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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.
Dear Bev,
I appreciated your article on growth. I concur with all you said. In our firm, “growth” seems to be the only thing our senior leaders are talking about lately. They are the classic management team — far removed from the clients. They don’t seem to understand what we have to do to service clients and keep them happy.
Recently, I have clients sending me article after article about disaster in the markets due to current economic conditions. Our portfolios are doing well, and we have strong client relationships. However, responding to their inquiries and providing information is time-consuming. I’ve also had two deaths, three divorces and one significant medical issue occur among our current clients all at once. We have an amazing support team, and we couldn’t do our jobs without them. But we are still front-line for our clients.
I tried having a conversation with one of our firm owners and was surprised at how callous she was in her response. She told me new money is worth more than babysitting existing clients. This contradicts everything I’ve ever learned: It is much less expensive to keep a client than it is to find a new one and onboard.
I have a few friends at other firms, and I know growth is the focus almost everywhere. But I haven’t heard of firms that are holding their advisors so strictly to standards that prioritize growth like we are. Is there a way to help our leaders understand what our jobs entail?
It’s not that my colleagues and I are even resistant to the growth mandate. However, we already have a full-time job that requires a lot of time and attention. My clients call me nights and weekends, and I am always available. I work close to 70 hours a week as it is.
Anonymous
Dear Advisor,
Thank you for being an ongoing reader of the column. Your situation is unique and, at the same time, not so unique in the market, right now. One of my clients asked me a while ago if I would establish a sales school for non-advisors (we have one called Advisors Sales Academy for those already in the business). He lamented how hard it was to find advisors who are sales-focused and hungry to grow. He also asked if I’d consider training people on the sales side, while his firm took over for the technical piece.
I thought it was a stunning perspective, because he was basically saying that — in this cerebral, technical, highly educated industry that all can be taught — it is the sales skills that are harder to grasp!
In fairness to him, he isn’t wrong. Most advisors don’t find themselves in this business because they wanted to be salespeople and spend all of their time worrying about the next sale. They find themselves here because they (a) love finance and the markets, or (b) want to help people, or © are great planners and love problem-solving, or (d) a combination of all three.
Sales can be taught. I know this, because I’ve done it for decades in my career. In your case, the problem isn’t likely the advisors and their sales skills or lack thereof, but rather the way management is treating you on the topic of growth.
I have run sales teams, developed sales teams, trained salespeople and trained advisors for many years. The things I have found that do not work are:
- Badgering people about next steps and asking them over and over again about opportunities in the pipeline.
- Setting unrealistic expectations for growth and then expecting people to reach them anyway.
- Working with non-qualified prospects just because management is putting on pressure to find anyone.
- Pushing for a close for someone who will come in the front door, but likely shortly go out the back door because it wasn’t the right fit, or there was pressure to close, or the person working the deal just needed a win.
- Asking “What have you done for me lately?” instead of acknowledging that the right steps, taken over time, always lead to the best results.
Your management likely has never been in sales, so they are making all of the wrong decisions about how best to encourage people to succeed. It could behoove you to share some client stories, talk about the work you are doing on a daily basis, remind them of the revenue attached to existing clients and even do some time tracking to show where your 70 hours are going. Education is your best bet, but if people are focused on growth at all costs, sometimes they aren’t in a position to really listen and hear.
Dear Bev,
We have recently hired three new advisors and two support team members. Our website is outdated and features our prior team. Our materials are also old and tired looking. Our marketing person is all about social media. He focuses his time on posting to accounts that I’m not sure our clients even frequent. Meanwhile, I had a new client I needed to transfer to one of the newer advisors ask me the other day why the advisor isn’t on the website.
Our marketing person is young and often seems to think, because we are older, we just don’t get how things work today. However, our clients are also older, with 80% of them over 50. They aren’t scrolling Instagram to find their financial advisor.
T.T.
Dear T.T.,
Ah, the disconnect between the front-line client-facing people and the back-office support individuals who are presumably doing all they can to support prospects, clients and their advisors! Often, the back-office folks fall short. It happens everywhere and can be eternally frustrating.
Your best bet, as I said to the earlier reader in today’s column, is education. Don’t expect your marketing person to know what you are hearing from clients. Don’t expect him to read your minds about what should be prioritized. Tell him. Share the client story about the new advisor. Collect details and data about the questions clients ask about your website, or for materials.
Ask your marketing person how many new prospects have come in from Instagram. If there are not many, ask if he could balance his activities so you are able to get the support you need. Most marketing people — like any professional — want to be successful. I doubt he is trying to choose things that aren’t as productive — he likely just doesn’t know better. Take the time to be informative in a non-accusatory, collaborative manner.
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. The firm has won the Wealthbriefing WealthTech award for Best Training Solution for 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025 and 2026. Beverly is currently an adjunct professor at Suffolk University teaching Executive MBA students Leadership and Managing Teams. She 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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Advisor Perspectives welcomes guest contributions. The views presented here do not necessarily represent those of Advisor Perspectives.
