I originally met Jon through his wife, Michelle. The Feinsteins are better known as the “power couple” in the financial services industry, and rightfully so. (See Michelle Feinstein’s interview here.)
Jon is this very interesting person who, by the way, is the only person I know who would literally “intentionally disrupt himself”! He’s that type of person, and we are honored and thrilled to share his unique journey.
– Maree Moscati, CEO CTPRP
Jon Feinstein
Vice President, Relationship Manager
Skience
Share how your career path positioned you to be where you are today.
Jon: Absolutely nothing to do with my college education nor previous jobs had anything to do with where I am today. I wanted to become a lawyer and a judge. Following college graduation, I was so burnt out from studying. A recruiter friend in New York City thought I might be a good fit in the advertising industry, but the more we talked, she instead referred me for a job as a stockbroker in the city. I was there maybe a year. It wasn’t for me at all.
I found a role with Pershing, and as I progressed in that role, I was looking for more to do to elevate my career. Pershing was developing NetExchange, and my boss at the time suggested I take a product manager role with that department. I enjoyed being in that role for many years, and then I became a relationship manager at Pershing. I took my knowledge, my skill set, and my understanding of how technology can advantage business, and I brought that to a broader scope within all of Pershing’s custody and clearing capabilities.
When I left Pershing, I decided to intentionally disrupt myself and immerse myself in conversations with business and technology executives around digital transformation. Now, at Skience, I continue to enjoy spending time with business and IT executives, learning how they view digital transformation and helping provide them with the strategies to fulfill their vision.
How can we make the financial services industry more equitable, especially for women?
Jon: First and foremost, the output is only going to be as good as the input. Inclusion efforts are the gateway to greater diversity. For years, we have seen increasing awareness of the need for more diversity, equity, and inclusion within the financial services industry. And, if we are going to meaningfully serve all clients, we need to ensure a fair representation within our firms. There are a few simple steps firms can take to make our industry more equitable for women. The first is evaluating your recruitment tactics to ensure intentional recruiting as well as offering supportive reentry programs to women returning to the workforce. Transparent policies such as these send a message that attracting, retaining, and advancing women is a priority for your firm. Moreover, these policies are crucial if we are going to successfully attract the next generation of talented women who are contemplating entering our industry and are currently watching what we are (and are not) doing. Over the years, I have found that sponsorships and mentorships have been helpful in advancing the careers of both young male and female professionals and has been an area where I have been able to give back in our industry. Success is achieved when we all lean in.
Where do you see an opportunity for growth in our industry?
Jon: Analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) are underutilized in the financial services industry. We see some great use cases and utilizations in the consumer retail business, and I believe the financial services industry is behind in adopting data and applying AI so that not today or tomorrow but in one, three, five years from now, they are even stronger.
Technology in the financial services industry is largely about empowering advisors to cultivate better relationships with their clients. I think there are opportunities for technology to help advisors engage more clients, scale their business, and deliver a better investing experience to the clients they serve.
Bio:
Jon Feinstein is Vice President, Relationship Manager, at Skience. In this role, Mr. Feinstein works consultatively with financial services organizations to inform and advise on best practices to progress the digital transformation journey and evolve the employee, advisor, and client experiences.
Mr. Feinstein has been in the financial services industry more than 25 years and has held a series of senior positions. Previously, Mr. Feinstein was a Strategic Account Manager, Enterprise Financial Services at Salesforce, where he was responsible for working with key financial services organizations to set strategy to drive adoption and utilization of the Salesforce platform.
Mr. Feinstein was a Senior Director, Global Financial Services, with Gartner where he immersed himself in the thinking around digital transformation and helped bridge the gaps in that thinking to support organizations in their evolution and ability to adapt to change, while also helping them become more cost-optimized and achieve positive digital alpha.
Mr. Feinstein spent several months as a Financial Services Partnership Sales Executive with SIGNiX, an e-signature solution company, defining strategy within that sector as part of a holistic optimized Business Process Management and Enterprise Content Management ecosystem.
Mr. Feinstein was a Global Client Relationship Manager for Pershing LLC, a BNY Mellon company, where he was responsible for business development and relationship management. Before this, Mr. Feinstein was a product manager of Pershing’s NetExchange® professional suite of products. In this role, he was responsible for client engagement, product development, implementation, rollout, and customer support for the NetExchange® platform and NetExchange Office applications. He represented Pershing’s technology, vision, and best practices at Pershing, broker-dealer, and industry events across the country.
Mr. Feinstein also spent eighteen months at PC Financial Network (later known as DLJdirect), as an investor services representative.
Prior to joining Pershing, Mr. Feinstein worked as a junior broker in Lanyi Research, a division of Ladenburg Thalmann & Co. Inc.
Mr. Feinstein earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from Syracuse University. He received certifications in Product Management from Wharton Executive Education, Pragmatic Marketing, and Sequent Learning, as well as certifications from Miller Heiman’s Strategic Selling and Large Account Management Process, Value Selling, and Challenger Sales. He previously held FINRA Series 7 and 63 licenses (expired).