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EJ - GP & LP changes

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Aug 26, 2009 4:39 pm

Support staff is important



Sales staff is critical



Therefore sales staff is MORE important



If you can’t see the logic in this then I hope you are never in a leadership position, Spiff.

Aug 26, 2009 4:45 pm

Support means we have a symbiotic relationship and we work in PARTNERSHIP for the betterment of the firm as a whole.   

 
I can see that you and foot are cut from the same cloth.    Spiff-   I really struck a nerve, that wasn't my intention at all. I think you ought have these discussions with people that may care to listen and perhaps persuade upper management what a mistake it would be to follow through with a change in the LP program. What will you do if they change the LP floor or allow for more profit to higher producers or keep it with the GP's who take on all the risk of the firm?   You are an employee, whether at home office or as an FA, and as such, you are expendable.  Your concept of partnership and the GP's may not be what you hope it to be. You really aren't a partner in the sense of equity, you have no vote, and if they change things you can only react to their decisions.Maybe that's what is bugging you the most. The cloth you refer to is the mindset of a business owner.   By the way you mentioned LPL back office...can't hold a candle to yours. Our office montra is we tell them what to do, or we tell how what we want to get accomplished, and we follow-up relentlessly. We need them, but they know intuitively without us they don't have employment.    
Aug 26, 2009 7:18 pm

[quote=B24]

Bottom line, support staff in any business should be entitled to as much ownership stake as the owners see fit.  Owners don't cut in staff out of the goodness of their hearts.  They do it to get buy-in and increase retention.  If the owners don't want to do it (offer ownership), they must live with the potential consequences (employee morale, turnover, disinterest, etc.).  It just depends how valuable the staff is to the owner.  IMHO, Jones believes that the culture they foster at the home office (partially leveraged through LP participation) has a positive enough impact on the firm, that they continue to offer it.  Think of it this way...with all of Jones quirks, what would FA retention be if we had a really sh!tty back office?  I mean, I have nothing to compare to (except other industries), but I am very pleased overall with the support I get.   Just a different perspective.[/quote]   At Jones the owners have entitled support staff to be treated as equals when it comes to LP.  Historically, the only differentiation in the way FAs are treated has been in the amount of LP they are offered.  I would guess that the average associate who is offered LP at the home office is offered somewhere around $10K-20K, whereas the average FA is probably offered twice that.  Jones has never before made a distinction between whether or not you were an FA when it comes to payout.  You get paid 7.5% guaranteed and then whatever LP earns above that.  End of story.    What irks me about the conversation with foot, and now volt, isn't specifically their opinion on where they rank on the food chain at EDJ (BTW Volt, you're not as high as you might think yourself to be), but their attitude that home office people are a somewhat lower class of people.  Now, that's my interpretation and if I misinterpreted, my apologies.  The fact that I used to be one of those folks certainly puts me a bit on the defensive. 
Aug 26, 2009 7:44 pm

Spiff-

  I will take a bet that if you query 100 brokers, 90 of them will feel exactly the way volt and I have expressed it. What irks you...is deep down...you know we are spot on when it comes to this topic.   Ask a GP, and I would bet you off the record, they would set you straight. They can't really care about employees...they are owners.
Aug 26, 2009 10:41 pm

[quote=Spaceman Spiff][quote=B24]

Bottom line, support staff in any business should be entitled to as much ownership stake as the owners see fit.  Owners don't cut in staff out of the goodness of their hearts.  They do it to get buy-in and increase retention.  If the owners don't want to do it (offer ownership), they must live with the potential consequences (employee morale, turnover, disinterest, etc.).  It just depends how valuable the staff is to the owner.  IMHO, Jones believes that the culture they foster at the home office (partially leveraged through LP participation) has a positive enough impact on the firm, that they continue to offer it.  Think of it this way...with all of Jones quirks, what would FA retention be if we had a really sh!tty back office?  I mean, I have nothing to compare to (except other industries), but I am very pleased overall with the support I get.   Just a different perspective.[/quote]   At Jones the owners have entitled support staff to be treated as equals when it comes to LP.  Historically, the only differentiation in the way FAs are treated has been in the amount of LP they are offered.  I would guess that the average associate who is offered LP at the home office is offered somewhere around $10K-20K, whereas the average FA is probably offered twice that.  Jones has never before made a distinction between whether or not you were an FA when it comes to payout.  You get paid 7.5% guaranteed and then whatever LP earns above that.  End of story.    What irks me about the conversation with foot, and now volt, isn't specifically their opinion on where they rank on the food chain at EDJ (BTW Volt, you're not as high as you might think yourself to be), but their attitude that home office people are a somewhat lower class of people.  Now, that's my interpretation and if I misinterpreted, my apologies.  The fact that I used to be one of those folks certainly puts me a bit on the defensive.  [/quote]

