Opinion

Certainty Blog

In Charge & Letting Go of Control

In Charge & Letting Go of Control

A 24-year-old adviser in one of our Certainty Advice firms, engaged a $12,000 new advice client last week. The striking aspect of this engagement was that the 24-year-old adviser is still in her professional year. Technically unqualified? Yes. Compliant? Yes....

AI Advice – The Consequences.

AI Advice – The Consequences.

$88 Advice? Welcome to the future. Financial providers are releasing new advice offerings in response to the first tranche of the Delivering Better Financial Outcomes legislation. An annual $88 will give Colonial First State (sorry, firewalled) superannuation members...

Bigger is not always better

Bigger is not always better

As a kid, I always wanted to be bigger. Grownups could stay up late, didn't have to go to school, could do what they wanted and had money to buy whatever they wanted. Little did I know my life as a kid was privileged, safe, happy and secure. I also didn't appreciate...

The future of advice?

The future of advice?

Seen the latest predictions for the Australian financial advice industry? Check it out - Deloitte’s – “Advice 2030 – The Big Shift” The main objective of ‘trend’ reports is to position the authors as experts. I’ve done it myself several times, starting twenty-two...

Black and White Advice Syndrome?

Black and White Advice Syndrome?

I have a weird memory. Particularly for far too many old TV ads. Joe the Gadget man. You need Palmolive Gold. Mrs Marsh’s Chalk. Louie the Fly. It gets weirder. Sometimes, my brain replays, re-visualising an old commercial during random conversations. This happened...

Start with Why, Pay for What?

Start with Why, Pay for What?

Simon Senek's book "Start With Why" is a phenomenon. Published in 2011, the book extolled that people don't buy what you do. They buy why you do it. Sinek's theory suggested that of the two methods of influencing behaviour, manipulation and inspiration, most influence...

TOUGH CHOICES

TOUGH CHOICES

I'm a COBOL programmer. We moved out of our family home of 32 years last weekend, and I found an old coding template with a few punch cards that I have kept since the late 1970s. I didn't think I was a hoarder (maybe?). It took me back to when the talent supply could...

ADVICE FOR THE MAJORITY

ADVICE FOR THE MAJORITY

What do advisers do? Maximise returns, protect risks, anticipate complexities, minimise costs, reduce stress, remove distractions, test assumptions, and change client’s long-term habits. Advisers are in the confidence business. They convert a client’s doubts into...

Don’t Fly Solo

Don’t Fly Solo

4:52 pm March 23rd, 1995, will be special until my last breath. I had never been so elated before this moment. It was the birth of our first baby – Bec. At least half an hour later, as emotions settled, I wondered what had happened to our obstetrician. Nice guy,...

Advice MoneyBall

Advice MoneyBall

We listen to a lot of adviser-client Discovery conversations. That’s our job. We can’t transform advice skills without working deep into the details of what’s said in client meetings, which only recordings of Discovery and Engagement conversations can provide....

Discovery Gates

Discovery Gates

DISCOVERERS & EXPLORERS A great influencer of mine died last week. He was 95 – a close cousin of my father. He fought, laughed and played hard until his last tough weeks. A showman. A preacher. A rebel. A community-builder. Gawd, he could talk and boom his way...

YOUR UNWRITTEN STANDARDS

YOUR UNWRITTEN STANDARDS

Molly recently cared for a client facing an unexpected life-changing decision to move directly from a hospital stay into a nursing home. Going home was not an option. It was a challenging situation at the best of times, but in this case, it became heart-rending when...

What advice for Laurie?

What advice for Laurie?

Laurie wants to stop and retire. Originally from New Zealand, he built a landscaping business from nothing in 1986 to the best on the north coast. He reckons he is working harder than ever. Finding and keeping staff is getting harder. Dealing with their attitudes is...

Bella’s Transition

Bella’s Transition

Bella has run her small architecture firm for over 20 years. As the demand for her work grows, so do her costs. At 52 years old, she had hoped for more options. Since a messy divorce seven years ago, she has spent all reserves from the settlement and parent's...

