The benefits of modern administration

From disparate systems and siloed workstreams to buyouts and outsourced technology, the legacy fund administration model of the last 20 years is fraught with challenges. While many GPs have been well-served by strong administration partners, employee turnover, higher prices, and sudden changes in service levels make it more and more challenging to successfully administer a fund. The legacy approach also introduces additional risks, including compliance lapses, data breaches and mismanagement, accounting errors, and more.

But change is possible. Contrary to the inertia of the legacy model, modern administration pairs dynamic technology with a new set of core beliefs. Beyond mere financial reporting, it delivers enterprise-building value that empowers GPs to impress investors, gain confidence and control, and find more value from their data.

Here are three of the key benefits of modern administration.

No team can perform at peak productivity–much less outperform the competition–if critical information is locked inside a spreadsheet, stored on an analyst’s desktop, or filed away in an email account.

Modern fund administration provides:

• Centralized access, visibility, and transparency to the right data for the right people at the right time, ensuring teams are coordinated, working smoothly, and rallying around the same information.

• Reduced risk of losing crucial information and context if and when personnel changes happen on the team that supports your funds.

• Improved collaboration and transparency with internal stakeholders, advisors, and LPs as they unite around a universal system that’s kept accurate and up-to-date.

Data unmined is value untapped. Embracing modern administration enables GPs to realize more value from the data they have on hand, avoiding the information gatekeeping that typically accompanies legacy fund administration.

More efficient data management enables GPs to:

• Integrate investment data, data rooms, and investor portals into a single source of truth.

• Provide internal teams and investors with 24/7 access to information and data about their investments, positions, and assets.

• Enhance the accountant’s experience, solving the pain points of their day-to-day activities so they can focus on the complexities of fund management and client interaction instead of scouting out data from disparate sources.

Every interaction—in-person, over the phone, or through the investor portal—can make or break an LP relationship. Further, better collaboration and transparency happen when internal stakeholders, advisors, and LPs unite around a universal system kept accurate and up-to-date by a modern administrator.

A modern administrator helps your team build and maintain relationships by:

• Offering a best-in-class digital data room for LPs to sign subscription documents. That can also make reviewing a capital call easier and more secure.

• Cutting down on the operational burden for investor relations teams, making the administrator an unexpected ally in the fundraising experience.

• Inspiring more confidence that you have the right tools, team, and an expansive administration approach to stay “on top of it."

Legacy systems have grown increasingly unwieldy and bunglesome over the years, primarily because technology and development simply weren’t part of the administrators' DNAs. The net result is that these systems lag behind the present–and will likely stay behind the curve for future demands. With an uptick in industry disruptors like PE buyouts and rollups, legacy systems struggle to maintain their efficacy, let alone adapt to evolving market conditions.

Conversely, modern administration operates within a dynamic, technology-centric framework designed to serve GPs, helping them create a standout investor experience and a future-proofed fund administration process.