end. Our SIP book has climbed up to Rs. 640 crores (more than 10% of the overall market share) which is also more than 4 times the SIP book of Rs. 150 crore, that we had in April 2014. The kudos for these fantastic numbers go to all the partners and my colleagues in Team NJ. It's your hard work and efforts for where we are today.
Numbers look good but is there anything beyond these numbers that we should be looking at?
I would like to talk about the opportunity which is yet to be unearthed. The industry numbers are thrilling undoubtedly, the percentage growth is magnificent, but they are nowhere near the true potential of the industry. Whether we see the AUM as a percentage of the GDP, or the share of household savings into mutual funds, or the number of investors investing in mutual fund vis-à-vis the population; the figures are modest. Adding to the case the impact of the expected growth of the economy, the demographic dividend, rising awareness, etc., we can say, “the growth has just begun”.
It's time to celebrate our success, but at the same time not to be complacent with our glorious past performance, it's time to start Dreaming Big, set higher targets for yourself and prove your mettle in times to come.
Let's Make An Honest Start
The dawn of the new year is an opportunity for us to think ahead, plan ahead and to Dream Big. That's the first mantra I have for everyone at the NJ family.
Now Dreaming Big is not enough, We have to act too. And the right way to go about doing that is by 'Starting Small' – the second mantra. You need to breakup the big vision into a simple step by step action plan, where you identify the smaller things that sum up to actualizing your big vision.
Discipline, Hard Work and Patience are the keys to success. You may have your goals in place, a plan in place but if you do not have the discipline to execute them, everything may fall apart. 'Act Daily', is the final mantra. Be at it, do what is required with regularity and with discipline, every time as it is the first time. Actions will become habits and habits will shape your character and it is a person's character that becomes his destiny. Destiny comes before discipline, only in dictionary, remember that.
After these three Mantras, let me share with you two Sutras too.
First, don't try to just stay relevant or keep your presence meaningful in the market. I would want each one of us to 'Stand Out'. Let us not be satisfied with being good when we can be great and fantastic. Let us stand out as to who we are and what we represent. Let us stand out to get recognised and respected. And most important of all, let us be an “Elite Adviser”
An Elite Adviser
We came across a study on the time allocation of an Average advisor vis-à-vis an Elite advisor between important business activities. The results were not surprising and something that we truly believe in. Have a look at the below graph and you will get the idea.
Source: www.iris.xyz
The message is very clear. Spend more time with Clients! Be it acquisition or interaction, Elite advisors have dedicated about half of their time to their clients. The Average advisors spend a paltry 1/4th of their time with their clients.
Another big difference is in the amount of time spent in areas like Research, Portfolio management and Operations. It is interesting to note that an Elite advisor spends only a fourth of the time spent by Average advisors on back-office, admin and operations work. This is a huge difference, the time which is given to Research and Portfolio management by an Elite advisor is only 11% as compared to 24%, given by an Average advisor.
This brings me to the final and the most important part of my message.
Being associated with NJ, you are in every position to match the figures of the Elite advisor. It is important that in our journey to become an elite advisor, we need to ensure that we start spending more time with clients while reducing time that goes into operations, research and portfolio management.
Embracing e-wealth full fledged would considerably reduce the time we spend on back office management and customer service. The advantages and benefits of e-wealth are innumerable and have been talked about often by me and my team at every platform and you all must be familiar with the same by now.
For reducing the time and bringing in efficiency in Research and Portfolio management, it's time to embrace MARS. MARS as you are aware offers 15 customized portfolios, out of which 10 are Static allocation portfolios, 3 Dynamic asset allocation portfolios, MARS Balance Portfolio and a recently launched MARS SIP portfolio. Most of the investor risk profiles and investment needs would be met from within the range of the portfolios which are available under MARS. We just need to understand the risk profile of the investor and his investment need and give him a suitable MARS portfolio. Annual rebalancing feature of MARS ensures periodic automatic review of your client portfolio.
The flagship portfolio of MARS, the Aggressive Dynamic asset allocation portfolio has got very good response and so has the recently launched MARS Balance portfolio.
Embracing e-wealth and simultaneously moving towards MARS would considerably reduce the time that goes into back office management, customer service, research, portfolio management, and hence will leave you with enough time to spend with and acquire clients, it would allow you to efficiently acquire and manage a much larger portfolio of investors.
Friends, that is all I had to say. For those who find my message a bit overwhelming, let me say it clearly – it is not. Our vision, our decisions and our actions starting today will dictate our destiny in times to come. Let me end by thanking the almighty for everything he has bestowed upon us. We are fortunate to be living in the right country, at the right time and working in the right industry. Let us make the most of it! Thank you!