Lower prices are just the beginning…

Lower prices are just the beginning…

I spent many Saturday mornings at Harry's Hardware on Whistler Street in downtown Manly after Anna and I bought our "renovator's delight" on Manly flat. Harry had an old-style cluttered store when hardware stores used to be as common as butchers, grocers, and milk...

Financial adviser, imposter or both?

Financial adviser, imposter or both?

Both my parents smoked. Like chimneys. As kids, we'd munch down our morning cornflakes surrounded by last night's dirty ashtrays. The perfect Christmas present for Dad was a sparkling new ashtray. Little did we know the dangers of smoking. Kind of like imposter...

GET ACCOUNTABLE

GET ACCOUNTABLE

I’ve run three marathons and a dozen half-marathons. I take my running gear whenever I’m travelling overnight. I love what running does for me. That’s thanks to Pete Talty. Regardless of the conditions, Pete was always there. 6am every Saturday, waiting at the bottom...

Get Agile

Get Agile

My wife Anna loves book club. She comes home from their dinners with a new thought-provoking discussion sparked by the book, regardless of whether she liked it, read it or hated it. Their latest was Lessons in Chemistry, which also recently began as a series on Apple...

Get Prioritised

Get Prioritised

I'm a rugby union tragic. I loved playing the game until one too many concussions meant I shouldn't run on ever again. I love watching local games. A highlight of my sporting year used to be watching our Wallabies in national games. Unfortunately, our team seem locked...

Building Deep Client Trust

Building Deep Client Trust

How do advisory firms methodically create and manage deep client trust? While protecting profitability and reducing dependency, building advice platforms and skills for advice teams to build deep trust in their client relationships is the third of six principles...

Reducing Dependency – Building Great Advice Firms

Reducing Dependency – Building Great Advice Firms

I know the problem with my golf game. The guy holding the club. My instincts want to hit the ball too hard because my ridiculous golf brain believes 'bigger is better'. On the odd occasion when my instincts produce a great shot, it's usually a fluke. Tim Carrigg and...

How to Grow Profits

How to Grow Profits

I can still see the surprised looks on their faces. It was November 1989, during a three-day "Agent As A BusinessPerson" workshop MLC asked me to design and facilitate. One of the last sessions for the twenty-five accountants and financial planners had each attending...

Advice is Not About Goals

Advice is Not About Goals

  Every August, I spend an evening at my old school answering questions from Year 11 students as they share their post-school career options. My sessions are generally Q&A events for kids interested in small businesses. Last week’s questions ranged from what...

How to Avoid Becoming Part of the Problem

How to Avoid Becoming Part of the Problem

These are interesting times. Interesting is probably an understatement, thanks to regulatory reform, ridiculous compliance guidelines, depleted advice talent, and increasing demands from teams and clients. Advisers don't need more hassles - particularly self-inflicted...

The problem with super is super

The problem with super is super

The problem with super is super. Since the 2002 Financial Services Review, there have been at least a dozen enquiries, commissions and reviews into Australia’s superannuation, insurance, investment, and financial services industries. Last week APRA and ASIC jointly...

Building Teams – Outsourcing & Thriving

Building Teams – Outsourcing & Thriving

My Dad was a radiologist. Many Saturdays, after watching me from the sideline of a sport-field, I would accompany him to his rooms as he worked his Saturday morning of patient appointments. I enjoyed these mornings working with his dark-room technician in the dim red...

Amazon Advice – The consequences of ‘good advice’

Amazon Advice – The consequences of ‘good advice’

Amazon Advice is coming to a screen near you. It is already happening. Wesfarmers recently bought a large telehealth business - Instantscripts - for $135m. This purchase was in addition to the company's $1B acquisition of the Priceline Pharmacy chain last year. Not to...

Better is better with proactive referrals

Better is better with proactive referrals

With two good friends, Anna and I just completed a 17-day walk across Northern England – the Coast to Coast – a through-trek charted fifty years ago by Alfred Wainwright. It was challenging. It couldn’t have been better. Britain’s Right to Roam offers walkers...