You lost this argument the moment you became emotionally invested.

I rank NOWHERE.  I'm simply a new guy trying to make my way however I have a bit of exp. outside of Jones that makes qualifies me to have an opinion on the value of production vs. backoffice.  Within a sales related business your sales force is ALWAYS the most important unit.  To think otherwise is foolish.  I know you are not a fool so don't insult our intelligence trying to say the value of support staff is equal to that of sales.  It's buffoonery.

They are NOT lower class.  The are hard working, honest, smart people ... but they do not pay for their salaries.  YOU DO. We make the business go ... not them, not ever - they simply greese the gears.

I also agree with you that they deserve LPs.  I imagine its quite a source of pride form them to get one and one heck of a recruitment/retention tool.

Do me a favor and don't put words in my mouth there Spiffy, read what I wrote and have written.
Aug 28, 2009 4:50 pm

Spiff,B or any other Jones rep-

  Can anyone confirm 1 in 10K statement that changes in the partnership plan are coming?
Aug 28, 2009 5:17 pm

What does it matter to you? If you used to work for Jones call some of your old associates.

Aug 28, 2009 5:59 pm

I’ll confirm that it was posted by a guy on this board for a week. I can’t confirm or deny the claim, but it sounds absurd on its face.

Aug 28, 2009 6:00 pm
voltmoie:

What does it matter to you? If you used to work for Jones call some of your old associates.

He has just as much ownership as you do!!!
Aug 28, 2009 6:14 pm

That’s actually pretty funny noggin.

  I called a couple of folks at HQ that I know and none of them have even heard about it.  Now, they're not GP's so they may not have any more insight than I do, but they would certainly have the opportunity to bump into more GPs than I do on a daily basis.  Both of them chuckled when I mentioned it.  
Aug 28, 2009 6:21 pm
Spaceman Spiff:

What irks me about the conversation with foot, and now volt, isn’t specifically their opinion on where they rank on the food chain at EDJ (BTW Volt, you’re not as high as you might think yourself to be), but their attitude that home office people are a somewhat lower class of people.  Now, that’s my interpretation and if I misinterpreted, my apologies.  The fact that I used to be one of those folks certainly puts me a bit on the defensive. 

  Jeez, this is easy:   Support staff guy quits, you look through a stack of resumes and find a guy who can read and write and you train him a little bit and then you're back in business.   $500k producing sales guy quits, you look through a stack of resumes, you have a 1 in 10 chance you find someone that can produce what you just lost, train him for a while, hopefully within 3-4 years he can produce the amount that just left.    Quite a different dynamic there, and quite a different amount of risk the company takes on when looking at the 2 types.
Aug 28, 2009 9:18 pm

what is a "500k producer"



are they making 500k for the firm, or is that how much they make for themselves for the year?

Aug 28, 2009 9:40 pm
utcheachea:

what is a “500k producer”

are they making 500k for the firm, or is that how much they make for themselves for the year?

  $500,000 gross production.  It could be $600,000 or $400,000, I was just using the number as an example.
Aug 29, 2009 1:54 am

Try to understand that there are 3 buckets of owners at Jones: GPs, LPs, SLPs. A GP at Jones earns whatever the return on capital is for the GP bucket - plus a salary. The GP earnings pay taxes, GP retention, and either loan or cash. The only tinkering they could do is change retention - which does not affect the other owners or the employees.   There is only 100% of GP capital - no more is created.

Aug 30, 2009 2:31 am

Your point, Noggin? I could careless what happens to EDJ partnership agreements. Thanks for making my case.