In this episode of Zephyr’s Adjusted for Risk podcast, host Ryan Nauman welcomes Mohan Gurupackiam, CIO at Steward Partners, to discuss how wealth management’s view of AI has shifted from curiosity and pilots to operationalization with governance and safe scaling. Mohan explains how firms are using AI as part of an advisor’s daily operating system—supporting meeting prep and automation, opportunity identification, communications, and eliminating non-value work—while noting investment research adoption remains limited due to trust. They cover key obstacles including data foundations, regulatory uncertainty, behavioral resistance and change management, legacy architecture, and talent gaps. Mohan emphasizes keeping humans in the loop, starting small with clear ROI, and combating advisor tech fatigue. He closes with three strategic advantages: unified data and context, productivity economics, and end-to-end automation.

Learn more about Zephyr here.

Learn more about Steward Partners here.

00:00 Welcome to the Podcast

01:11 Meet Mohan Gurupackiam

02:05 Steward Partners Overview

04:30 AI Mindset Shift

07:03 AI in Advisor Workflows

09:57 Human First AI Strategy

13:44 Implementation Roadblocks

19:17 Where AI Delivers Impact

24:53 Getting Started with AI

27:47 Tech Stack Fatigue

30:54 Winning in a Commoditized World

32:57 Wrap Up and Resources

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