Beverly Flaxington is a practice management consultant. She answers questions from advisors facing human resource issues. To submit yours, email us here.
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Dear Bev,
The founders of our firm don’t get along. I know I’ve read about this in your column in the past but our situation is unique. They are accusing each other of stealing from the firm, abusing the clients and taking advantage of the employees.
They haven’t done this publicly. But they have done it in front of three of us who are insiders and have been with them for a long time. It’s like a game to see which one will pull us aside to talk about the other one. The things they are accusing each other of are serious. None of us think they are telling the truth. But if they were true, we would be in big trouble if we were visited by the SEC.
We have not asked them to get into a room together. We think this is an important next step. Should one of us do this? All of us? What do we say to get them together (they barely speak to each other anymore and typically won’t attend the same meetings)? I don’t want Mount Vesuvius to erupt but we can’t allow it to keep happening.
Anonymous
Dear Anonymous,
I’ve been in this business for a very long time and every time I think I’ve heard and seen it all, until someone brings a new situation to my attention. This is obviously very serious and I would debate with you whether these partners have been successfully “hiding” their anger and vitriol from the rest of the team. Never showing up to meetings together? Avoiding each other? The team may not know all of what’s going on, but they certainly know something is!
I admire your objective to try and fix this – I’m not sure it is going to go as well as you might think. However, I agree that you need an intervention. Could you suggest an outside business consultant to meet with them, one who is talented at working with partnerships? There are many people who – just like marriage counselors – will work with partners of firms to uncover issues and get them back on a good working track together. For the type of anger you describe, it would be best to get an outsider to deal with them.
If they won’t do this, you might consider threatening to speak to the SEC yourself. You, or one of the other two colleagues getting dragged into this, could say you are so concerned about the accusations of the other partner that you want to get a professional in to review what’s happening. Hopefully you will only need to threaten this, and not follow through, but sometimes a threat like this could scare someone into telling more of the truth, or make them concerned about the effects on the entire firm and team.
I definitely think you and your colleagues need to take a more direct stand – pulling you in and making these accusations requires you to go along with this. If you adamantly refused to be part of it anymore (and all of you would need to do this) maybe they would wind down the drama and consider talking to someone together. I have not seen a situation exactly like this but I’ve certainly been involved in partnerships where the partners don’t like each other, and are barely willing to speak to one another. In these cases, an outsider who is talented at getting at the issues has always been able to help. Candidly, sometimes the answer is that the partners need to split – one buys the other out or they sell to the rest of the team. So it isn’t always a “warm and fuzzy” ending but at least it gets resolved and you are unleashed from the day-to-day drama you are experiencing now.
Dear Bev,
What do you do when the leader of your advisory firm wants to be involved in everything, but is too busy to be involved in anything?
A.A.
Dear A.A.,
I would call him or her a typical entrepreneur! It’s very common for someone who starts a firm to think of it as their baby and to want to be involved. Many times the entrepreneurial behavioral style is a person comfortable with change, and able to juggle many different things. Because of this, they like to be involved in everything.
But, the fact of being human eventually catches up and there just aren’t enough hours in the day depending as the firm grows. So the best intentions fall through – the leader wants to be involved, but overbooks him or herself so they can’t follow through. The good intention is there and the interest is probably there, but the actions fall short.
Try not to think of this as the leader needing to check up on you, or not trusting you. It’s a transition for them to learn to let go. In most cases you can manage this by doing a lot of proactive communication – making sure the leader knows what’s happening and is up to speed on everything.
As someone who runs my own firm, I don’t like surprises. Even if my team has bad news, or has not completed something, I’d rather know than not know. Try keeping him/her overly informed and see if you can’t shift the dynamic a bit.
Beverly Flaxington co-founded The Collaborative, a consulting firm devoted to business building for the financial services industry in 1995. In 2008, she co-founded Advisors Trusted Advisor to offer dedicated practice management resources to advisors, planners and wealth managers. She is currently an adjunct professor at Suffolk University teaching undergraduate students Leadership & Social Responsibility. Beverly is a Certified Professional Behavioral Analyst (CPBA) and Certified Professional Values Analyst (CPVA).
She has spent over 25 years in the investment industry and has been featured in Selling Power Magazine and quoted in hundreds of media outlets, including the Wall Street Journal, MSNBC.com, Investment News and Solutions Magazine for the FPA. She speaks frequently at investment industry conferences and is a speaker for the CFA Institute.
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