Where your branch stands on AI today – and the highest-leverage places to act.
Built from your AI Readiness Check answers and your strategy session with Dan.
AI Readiness isn't about whether you use ChatGPT. It's about whether the work you actually do is set up to benefit from AI – so it can save you time, raise the quality of what your branch produces, and give you back the hours that should be going to client conversations and growth.
For that to happen, five things need to be in place:
Your score below reflects how close your branch is to those five conditions today.
Two of five conditions land in "Ready to scale," three are in "Foundation in place." The stronger signal is your magic wand answer and what the session added underneath it. The opportunity is the recurring back-office work already on your plate – the work you said you'd most want handed off – and capturing the SOPs as you produce them through your coaching program, so the documentation comes out of the work rather than a separate effort.
Each condition is scored independently and falls into one of three bands:
The strategy session with Dan validated the magic wand and added detail.
The session sharpened three things the diagnostic couldn't: a current bottleneck (the SOP and operational work currently sits with you, while a 10-month coaching program is helping to produce the SOPs themselves), a format (the visual Microsoft-stack home page you sketched), and a daily pattern – you named the wish directly: "if I could have more stuff pushed to me as opposed to me pulling it out, that would be better." The five conditions above and the three opportunity areas below are scoped against this.
None of the opportunity areas this points to touch client account data, holdings, performance reporting, or advertising compliance content – that's a hard boundary.
Edward Jones carries the structured side – Salesforce, firm planning software, corporate reporting, the Advisor Intelligence program. And you're already in motion on AI well past what the diagnostic caught: ChatGPT / Claude / Copilot running deliberately across platforms, a business DNA file producing outreach sequences, Claude refining your Excel investment model.
Three areas where the diagnostic and the strategy session showed real leverage – each tagged with the source. These are directional, not finished specs; the AI Plan is where they get prioritized and scoped into actual builds.
A single place for how the branch actually runs – the visual home page you sketched on the session, holding routines, SOPs, and the click-through paths into the systems you already use. The shape you named: you're doing the SOP and operational work yourself right now, and you're in the middle of a 10-month coaching program helping to produce step-by-step SOPs. The opportunity is to capture those SOPs in a structured home as you work through them – so the documentation comes out of the work you're already doing, not a separate effort layered on top. Your admin's retirement within two years is the backdrop, not the driver: this work needs structure whether she stays or goes. The direction: one place that holds both the daily routines you and your team use, and the institutional knowledge – so the know-how lives in the branch instead of in one person's head. The AI Plan would scope which routines and what knowledge get captured first.
Direct answer to the wish you named on the session: "if I could have more stuff pushed to me as opposed to me pulling it out, that would be better." The stakes: the hours you most want back are the ones spent pulling – pre-market scans you have to remember to run, annual reviews you have to remember to pull, cohort questions Salesforce doesn't support ("Endicott College grads"). Every one of them is a tax on the work you'd rather be doing. The direction is a layer that runs proactively against your own data and tells you what matters – not waits to be asked. The AI Plan would scope what to flip from pull to push first.
The Core engagement sets up a Branch AI Workspace – Copilot as the home base for anything that touches EJ IP or client data, your business DNA file and depersonalized investment process loaded in, the cohort logic Salesforce doesn't cover. This opportunity is the deeper build on top of that workspace. The stakes are two-fold. One: you're already doing serious AI work – the Excel investment model, the outreach sequences, the warm-leads workflow – but it lives across tools without a structured home, which means you re-do setup work every time. Two: the strategic upside of making your investment process visible – client-presentable artifacts that show the depth behind your decisions, so the work itself becomes the answer to fee-justification questions rather than a debate you have to have. The direction: the Excel investment model becomes client-presentable artifacts that show how you make decisions (not just what you recommend), the outreach motion becomes a repeatable workflow, and the compliance guardrails become automatic checks rather than mental ones. The AI Plan would scope which surface to build first.
This report identifies the gaps and opportunities. The AI Plan turns them into a sequenced, executable program – built specifically for your branch, delivered by a dedicated AI specialist, with all the standard infrastructure included.
In the first two days, the AI Plan is delivered and we walk through it together – your feedback gets incorporated and the scope locks for any Plus modules you decide to add. The rest of the standard infrastructure rolls out across the balance of the engagement. Saying yes guarantees the Core deliverables. Plus work, if you add any, extends the timeline beyond the initial two weeks.
A complete plan and the foundational deliverables, in two weeks. Yours to keep regardless of whether you add any Plus modules.
When the Plan is delivered, you'll see custom pricing for the three modules above. You decide what (if anything) to add – no commitment beyond the Core.
A scoped, fixed-fee engagement – not a retainer, not a subscription. The plan and all standard infrastructure deliverables are yours to keep regardless of whether any Plus modules are added.
The complete AI Plan is delivered and we walk through it together in a review session: prioritized roadmap, what each module replaces or improves, and a Plus add-on menu with custom pricing for the three modules. Your feedback gets incorporated and the scope locks for any Plus modules you decide to add. Plus is optional – the Core engagement delivers real value either way.
The rest of the Core lands across the balance of the two weeks – informed by the reviewed Plan: AI Workspace setup and context loading, $200 platform credit applied, regulated wealth management AI Usage Policy, Vendor & Transportability Framework, and the Quick Wins guide and prompt library. All Core deliverables shipped by day 10, with 30 days of post-launch refinement to follow.
Any Plus modules locked during the review session get built after the Core ships, on a fixed scope and timeline agreed up front. Plus work extends the engagement beyond the initial two weeks – no surprises on cost or duration.