’Being a broker is all about relationships,’ says chief executive
Artificial intelligence (AI) tools can assist brokers in bettering their relationships with clients by providing insights and freeing up hours for more high value tasks.
That was according to Stuart Breyer, chief executive of pension and insurance-focused technology firm Mallowstreet, who spoke during a breakfast briefing entitled Financial Services in an AI Era yesterday (19 June 2024).
Mallowstreet’s Sofi AI software tool has been designed to help brokers make better decisions by recording conversations and then analysing them to identify trends or insights.
Breyer explained that, for brokers, AI tools like Mallowstreet’s can ensure conversations with clients are “efficient and direct” and help to ensure business-critical positive relationships are maintained.
He continued: “Being a broker is all about relationships. The thing that excites me about brokers is that they can start looking through reams of meetings and pull out trends that humans simply can’t see.”
Going further, Breyer added that the proper use of AI tools could remove “bad brokers,” although he stressed that “AI only gets you 80% of the way there” and a human broker that “understands their clients” is still needed.
Not a magic bullet
Despite his optimism around the potential of AI tools, Breyer explained that technology could not provide all the solutions to the sector’s challenges.
He explained: ”Anyone that says that AI is the magic bullet is, in my opinion, wrong.
”AI will always make mistakes and assumptions and can never be 100% accurate. The big thing you have to think about when it comes to AI is hallucinations – it can just start inventing things.”
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For this reason, Breyer believes that AI regulation is important and that there should be “guardrails” built around the use of the technology.
“We had to develop our models in a way that was compliant, regulatory approved, GDPR [general data protection regulation] compliant and super secure,” he said.
Looking to the future, Breyer added: “AI is here in a big way that we do not realise – everyone is looking for use cases.
”The efficiency component [of AI tools] is going to knock out a swathe of jobs over the next five years.”
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