Fighting Helplessness

Fighting Helplessness

Heard of Learned Helplessness? It is a condition first researched in the 1960s by a team of psychologists that included Professor Martin Seligman. A group of dogs were given mild electric shocks. Some dogs could press a button to stop the shocks, while a second group...

The Three Myths of Fee Increases

The Three Myths of Fee Increases

I've got the best job in the world. Clients pay me to observe and recommend paths they've already considered. Such as a pricing session I ran for a fast-growing advisory firm. I knew it would be interesting when I read in the pre-work that one director had suggested...

Quality or Quantity of Advice Reviews?

Quality or Quantity of Advice Reviews?

If plumbers need new pipes, and if the cobbler's kids need new shoes, does it follow that a lawyer needs new laws? Maybe. Michelle Levy's three-page plea to the government to adopt her Quality of Advice Review recommendations in this week's AFR is a curious political...

The problem with systems…

The problem with systems…

Michael Gerber was right. Systems can improve every aspect of our work lives by providing the necessary frameworks to help busy technicians create solid businesses. Gerber's book - "The E-Myth Revisited"- created a new language for small business development. His...

Lacking talent or vision?

Lacking talent or vision?

Have you heard Nigel Marsh speak? He is good. An ex-marketing executive, he started EarthHour in 2007, the Sydney Skinny Swim in 2013 and has managed to accrue over 5.3m views of his work/life balance TED talk. His message was about navigating the constant white water...

To thrive, it helps to be extraordinary

To thrive, it helps to be extraordinary

I enjoy the New Philosopher. It is easy to read, provocative, and past editions are a reliable source when I need something to clear my head, which is getting more often. For instance, a recent article – The Courage to be Different - in Edition 38: Courage quoted...

Advice – The Best Debt Ever?

Advice – The Best Debt Ever?

“You have got to be joking?” "Ten thousand dollars?" “What on earth will you tell me for $10,000 that I can’t discover myself?” Nicole’s advice fee was a bit of a shock. While understandable considering the circumstances, the reaction took her by surprise. Why? ISSUES...

The (Challenging & Prosperous) Road Ahead

The (Challenging & Prosperous) Road Ahead

Twenty-one years ago, I conducted a qualitative survey of Australian financial advisers with John J. Bowen Jr and Russ Alan Prince. The objective was to identify the client proposition advisers regarded as crucial to the future of financial advice. Russ’ team had...

The Quality of Advice Review

The Quality of Advice Review

There’s good and bad in the Quality of Advice Review (QAR) released by Treasury last week. The good is the proposed framework for the delivery of affordable financial products. For Australians less interested in advice and more focused on making simple purchases, the...

How much for that Statement of Advice?

How much for that Statement of Advice?

How much do you charge for a Statement of Advice (SOA)? Do you price based on complexity? Do you have a minimum fee regardless of complexity? Do you reimburse the SOA fee when the prospect becomes a client? CRUCIAL There is no question that SOAs are crucial when...

Why Buy a Client Base or an Advisory Firm?

Why Buy a Client Base or an Advisory Firm?

I'm currently working with several firms considering a client base or business purchase. Each has different reasons. One wants to achieve more significant 'economies of scale'. One wants to fill a gap in the range of expertise. One is on an aggressive start-up path...

Advice for 2033…

Advice for 2033…

All the best for 2023! Ready? Neither am I. A reflection on the 2013 advice marketplace and three thoughts on what advice might look like in ten years - 2033 - might be helpful for your steps in 2023. Despite the exceptional upheavals over the past decade, financial...

The Four Advice Hurdles of 2023…

The Four Advice Hurdles of 2023…

Advisers thrive because they anticipate, worry, prepare and manage complex client issues. Good advisers are masters at it. Great advisers are masters at doing the same for themselves. There are several hurdles facing advisory firms in 2023 - for advisory teams...

JOE, THE GREAT ADVISER

JOE, THE GREAT ADVISER

Listened to any of Pushkin’s podcasts? They pump out some great ones. A favourite is “The Happiness Lab”, which lives up to a promise showing how our brains are not always our best guides for our well-being or progress. Another one – “Against the Rules” – is just as...

