Financial Advisor Success

Latest Episodes:

Ep 110: Adapting The 4-Hour Work Week Into A Highly Profitable 4-Month Work Year Lifestyle Practice with Micah Shilanski Feb 05, 2019

Show notes

My guest today transitioned from working over 70 hours per week to refining his practice to the point that he's now only in the office for four months out of the year. Micah Shilanski is a partner with Shilanski & Associates, an independent RIA in Anchorage, Alaska that oversees nearly $130 million of assets under management for almost 160 client households. Focused on a niche of helping federal employees with their retirement benefits, the firm has streamlined its processes and increased efficiency to maintain Micah's unique schedule while still growing 20% per year.

In this episode, Micah shares how he's managed to grow such a profitable practice despite his time out of the office, as well as the steps he's taken to make the most of the time he does spend working at the firm. Listen in to learn how he sets client expectations about his unusual schedule from the very beginning, how he differentiates his practice to justify their above-average fees, and advice for any advisor who wants to improve his or her own efficiency at work.

For show notes and more visit: https://www.kitces.com/110

Ep 109: How A Retirement Researcher Implements Retirement Planning For His Own Clients with Jon Guyton Jan 29, 2019

Show notes

Jon Guyton sits at an interesting intersection of the advisor world. The founder of Cornerstone Wealth Advisors—an independent RIA that oversees $240 million in AUM for mostly retiree clients—Jon runs an advisory business that implements the very retirement strategies he researched and published a number of important and influential articles about in the mid-2000s.

In this episode, Jon shares his unique approach to retirement planning, including how and why he separates out client retirement expenses into two distinct categories. Listen in to learn how he is applying his own research to the way he works with clients, the sustainable retirement income framework he utilizes in his practice, and how he went from qualifying for the low-income EIC tax credit in his first year of business to running an incredibly successful firm.

For show notes and more visit: https://www.kitces.com/109

Ep 108: How To Take A Sabbatical Even When Your Clients Depend Primarily On You with Lisa Kirchenbauer Jan 22, 2019

Show notes

My guest today is Lisa Kirchenbauer, founder and president of Omega Wealth Management. Lisa's firm oversees more than $100 million of assets for nearly 100 affluent clients, with whom they've been able to form deep relationships by implementing George Kinder's EVOKE life planning process. And yet, even with the close relationships Lisa has with her clients, she has achieved what most advisors consider impossible: taking two six-week sabbaticals in the past six years.

In this episode, Lisa shares how she works with her staff to prepare the firm, train the team, and transition tasks so that she can step away from the business completely. Listen in to learn the steps she took to train her clients to become less dependent on her and more comfortable working with the other members of her team, how she breaks the news to clients about her taking time off, and the lessons she's learned throughout the experience that will change how she does her next sabbatical.

For show notes and more visit: https://www.kitces.com/108

Ep 107: Using Podcasting As A Marketing Strategy To Attract (Retirement Niche) Clients with Roger Whitney Jan 15, 2019

Show notes

Roger Whitney is a partner with WWK Wealth Advisors, an independent RIA where he works with a personal client base of retirees with $75 million of assets under management. Perhaps even more impressively, he's been able to attract almost $50 million of those assets in just the past two years by launching a niche podcast on retirement.

In this episode, Roger shares why and how he built his Retirement Answer Man podcast, as well as how he transitions listeners into prospects. Tune in to learn what makes his unique approach to retirement management so effective, what he's doing to serve the subset of podcast listeners who are unlikely to hire him as their financial advisor, and advice for up-and-coming advisors who hope to follow a similar path to success.

For show notes and more visit: https://www.kitces.com/107

Ep 106: Empowering Widows Financially By Helping Them Navigate The 3 Stages of Widowhood with Kathleen Rehl Jan 08, 2019

Show notes

My guest today works with financial advisors to teach them how to handle a tricky area for a lot of firms: working with widows. Kathleen Rehl is a speaker, trainer, and researcher specializing in the particular challenges of widowhood and how advisors can be more effective in dealing with these issues. Also the author of Moving Forward on Your Own: A Financial Guidebook for Widows, Kathleen spent seventeen years working as a financial advisor before becoming a widow herself and shifting her focus to helping other women in similar circumstances. In this episode, she talks in depth about what advisors need to understand about helping widows through their financial transitions, as well as what to say and what not to say in the process. Listen in to hear how to avoid pushing the wrong financial issues after the death of a client's spouse, tips for handling the three stages of widowhood, and what Kathleen's research tells us about how financial planning affects widows' outlook and confidence in their financial future.

