The old proverb that the early bird gets the worm doesn’t apply to Calgary-based ATB Investor Services Inc., which has found that biding its time has resulted in steady growth and client satisfaction.

“We wanted to build a model that we’d feel safe putting our own money into,” says Sheldon Dyck, senior vice president and lead portfolio manager. “Something we could recommend to our friends and family without hesitation.”

ATB Financial, Alberta’s largest full-service financial institution, started ATB Investor Services in 2002 as a wealth-management arm. It now comprises four units: ATB Investment Services Inc., a mutual fund dealer; ATB Securities Inc., a securities dealer; ATB Investment Management Inc., which handles a high net-worth client base; and ATB Insurance Advisors Inc., a recently created insurance dealer. Since 2002, Investor Services’ assets have grown to more than $3.4 billion and it employs 125 advisors, five times its original staff.

“Starting later meant we could inspect other businesses,” adds vice president Michael Mezei. “A lot of our model grew out of our observations of what was good and what was not.”

Investor Services was able to build a model, learning from other institutions’ mistakes and its parent company’s successes. Since December 2002, it has been building momentum, while sticking to its foundations. Taking a page from ATB Financial, Investor Services promises first-rate customer service and the kind of experience a veteran client of the Alberta bank would expect.

“We measure success in three ways,” says Dyck. “Good shareholder returns, having employees who like working here and client satisfaction, which we measure right down to each advisor.”

Investor Services has focused on providing consistent results for its clients. The model concentrates on everything from communication to team work, which has meant investing time in continuous training and coaching for its advisors.

“Bad portfolio strategies spill over into bad communication and service,” says Dyck. “Our model helps. We ask our advisors to be brilliant at what they’re good at and have others to do everything else.”

Management has developed the Solutions Team, a full-scale research group that takes care of advisors’ inquiries. “By freeing up the advisors’ time, there’s more time for them to communicate with clients,” adds Dyck. “If you’re doing everything else, how much time are you going to have to pick up the phone?”

The practice standardizes the assistance offered, while giving advisors the time to deal with clients and get to the heart of their problems. It’s not the right system for everyone, however, and ATB is very careful in its recruiting process. Having a good fit within the company is very important, Mezei says, and prospective advisors go through an arsenal of tests to make sure they’re right for ATB.

“We’re very selective in our recruiting,” says Dyck. “We do things such as behaviour-based interviewing and character tests, because the investment knowledge we can train, but the attributes are far and away more important. Part of it happens naturally. The people who work well know others who’ll fit.”

In creating such specific criteria for potential advisors, Investor Services is creating a strong brand, which happily plays off the almost 70-year presence of ATB Financial in Alberta. That branding is considered in all facets of the business.

“Most important is maintaining the culture,” says Dyck. “If you walk into any branch, it will feel like other branches, and you’ll get the same service and results.”

The most important lesson learned from watching other wealth-management companies was to not force anything, and let things happen organically. Since its days as a fledgling company of only 27 advisors, Investor Services has never imposed change, but provided support for growth.

“We saw some problems from trying to buy your way into the business,” admits Dyck. “Sometimes people just don’t mesh and things can go badly. We looked at portfolios and asked whether Albertans were achieving their goals. The key, then, was to bring in the right people.”

The method has been a great success for ATB, but there is still room to expand in many directions. “The goal was to be the No. 1 provider of wealth-management services in the province,” says Mezei. “So we have to keep building on that.”

Alberta is proudly sporting the title of Canada’s richest province, and people are flocking to work in its cities and oilsands projects. Even without the influx of new blood, however, Investor Services has a huge potential market of clients it has yet to tap. ATB Financial serves more than 600,000 Albertans.

@page_break@“We want to go deeper within ATB,” says Mezei. “We want to start into the external market and centres of influence. We can use ATB’s footprint, which is literally all over the province.”

Dyck agrees. “We’re still getting the word out in ATB that we’re here, but we’re having a very easy time of convincing clients this is a good place to have their money.”

The company’s business model sees new clients as those nearing their 50s with close to a decade before retirement, no more kids in the house and typical savings, Dyck says. Yet a number of high net-worth clients have also appeared. They differ little from the typical client, but have recently come into the kind of money they’ve never had before. “But we also have people who walk in for their first RRSP,” says Dyck.

As its client base grows, Investor Services is always looking for new advisors, finding them with the competition as well as inside the bank. The advisors are quite diverse, and Dyck says it is finding a great deal of talented women within the institution itself. Currently, 47% of ATB’s advisors are women, far above the industry average.

Investor Services is also always looking to add services. “We can continue to broaden the offerings — such as adding insurance,” says Mezei. “We have a massive ability to generate prospects.”

Investor Services is growing quickly, and it has the market to carry it. As for the final frontier of banking, it seems ATB is in no rush to take its venture national. ATB has moved into British Columbia and Saskatchewan, but simply to follow migrating Albertans, says Dyck, who adds the company is not averse to making a move east, but will do so when it feels the time is right.

“The Alberta wealth market is growing so fast,” says Dyck. “A clear competitive advantage is knowing the market. It’s a lot easier to do business in your own backyard.”

ATB Investor Services has learned from experience that there is no harm in taking your time. IE