Helping successful financial advisors build extraordinary teams
As advisors respond to our new landscape, there seems to be one group that is especially lucky. The advisors in this group aren’t lucky because they have better investment strategies or richer clients. They’re lucky because, long before the meltdown, they gave themselves a job description. And on that job description is one primary duty: “see [...]
The most dramatic and bewildering year we’ve experienced in our careers, mercifully, is about to end. At a time when much seems out of our control, here are six simple things you can do to launch 2009, empowered and engaged: Plan. You may have been inconsistent about annual planning in the past, but this is [...]
The art of debriefing a client meeting and delegating the tasks. How do you debrief a client meeting? Do you have a process or is it “seat of your pants? Let’s assume you have twenty client meetings per week and out of each comes five “to-do’s”…that’s 100 new tasks coming into the practice each week. [...]
How to try an employee before you buy an employee We’ve all been there. The resume was strong. She interviewed great. She was professionally dressed, had all the right answers and even came with industry pedigree. You did a personality or instincts test and it looked like a great match. You even remembered to check [...]
Get the introductions you deserve – and hold the agony! Your practice may serve the wealthiest people in your community. Your assets under management may be an enviable number. Your brand may be associated with sophisticated planning and high-touch service. But if you’re not adding new clients every year, you have a vulnerable business. The [...]
It’s not sexy. It’s just essential. I often joke that, contrary to popular belief, our industry does have a national employee training program – it’s called “Baptism by Fire”. When it comes to training, we typically throw new people into the job and pray that they will be both smart and resilient. How much could [...]
Five transforming phrases to use with staff. Every advisor I know believes in the power of words. They spend days crafting their elevator talks. They memorize sales tracks. They soak up magic words shared by industry pundits. And yet these very same advisors often struggle to find the right words when they’re communicating with their [...]
Does your team have a taskmaster? If life inside your practice is feeling a little chaotic, it may be because the team has a thousand things to do and no system for making sure those things get done. And you’re probably waking up at night worried about what’s slipping through the cracks. The problem is [...]
Does your team know what to say? Many advisors struggle with how to respond to the simple question, “What do you do?” so it isn’t surprising that few get around to arming their staff with an elevator talk. But, boy, is this a powerful concept! What would it be worth if your staff could deliver [...]