For show notes and more visit: https://www.kitces.com/106

Ep 105: Growing An Advisory Firm By Pairing Young Advisors To Acquired Books Of Business From Retiring Advisors with Chip Munn Jan 01, 2019

Show notes

Chip Munn is the co-founder and managing partner of Signature Wealth, a hybrid wealth management firm on the Raymond James platform that has quickly gone from $300 million to over $1 billion of assets in just the past few years. With a focus on buying books of business from retiring advisors and handing them off to younger advisors, the firm's tremendous growth comes not only from their unique acquisition strategy, but also from the particular set of freedoms an independent RIA has to try out different technology tools and marketing strategies.

In this episode, Chip shares what it was like transitioning from a regional broker-dealer to the independent model, as well as the challenges and surprises he faced along the way. Listen in to hear how he has successfully built his firm by following his passion for helping out those new to the industry, his approach for positioning young lead advisors as part of a team to make transitioning clients comfortable, and why it's so important to support advisory firms that have chosen the independent model.

For show notes and more visit: https://www.kitces.com/105

Ep 104: How Financial Coaching Skills Enhance The Financial Planner's Value Proposition with Saundra Davis Dec 25, 2018

Show notes

My guest today is here to help with one of the most common challenges we face as advisors: getting clients to actually follow through and implement our financial advice. The founder of Sage Financial Solutions, an organization that provides Financial Fitness Coach (FFC) and Accredited Personal Financial Coach (APFC) training and certification programs, Saundra Davis teaches advisors skills and techniques that will help clients make lasting behavior change.

In this episode, Saundra shares how her approach of financial coaching differs from the typical approach of financial planning, as well as how it leads advisors to navigate the client discovery process in a substantively different way. Listen in to hear how both approaches complement each other, why it's important to guide clients to making discoveries on their own rather than telling them the answers, and what we can do as advisors to not only give technically accurate advice, but also help clients to improve their financial behaviors.

For show notes and more visit: https://www.kitces.com/104

Ep 103: Finding Success As A Great Financial Planner Without The Need For Business Development Or Partnership with Kathleen Kenealy Dec 18, 2018

Show notes

My guest today is here to talk about a kind of success that hasn't been covered much on the podcast: building a career within a larger firm instead of going independent. Kathleen Kenealy is the Managing Director and Senior Wealth Advisor for Boston Private Wealth—a private bank and trust company that oversees nearly $8 billion of assets under management—and while she manages more than $300 million for seventy-five client households, she isn't actually responsible for bringing in clients. Instead, she focuses her time on doing financial planning for the firm's clients and improving the financial planning processes within the company, which recently earned her recognition as an InvestmentNews 40 under 40 honoree.

In this episode, Kathleen opens up about what it's like to work within a larger advisory firm that has separated out prospecting and business development from financial planning work, as well as how she's been able to find job opportunities with companies that reward her for being a great financial planner without requiring her to find clients herself. Listen in to hear how she found her way into the financial planning world and navigated her unique career path, why she chose to work within larger firms rather than going out on her own, and where she plans to end up in the long run as she follows this corporate career path.

For show notes and more visit: https://www.kitces.com/103

Ep 102: Transitioning From Wirehouse To Independence with Michael Henley: Is The Grass Really Greener? Dec 11, 2018

Show notes

There has been a lot of buzz over the past couple of years about the breakaway trend that has seen sizeable advisory firms moving away from wirehouses, and my guest today very recently went through that process himself. After spending the first decade of his career at Merrill Lynch, Michael Henley moved on to become co-founder and CEO of Brandywine Oak Private Wealth, an independent advisory firm that manages more than $500 million of client assets, at just thirty-four years old.

In this episode, Michael shares what made him decide to go independent after he'd been so loyal to Merrill Lynch that he had a bull-shaped wedding cake, as well as how he handled the breakaway transition not quite going the way he expected. Listen in to hear what it was like for him to build an advisory firm in the wirehouse environment, the unique way he created the necessary startup capital to fund his transition, and how the grass is—and isn't—greener in the independent channel.

For show notes and more visit: https://www.kitces.com/102

Ep 101: Financial Advisors As Adherence Partners To Deliver Advice That Actually Sticks with Moira Somers Dec 04, 2018

Show notes

My guest today comes from a different background than my usual guests, and she's here to answer the fundamental question of why clients sometimes don't take the advice we give them. Dr. Moira Somers is a clinical neuropsychologist who studies the complexities of how hard it is for people to change their behaviors, especially when it comes to money. Moira has applied her financial psychology expertise not just to consumers themselves, but also to teaching advisors how to better deliver advice in a way that actually sticks.

In this episode, we discuss how patient compliance research from the medical field is being applied to help clients better adhere to financial advice, as well as how to assess whether someone is truly ready to apply what an advisor suggests. Listen in to learn why it's unrealistic to expect even good-intentioned clients to always follow through on advice, why it's important to measure client adherence, and specific steps advisors can take to improve the way they deliver advice in order to significantly increase the likelihood that it will be followed.

For show notes and more visit: https://www.kitces.com/101

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