The new chief of NICSA has big plans for the trade group.

Jim Fitzpatrick NICSA President

Last month the mutual fund industry operations-focused trade group hired Jim Fitzpatrick as its president, permanently filling the shoes vacated over the summer Theresa Hamacher and then kept warm by interim NICSA chief Liz Jackson. Fitzpatrick chatted with MFWire about his plan to "reenergize NICSA."

"We're looking to expand the scope of the organization and functions that NICSA services," Fitzpatrick told MFWire. "We're looking to grow our membership base, improve and expand our content, and have a bigger impact within the mutual fund and financial services community."

Historically, Fitzpatrick said, NICSA's roots are in the transfer agency and operations side of the mutual fund business.

"The industry has changed quite a bit," Fitzpatrick said. "Some of those functions have moved back to broker-dealers. Transfer agency is really today a smaller function."

"There's an opportunity to engage more actively other areas of the industry," Fitzpatrick added, pointing to fund accounting, custody, investment management, and distribution. "We're also focused on expanding outside of pure traditional mutual fund asset managers ... to expand into the alternative space."

Fitzpatrick, a former NICSA board member, said that he expects to take 90 to 120 days from when he joined "to get reoriented with the organization and understand how everything works on a day-to-day basis."

"Everybody's excited about reenergizing the organization and continuing the success that NICSA has had since 1962 in helping lead the industry through change," Fitzpatrick said. 

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