What if we were to bring La Boétie back into the conversation, to redefine the profile of the future premium salesperson? Customer loyalty is built primarily on the quality of interactions.
Being a modern salesperson is no longer just about selling and following up; it now requires a deeper understanding of customer needs that digital tools alone, even enhanced by AI, cannot fully achieve. Disciplines such as synergology (interpretation of body language), proxemics (study of distance in interactions) and idiosyncrasy (individual behavioural filters/cognitive biases) serve as relational nudges that are often overlooked in our wealth management sector, but proficiency in these arts is becoming essential for deciphering a customer’s expectations through active listening and behavioural analysis.
Persuading and guiding customers towards implicit decision-making certainly requires knowledge and know-how, but above all it calls for an ability to combine rational subtlety with contextual, emotional and, crucially, cortextual intelligence. We possess a plastic brain, constantly at risk of cognitive debt if we no longer think hard enough and lose the desire to think without resorting to tools. Paradoxically, given the deluge of data generated by Chat GPT, human relationships are more essential than ever, but care must be taken never to cross the line into the intimate boundaries of the customer’s personal sphere without invitation: this could create a potential conflict of interest or erode trust. Put yourself in the customer’s position to understand them, but never compare yourself to them.
Today, ”customer-centricity” no longer means simply meeting needs, but supporting customers with their life projects, challenges and demands, by anticipating their wealth management aspirations rather than merely reacting to them. In this way, understanding different personality frameworks (MBTI, NLP, GESTALT, etc.) is not a universal key, but facilitates a holistic understanding of consumer thinking, and in particular that of those of so explicit silences, as Talleyrand so eloquently put it: the best agreements are made with unspoken intentions.
Today’s customers are more fickle, unpredictable and influenced by social networks, which give them greater independence from advisers in favour of peer communities and influencers. We must therefore cultivate a ”QUICAD” (remote commercial intelligence quotient), capable of deciphering the customer’s epigenetic make-up. Mastering data enables a predictive and proactive approach, but care must be taken not to become too intrusive, particularly with customers who value secrecy and discretion.
As the advocates of Anglo-Saxon moderation like to remind us: “He who grasps too much, holds too little.”
The commercial approach must therefore evolve to take account of the economic and political landscape, which is littered with black swans, and of the customer’s spheres of interest, grounded in ever-expanding cultural and linguistic literacy. Heuristic dialogue, rooted in emotionally charged listening and support, empathy and embodiment, then becomes the foundation of authenticity. Meaning, ultimately, becomes the essential question: To whom should one entrust one’s fortune? And with what values attached to its transmission? Because while the digital world may optimise contact, only the human touch builds loyalty.
Customers don’t just buy a product or a service; they buy a story, a relationship. Relational intelligence must be enriched by the power of artificial intelligence (AI), through the new art of questioning, this new vocation which seeks to ask the right questions with an iterative and ultimately performative approach. However, AI feels no genuine empathy, even if its responses are beginning to simulate sensory cues. So it’s up to the human being to enrich it and retain what matters most: freedom of thought. Only then can we resist uniformity and continue to persuade through personalisation and a bespoke approach. This is the era of the enlightened and augmented salesperson, but above all, of the advisor who lives and breathes the transmitted values. Truth, then, becomes the only sustainable technology, and human capital the essential asset in this new era of enhanced wealth management.
In conclusion, the high-performing salesperson must now blend relational, emotional and artificial intelligence – while avoiding the trap of natural stupidity, embodied by the “click and-collect” syndrome. Hegel’s master–slave dialectic perfectly captures the need to find balance between full digital and full contact. AI must therefore be treated as a fertile ”slave”, lest we fall into the new voluntary servitude of algocracy.
For when we start believing that we owe our salvation only to the server – we risk becoming nothing more than servants ourselves.
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