GETTING OUT OF THE RED

GETTING OUT OF THE RED

Brian “Digger” Booker taught me to fly. One cool Sunday morning, after landing VH-TUC at Camden airport, Digger asked me to pull over into one of the aircraft waiting bays just off the runway. He was getting out. He believed it was time for my first solo flight. What...

WHAT IS MARKET PRICING?

WHAT IS MARKET PRICING?

We've been looking at rural properties. One near Little Hartley looks special. Why? It sounds ridiculous, but it's the driveway. It has a long, winding, tree-lined driveway lined with well-established liquid ambers. As you near the home, the trees open onto a large...

THE JIGSAWER & THE TOUR-GUIDE

THE JIGSAWER & THE TOUR-GUIDE

A tell-tale our family is on holiday is a jigsaw puzzle. A Stackpool holiday isn't a holiday without a tricky new puzzle. The puzzling can take all holidays, with the puzzle spot remaining frustratingly off-limits for non-puzzling activities until the puzzle has...

HOW MUCH IS THE RENT?

HOW MUCH IS THE RENT?

Do you ask your doctor what her fees will be next year? No, neither do I. Why do clients ask what the future ongoing fees will be for their financial advisers? Because, unlike doctors, they pay ongoing rent to their advisers. Is that typical of professionals?...

PRICING KNOWLEDGE

PRICING KNOWLEDGE

I used to sell shoes. Florsheim shoes. I thought I was pretty good at it. However, my mates used to say anyone could sell shoes when the shop is just outside the foyer of a Hilton Hotel. “What do you expect? If you’re going to sell fancy shoes, you’re in the perfect...

SUPPORT

SUPPORT

I've messed up again. I've used a story in two of my books incorrectly. The story is of a small group of WWII refugees scared so witless they have paid a guide to flee through freezing, mountainous, and enemy-infested terrain into safer territories. The ordeal takes...

WIN SOME, LOSE SOME

WIN SOME, LOSE SOME

Ever over-eaten? To almost being sick? My mother, Meg, had no sympathy for such a thing. Like sunburn and talking too much, she reckoned you only had yourself to blame. That’s the tricky bit. Realising you are the problem. Similar to the feeling of over-filling an...

GET LEVERAGED

GET LEVERAGED

Some lessons from the covid pandemic promised to unleash new productivity growth. Studies don’t prove it. Yet. The Economist reported that post-pandemic spending is reinforcing supply lines, re-building inventories and attracting talent from the tiniest unemployment...

Showing Up – The #1 Advice Productivity Measure

Showing Up – The #1 Advice Productivity Measure

An advisory team's best days are usually those spent in front of their clients. As most people join the advice industry to help others lead better financial lives, the time spent in client discussions, resolving issues, identifying forward steps, and creating greater...

WHAT IS PROGRESS?

WHAT IS PROGRESS?

The first benchmark of significance to me was a number of flip-flaps. When I could do ten flip-flaps at one time, I’d make the school’s gymnastic team. Gary Kurtz from my class did it. But I could never get to 10. I have slowly moved on from my missed benchmark of...

ADVICE SKILLS OF THE FUTURE

ADVICE SKILLS OF THE FUTURE

I was a COBOL programmer. Not a very good one, but that didn’t matter in the early 1980s. Back then, every Tuesday’s Australian newspaper featured a twenty-four-page IT section, of which many pages advertised programming and analyst positions available, with most from...

ADVICE IS LEADERSHIP

ADVICE IS LEADERSHIP

I had my own brush with Queen Elizabeth II. It was 1986, and I was running late for a meeting in Sydney. I somehow did not notice a barricade intended to block south bound traffic coming off the Cahill Expressway and heading down Macquarie Street. As I drove...

GOOD ADVICE?

GOOD ADVICE?

What is good advice? Is it cheap advice? Is it easy to implement advice? Is it advice that provides better options? Is it advice that saves time or money? Is it advice from a trusted friend? Is it advice from an algorithm that assumes you aspire, behave and resemble...

