As we have settled into the new normal of a post-pandemic world, we want to shine a spotlight on CFA Institute’s series of reports, The Future of Work in Investment Management.

This series looks at what we do, where we work, and how work gets done in investment management. We highlight some of the key findings below.

To prepare these reports, CFA Institute analyzed responses from 9,000 investment professionals across two surveys, gathered input from leaders at 41 investment organizations representing more than 230,000 employees, and engaged over 100 investment and human resources professionals to provide qualitative input through virtual roundtables.

Is working from home “working” beyond the pandemic?

The first report explores the consequences of the forced experiment in remote work brought on by the pandemic. Findings include that:

• CFA Institute members surveyed overwhelmingly (81 percent) expressed a preference to work remotely part of the time
• Supervisors and their subordinates had different perceptions of productivity, with supervisors believing that their subordinates were less efficient working from home than workers thought they were
• Workers in certain regions (Asia Pacific) and those in the early stages of their careers reported less interest in remote work

COVID meets corporate culture

The next report looks at organizational cultures in this period of disruption caused by the pandemic. The report highlighted that:

• There is a tendency towards conservatism and an unwillingness to experiment. Investment leaders should tap into investment professionals’ natural inclination of to be creative and use “burning platforms”¹ to enable innovation quickly and counteract the human hesitance to change
• There is an appetite for meaningful work, and organizations with a strong underlying purpose can find a more robust employee value proposition with which to attract and retain talent
• While there are still considerable imbalances concerning gender and ethnicity, respondents generally believe their company’s culture is sufficiently inclusive
• The cultural challenge of how to use technology to its fullest advantage is unfinished work. There is promise in “T-shaped” teams with investment professionals working alongside technology experts as peers. “T-shaped” refers to a combination of deep knowledge in a single domain (the vertical bar of the “T”) alongside broader knowledge in other fields and the ability to connect them (the horizontal bar of the “T”). 

Figure 1:

Exhibit 32. T-Shaped Team

Source: Cao, Larry. AI Pioneers in Investment Management. CFA Institute, 2019. https://rpc.cfainstitute.org/-/media/documents/survey/AI-Pioneers-in-Investment-Management.pdf

Building better teams for tomorrow

The final report in the series examines the changing nature and scope of investment management roles, the skills needed for success, and how to build effective investment teams.

• More than a third of CFA Institute members surveyed believe the role they perform will be substantially different in five to ten years, and that the most significant disruptive factor will be new analytical methods
• Career paths are becoming more varied, with more flexibility and career breaks. The next generation of investment professionals is coming from more diverse backgrounds as the investment industry arguably becomes more complex, with science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) professionals forming a more significant proportion of investment professionals
• The skills pathway for investment professionals continues to evolve. Technical skills continue to be significant at the beginning of careers, with skills in machine learning and artificial intelligence in particular demand. Soft skills, leadership, and T-shaped skills are important as investment professionals progress in their careers

Figure 2:

Exhibit 22. Supply and Demand Skills Gaps

Source: CFA Institute. The Future of Work in Investment Management: The Future of Skills and Learning. CFA Institute, 2022. https://rpc.cfainstitute.org/-/media/documents/survey/FoW_Skills_and_Learning_Online.pdf

We had the opportunity to meet with Ryan Munson, a Research Manager at CFA Institute and a lead contributor to the Future of Work series. Since the initial publications in 2021 and 2022, Munson notes that the rise of artificial intelligence—as exemplified by platforms like ChatGPT—has become a field of greater interest for firms and industry professionals. Conversely, interest in environmental, social, and governance (ESG) finance and crypto assets has diminished somewhat in a tightening capital market climate.

The Future of Work series is a wide-ranging and in-depth analysis into how investment management work and organizations have changed during the disruption of the COVID-19 pandemic. As industry professionals, these reports can provide valuable guidance to CFA charterholders on what we can do to ensure that we—as well as the organizations we work in—can continue to evolve and compete.

The CFA Institute Research and Policy Center continues to publish research on the future of the profession, such as the recently published Future State of the Investment Industry, ² which frames the most significant developments that will affect the investment industry in the next five to ten years. You can access these insights, as well as the Future of Work series, at: https://www.cfainstitute.org/en/research/future-finance/future-of-work