Natixis’ John Hailer Explores an Industry in Transition While Offering Sound Investing Advice for the Future

Few things in the world can cause more financial anxiety than a portfolio that isn’t properly performing. Professionals like John Hailer, the current Chairman of Diffractive Managers Group, are tasked with making sure that their clients are equipped with the information and financial partners that they need in order to find success in the field.

The former director and CEO of Natixis, John Hailer, oversaw the explosive growth of his company as it rose from $140 billion in assets to more than $900 billion in just 15 years. This meteoric growth didn’t happen by accident and it was the work of John Hailer that helped to motivate it.

Let’s explore how John Hailer made this change possible while underscoring the methods that made him different than the rest.

An Industry in Transition

In an industry where money is constantly moving and the stakes are at an all-time high, it is important for clients to have a plan of attack and even more important for their advisors to understand it. Hailer’s first order of business upon entering the industry as the CEO of Natixis was to introduce some industry-altering services that led to improved outcomes for clients.

After the 2008 bubble popped and left many individuals with nothing, John Hailer knew that it was time to put investors first. Hailer said, “I don’t care whether you’re an executive, an employee, or a portfolio manager – the first thing that should come to mind is the person that gave us that dollar to invest.”

To best accommodate and accomplish this objective, Hailer would engineer the establishment of the Durable Portfolio Construction Research Center. This facility was established by Hailer to offer sophisticated portfolio services to clients free of charge. The goal of the service was to offer insights with a product-agnostic approach that helped curate investment strategies for individual clients, no matter their background or situation.

Hailer admittedly took grief over the suggestion, particularly due to the fact that there were no charges in a financials-driven industry. Hailer went on to add, “We showed that helping clients become better fiduciaries (…) built a lot of trust. And trust is the backbone of all long-term successful businesses.”

Through free services offered by his new platform, John Hailer and his advisors were able to build better interactions with clients which would lead to better decisions, returns, and ultimately better fiduciaries for investors.

In his words, Hailer said, “What we were talking about was making the industry less sales-oriented. We weren’t just selling products. We were providing a service.”