Thanks in large degree to Cisco's networking technologies and consulting work, that rate's down to 6 percent, now, and should hit COO James Gorman's goal of less than 5 percent, says Lance Braunstein, a top technologist at Morgan Stanley. "Our FAs had a sub-optimal technology platform - decrepit PCs running more than 60 apps, none of which were integrated. Having to see a [crashed PC's] blue screen everyday was demoralizing. But now, we've installed new hardware in all of our nearly 500 branch offices, integrated all the apps FAs use, created natural workflows that reflect how they do business, and made everything Web-based. Cisco has been very involved in this."
Financial advisors are elated. "The new IT infrastructure moved us from the old mainframe era into the Windows world," reports Craig Hammond, a Morgan Stanley senior vice president and financial advisor in the Seattle area. Tasks that once took a few hours to complete can now be done in a few minutes.
"This is of great importance to my business," Hammond says. "I am not spending as much time searching for the data I need."
Hammond and his fellow FAs are also gaining advantage from a new, Cisco-designed global network. Its fiber-optic backbone gives it 10 times the aggregate bandwidth of its predecessor, but at just one-twentieth of the cost - a "profound" improvement, says Braunstein. Already, he notes, the cost of training for new hires out in the field is "down dramatically," largely due to increased use of on-demand video training courses. "This has had a huge financial impact," Braunstein says. Also woven into the network, he notes, are many basic services such as email and file serving. Because they're provided as network services, their daily administration costs are much less than before. -Cisco
