Margaret, an advisor for only the past two years, had brought in close to $60 million in new assets from seven new clients plus consolidations from existing clients. However, Margaret was no rookie. She'd been a sales assistant for 17 years. She was recruited to a wealth management team 10 years ago and impressed the team leader to the point she was assigned 45 affluent clients to personally manage. Clients loved her, and as they began to consolidate their assets with the team, Margaret excelled.
Her success prompted Jeremy, the team leader, to take Margaret under his wing and mentor her in the art of rainmaking. He became her role model as she got fully licensed, followed Jeremy’s directive, listened and learned from his feedback, and became a rainmaker within two years. Due to her own hard work and Jeremy’s instruction, Margaret is ahead of the team's two junior advisors and second only to her mentor in new assets.
The power of an excellent role model is awesome and cannot be understated. But, it can lead you down a number of different paths such as constructive growth activities, destructive negative activities or even complacency.
Complacency has become a curse for many financial advisors. Why? Many of the veteran big producers have already made wealth for themselves and have taken their foot off the growth engine. They’re not willing to put forth the effort that Jeremy was modeling for Margaret. Don’t get me wrong, they’ve worked hard and if they want to relax, they’ve earned the right. However, those fledgling financial advisors who’ve looked up to them for so long need to find a New World Role Model.
So here’s my question: do you have a professional role model? Is she or he fully engaged and crushing it during these challenging times? If so, great. Take a look in the mirror and assess whether or not you’ve been modeling both the attitude and behavior of this exceptional advisor.
If your role model hasn’t been fully engaged, or if you don’t currently have a role model, your mission should be to search for and find a New World Role Model. When you do, you’ll find yourself in Margaret’s world, working harder than ever, living outside your comfort zone and experiencing serious personal growth.
Margaret’s New World Role Model (i.e. her team leader, Jeremy) preached opportunity as soon as COVID-19 entered the scene. His mantra was…
“Now is the time to work harder than ever on relationship management and relationship marketing. Most advisors won’t know what to do. We’re going to love our clients and COIs like never before, consolidate their assets and bring in new clients from all the positive word-of-mouth.”
Not only did he repeat that message like a drum beat, he encouraged everyone to be as proactive as possible. In the early phases of the pandemic, this meant:
- Setting up a home office with a video studio for every advisor.
- Calling a minimum of 10 clients and 1 COI a day to check in.
- Conducting educational webinars for clients and inviting COIs to attend.
- Sourcing one prospect daily for a future introduction.
As we’ve entered this next phase of the pandemic, they’ve incorporated:
- One lunch, breakfast or early dinner every day
- Small, outdoor client events
- Invitations for COIs to visit their office
- Recorded video segments for social media
They’ve now embraced the fact that many clients and COIs were ready for face-to-face interaction. It provided a perfect opportunity to combine business with catching up on personal family affairs. In turn, clients rave about Margaret and have provided her with a wealth of referrals and upgrade opportunities.
In Margaret’s words during one of the team’s coaching calls:
“I’m not sure what we’d have been doing without Jeremy’s leadership. I know we’d have been busy, but I don’t think we’d be succeeding at this level.”
While Jeremy and Margaret are going gangbusters, the junior advisors are struggling to keep up. According to their coach, Margaret has blown by them and Jeremy is quick to remind them of that fact and challenges them to follow Margaret’s example.
Margaret, and her role model Jeremy, continue executing what Jeremy now refers to as their New World Growth Plan. The team is crushing it, the junior advisors have had a wake-up call and should survive, and Margaret is a poster child for thriving under the New World Role Model.
Now is the time to reboot and crush it! Who’s your New World Role Model?
Matt Oechsli is author of Building a Successful 21st Century Financial Practice: Attracting, Servicing & Retaining Affluent Clients. www.oechsli.com