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 hired a couple of very talented millennials. They were top of their class in finance at their respective universities and have deep knowledge. We have no problems with their technical knowledge or contributions to the firm.
But they push us (the three partners) on our “value to the community.” They want to know what we are doing to give back, how we view ourselves as supporting charities and those less fortunate. One of them, in particular, is quite vocal about it. I wouldn’t call her aggressive but she asks questions every chance she gets either to us directly or in our staff meetings.
It makes my partners and I think she doesn’t believe we are good people. We each donate a sizeable amount every year to a number of charities, but I don’t believe it is her business to know what those amounts are, and what we do. She has hijacked the other millennial so they are both repeatedly asking about this. I told them I would support any initiatives they have to donate their time or give back. But I can’t allow them to spend hours and hours doing this.
Am I crazy or doesn’t this generation understand financial advisory is a profit-making business. We are here to help our clients. But we aren’t here to save the world. If that’s what these folks want to do, then they should work for a charitable organization instead of pushing us to contribute our team’s resources.
A.N.
Dear A.N.,
I re-read your message a couple of times and the only question I found was “Am I crazy?” As many times as I have answered inquiries or talked to my advisor clients about issues, I do not believe I have developed the qualification to ascertain if someone is crazy or not based on a note they write! So, I won’t answer that particular question. But I can shed some light on the frustration you are having and the differences of opinion you outline.
Many millennials believe in giving back. I had the opportunity to run a student-oriented session at TD Ameritrade this past week and one of the other professors commented on the different values and the adjectives the younger generation uses to describe this work. They talked a lot about “community,” “collaboration” and “giving back.” This age group cares deeply about taking care of others and feels a responsibility to do something that makes an impact. Many of the students in the session saw financial advisory as a way to “help.”
Your situation is a common problem, which is a values mismatch. Those people joined your firm not knowing enough about what you do stand for and what matters to you. Either they didn’t ask enough in the interview process about how you give back, or you didn’t share enough about the philosophy of your firm but clearly what matters to them – at a root level – and how you run your business do not line up. In most cases it means that eventually the people will leave to find their bliss elsewhere because they aren’t fulfilled enough in the current environment.
I’m not sure there is a lot you can do unless you are willing to relook at your own values and consider whether you want to instill a new value set. We are all wired with certain value sets and what you care about may actually be in conflict with what matters to these employees. You can hope to show them the error of their ways (it doesn’t work….) or you can shift the way you do business, which is a huge endeavor and may go against your own personal values and that of your partners.
The easiest way to address this, assuming you want to keep these people on your team, is to allocate a certain number of hours each month they are able to donate their time on your dime. Many years ago when I worked for a large company, we were able to take time during our workday to go into the public school system and read to the students. The company gave us the time off – it was a contribution to the city, and to kids in need and it made employees feel good about what they were doing. Rather than upend your culture, you can institute a program like this (on a smaller scale) and find a way to get their values met without you losing a whole lot in the process.
Be glad they are asking – it sounds like you have hired very confident young people which will likely serve your advisory firm well over time.
Dear Bev,
How do you deal with an advisor who is nearing retirement, makes plenty of money, doesn’t need a lot more and has access to some of the most plum relationships in the firm, but won’t share the clients so others can meet them? How do we get this person to find new business, and help to grow the firm by leveraging their contacts and their relationships?
R.H.
Dear R.H.,
How do you deal with them? You don’t! Honestly, this is one of the more challenging dynamics that I experience in our industry and many firms are facing it. What’s the incentive for someone who doesn’t want to work that hard, is making great money and is looking at the downside of their career? There are really no effective carrots, or sticks, that will move that person to action.
That said, you can’t run the risk that he or she rides off into the sunset and you have no connection to their clients when they do. Talk with them about the client perspective, the risk inherent in having a single point of contact, the fact that you have others in the firm who could serve the clients well. Tell a story about an advisor who faced an early and very unexpected death and whose clients were reeling from the loss but how no one else in the firm knew them well enough to deal with them effectively. While morbid, it is the same way companies sell insurance – the fear of leaving someone you care about without options or support. Tell him or her you hope they don’t go anywhere for a long, long time but to mitigate risk with the client base, it is important to share connections more broadly.
Perhaps you can find an area that isn’t the strong suit of this person. For example one of my clients had this situation and figured out the lead/older advisor had never met the next generation (or the next one) for their clients. The firm explained this was limiting the investor because their family would not know how to deal with everything if something happened to them. This gave the advisor “permission” to bring in another, younger colleague to deal with that next generation.
You can’t threaten or cajole, but sometimes you can make an appeal on behalf of the client that will resonate with an advisor and get them a bit more motivated to take some action. But I will close as I opened, it is a tough road and it may take several conversations and your best influencing skills to bring them around to your way of thinking.
Beverly Flaxington co-founded The Collaborative, a consulting firm devoted to business building for the financial services industry in 1995. The firm also founded and manages the Advisors Sales Academy. She is currently an adjunct professor at Suffolk University teaching undergraduate students Entrepreneurship. 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. 
