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,
Our firm throws around the word “diversity.” As one of the longer tenured women, I get sick of hearing it when every time I am invited to a meeting, I look around the table and I am the token person representing diversity. We talk about it in hiring, working with our high-net worth clients, when considering succession planning and career pathing. But all we do is talk about it. What steps are firms taking to actually bring about diversity? I’ve been in the industry for over 20 years and I don’t see much changing despite all of the talk.
T.I.
Dear T.I.,
I agree – diversity is most definitely a hot topic.
In working with a number of firms small and large, one of the problems in bringing about diversity is that there just aren’t enough candidates who represent the diversity firms want. Many years ago I was interviewed by a major industry publication on why senior women tend to get to a certain level and then leave the industry – either to start their own firms, as I did, or move on to something else. I shared a number of insights. But before the article ran, the publication killed it because they thought it was too controversial!
The first step is being comfortable having the dialogue. Is it because women and minorities don’t feel welcome or valued? Is it because people tend to network with those they know and who are like them, so the hiring process is unbalanced from the start? Is it because not enough people of a diverse nature know about jobs in this industry and seek to make a career here?
I don’t know the answers and I suspect they are all part of the problem, and more.
The firms I see actually making changes happen are the ones who are being honest about the discussion and have a commitment to bringing about diversity. They have moved from your personal experience of having one person to represent an entire segment of the population, to convening committees and teams made up of diverse groups of people to talk about these issues.
Personally, I don’t believe our industry is doing enough to grab diverse candidates early in their college careers. I created and taught an undergraduate course called Career Opportunities in Finance and Investing and was shocked to learn that many of the students who were juniors and seniors didn’t even know the many, many jobs available to them in our industry.
If women and minorities don’t know about the jobs or don’t have mentors willing to take the time to work with them, then they won’t realize or be confident to assume roles available to them. And once they come into an organization it’s important to team them up early in their career with someone who is like them so they can be comfortable to ask questions and learn the ropes. These are not easy things to do. Don’t take my comments as simplifying a difficult topic, but companies need to start planning and focusing this way or the diverse nature of the general population will catch up with those holding the wealth and investment advisors will find themselves not having a team that represents their client profiles.
Age diversity is also a problem. There are many misconceptions about the contrasts between the ages and firms aren’t doing enough to build these bridges and show the differences are not as vast as one may think. And, there are opportunities for different age cohorts to learn from one another where the differences do exist. But you have to create teams to address these things and work proactively to benefit from the different insights.
It takes a real commitment. Not enough firms are willing to make that commitment – at least not yet.
Dear Bev,
I am like a fish swimming upstream all of the time. I can’t work fast enough, hard enough or thoroughly enough to meet my numbers, uncover new opportunities, get back to clients and participate in the internal projects for which I am responsible.
How can we stop repeating the same cycle without missing something important?
N.Q.
Dear N.Q.,
I write often about this topic – lack of time is the crisis of our culture. Technology was supposed to make everything so much better, but I have clients who invest in new technology and then no one has the time to learn how to use it effectively!
My number one recommendation is to use calendaring. Whether it is Outlook, or an app on your phone, or a paper-based tool, capturing everything you need to do, and when you need to do it, is critically important. Having the “pre” and “post” is key too. So for example, you need to make a certain number of prospecting calls so you block two hours on your calendar and write “prospecting calls.” But what about the time it takes to put together the list of people you want to call? Is that at your fingertips or do you need to block 20 minutes to “create list of names” for calls. Do you need to block an hour for “follow up from prospect calls” and so on?
Don’t look at one task as a singular thing you need to do, but rather get good at capturing all of what’s involved, making time for it on the calendar and then focusing on only that activity at the time you are doing it. If you can prevent yourself from becoming distracted and picking up something else you need to do, this will also help you complete the task at hand and be able to move confidently on to the next thing!
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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Beverly Flaxington is a practice management consultant. She answers questions from advisors facing human resource issues. To submit yours, email us here. 
