At CAIS, we believe that alts education, along with innovative technology, is the key to unlocking opportunities across the changing alternative investing landscape. But education isn’t just about sharing the basics—it's about creating a journey of ongoing discovery.
As an advisor, we appreciate how busy you are in your day-to-day work, which is why we’ve created an alternative investment education experience that truly puts you in control. Whether you prefer live, in-person events or the flexibility to learn at your own pace through on-demand resources, we give you the choice—empowering you to gain insights and grow your alts knowledge in a way that works best for you.
In this piece, I wanted to help you explore how you can stay informed and up to speed on alternative investments with CAIS, leveraging a blend of digital tools, on-demand, interactive resources, and intimate in-person experiences.
Mastering Alts Foundations at Your Own Pace
Our interactive online learning platform, CAIS IQ, is at the heart of this journey. Built with adult learning principles in mind, CAIS IQ provides advisors with autonomy—because we know that adults learn best when they’re in the driver’s seat. Our courses are broken into shorter, digestible segments, allowing advisors to "choose their own adventure" as they progress. Whether the goal is to earn CE credits or simply get a quick refresher on a specific fund strategy before a client meeting, CAIS IQ puts the power of learning in the hands of the advisor.
Our team of learning designers aims to ensure our courses are far from a "watch and forget" educational experience. With knowledge checks and interactive features, CAIS IQ keeps advisors actively engaged throughout the journey. We build these courses with the hope that advisors walk away from every session more prepared to engage with their clients on alternative investing strategies.
Staying Current With Timely Webinars
Of course, learning doesn’t end with foundational knowledge. The world of alternatives moves quickly, and our goal is to ensure that advisors are up to speed on trends and potential opportunities. Our regular thematic webinars bring together industry experts—alternative asset managers, practitioners, and thought leaders—to dive into timely topics and to share insights that advisors can use in their day-to-day work.
In the last few months alone, we’ve hosted webinars on everything from global outlooks and market trends surrounding the US election to specific investment strategies, like sports, GP stakes, and hedging and monetization. We also offer regular webinars on the tech features and other resources available on our platform.
Discovering Insights Through an Expanding Network
As we approach the end of our first year of CAIS Live, its success across more than a dozen in-person events reaffirms why we launched this initiative: technology alone isn’t enough. Advisors thrive on the human element—the shared insights of peers, asset managers, and others navigating the markets together.
Our in-person events, including CAIS Live and the CAIS Summit, take this experience further. These gatherings foster meaningful connections, candid conversations, and in-depth examinations of the themes that matter across the industry. Advisors have told us that they left feeling inspired by insights from industry leaders and peers that they can immediately apply to their practices.
Broadening Alts Education Into New Formats
And we’re not stopping there. We’re expanding our suite of educational resources through other forms of media to provide advisors with even more ways to learn on the go. For example, across the US, podcast engagement reached record highs this year—with nearly half of the 12-and-older population having listened to a podcast in the previous month.1 To try to meet advisors where they already are, we’re launching the first episodes of our new podcast, CAIS Live Conversations: Building With Alts, in January 2025.
Whether it's during a commute or between meetings, we want to ensure that advisors have access to news and information about alternative investments in formats that fit into their busy lives. Along with others from the CAIS team, I’ll host regular episodes of CAIS Live Conversations, where our guests—respected leaders from all around our ecosystem—will share stories from their careers and reflect on the trends and shifts that could affect how we think about investing in alts.
Personalizing Support for Every Stage of Learning
At CAIS, we want our alts education programs to strike a balance between authentic learning and efficiency. On one hand, our goal is to help advisors speak confidently about the fundamentals of an asset class or strategy, enabling them to educate their clients effectively. On the other hand, we’re focused on making the learning process efficient—breaking down barriers and making it easier for advisors to learn, access, and ultimately invest in alternative strategies.
We also know that every advisor is different. Whether you’re just starting out in the world of alternatives or are just looking to refine your approach, you can turn to our team for personalized support. Our dedicated product specialists can meet with you one-on-one to help you beyond theoretical learning. Our advisor services team can also help you navigate our platform and get up-to-speed on the nuances of alternative investment operations.
Supporting Your Alts Education Through Constant Change
I love how fast our industry moves. The change is never-ending, and there’s always something new to learn along the way, which makes our mission to educate advisors especially meaningful and rewarding.
To our platform members, I encourage you to take some time to explore our resources—including CAIS IQ courses, webinar replays, and videos of live event sessions—to see what’s new. For advisors not yet on our platform, you can sign up to start accessing resources or subscribe to our newsletter to get the latest from our team.
We also want to know more about your experience learning alts with CAIS so far. Let us know how we’ve helped you or what we can keep improving to help you forge ahead confidently in your alts journey.
