Information Technology should not be expensive rocket science.  It is a myth that IT systems in the Financial Services market need be overly complex and costly.

For any firm there are three competing forces at work.  The Regulator – compelling a Firm to organise its systems in a certain manner, Investors – suggesting that a firms’ control systems and affirm their operations and testing are real.  And the firm itself who need to balance the Day to Day ease of use with often limited budget and seemingly random outside requirements.

Regulators and Investors infrequently appreciate or reward innovation in what are seen as the core systems of Operations and IT.  Fortunately, over time, outsourcing has become acceptable and the public cloud, correctly configured, is being seen as a safe option in all sizes of firm.

This move to outsourcing and public cloud has made what was previously seen as corporate IT system delivery much more achievable for smaller firms. In general, the focus of Regulators and Investors is on the location and security of files/email/data which is coupled with retention/archiving and preventing private information leakage from the environment.

Any infrastructure has to take into account more than just secure files and file exchange on a PC. Your Firm will be compelled to control data leakage amongst your local and remote user population regardless of device used to access the systems.  All systems should ensure that Group policies are enforced on Laptops, PC’s and mobile devices. Any data will need to be encrypted at rest and in motion, backed up and archived to a secure location. Finally, any infrastructure will have to keep itself automatically patched to the latest software revisions and have the Anti-Virus kept up to date.

Being regulated brings an unavoidable overhead cost of doing the IT in a more corporate style.  Similarly, to bad lighting in a movie, the worst thing that can happen is if a potential Investor or the Regulator actually notices the IT systems.