The Four Pricers

The Four Pricers

I had a coffee with a 'comparer' last week. Although busier than ever, he was bewildered by a response from a significant prospect. He had pitched an advice strategy that would have saved the prospect tens of thousands of dollars in the first twelve months of an...

Bankers becoming Advisers

Bankers becoming Advisers

For different reasons, all our kids left home once they finished school. The eldest, the family’s best writer, went west to Bathurst to study marketing. The determined actress left Australia to chase opportunities in Vancouver’s film industry. The quiet achiever and...

Under-Delegation – How to cripple an advisory firm

Under-Delegation – How to cripple an advisory firm

Know any Texans? If you have to think about it, the answer is probably no. These guys stand out. I've been there several times and have never met a timid one. In the early 1980s, I worked in a small Australian software firm founded by Bruce – a tall, lanky Texan....

The De-Brief Meeting – A Key to Build Firms Not Jobs

The De-Brief Meeting – A Key to Build Firms Not Jobs

The old fisherman with the summertime job running the rusty merry-go-round on Terrigal Beach taught me how to rig my fishing lines. He reckoned there was only one fishing knot I'd ever need – the locked half-blood knot. While my mates say I'm wasting money renewing my...

AVOIDING REAL POTENTIAL?

AVOIDING REAL POTENTIAL?

I love my vinyl record collection. It started when I discovered Electric Warrior in early ’76. The collection continues to grow despite Anna’s opinion that I’m a hoarder. Regular vinyl still beats the best digital sound – vinyl is so much bigger, brighter and better....

The Value is Within

The Value is Within

I reckon Shaftesbury Avenue was one of Australia's greatest weight-for-age horses. Although dominated in handicapped races of the early 1990s by another great horse, Super Impose, I have always believed Shaftesbury was a better horse. I'm biased. My Godfather – Jimmy...

The Value is the Journey

The Value is the Journey

I love trekking. I used to regard anyone walking with poles as a tad too keen. Now I’m one of those pole people. It is not just the poles. I’m discovering all sorts of great, weird stuff. For instance, I don’t know what it is, but I find the combination of conversing...

The Value is in the Detail

The Value is in the Detail

I used to coach a guy I call Adviser Tony. Nice guy, experienced, founder of a successful advisory firm and well-respected in the advice industry. Tony once told me that when his clients ever squabbled about how they wanted to spend their retirement monies, he...

The Illusion of Control

The Illusion of Control

"I just want a handful of good clients without all the stress and grief." This was from the principal of a well-established firm with a fast-growing team. It is a common situation facing owners who appear to have built a successful advisory firm but who are unprepared...

Lessons from Debt – a path to Advice?

Lessons from Debt – a path to Advice?

Heard about Grameen Bank - the bank for the poor? It presents a powerful working model of trickle-up development. Founded in the mid-1970s by Muhammad Yunus in a country lacking first and second-world finance infrastructures, it has sprouted up in over 80,000...

The Toughest No’s of Growth

The Toughest No’s of Growth

With apologies to my first favourite author - Dr Seuss. No is no foe to grow. For grow without no is the toughest of grows. In his book  "The Cat In The Hat Comes Back",  Cats A through Y unleashed incremental mayhem until the tiniest Cat Z makes everything good. "And...

The Advice Gap

The Advice Gap

I love the bush. I reckon it has something to do with my four grandparents being raised in NSW's central west. It never ceases to amaze me how much I enjoy touring on unmarked open country roads with windows down and the elements whooshing in. Even when it's cold and...

Dear Minister… fixing our broken advice market

Dear Minister… fixing our broken advice market

Dear Minister Jones, Congratulations on your appointment as Minister for financial services. I read your early plans with both hope and trepidation about your priority to address the hot mess that is the Australian advice marketplace. I understand the weight behind...

Is Bigger Better?

Is Bigger Better?

I was consulting with a firm recently. They sought advice concerning their massive growth opportunities. Like most advisory firms today, they were enjoying a solid flow of new clients. Thanks to good networks, they were also attracting talented senior advisers...

What Makes An Ideal Advice Client – Part 6 – They Pay

What Makes An Ideal Advice Client – Part 6 – They Pay

During a pricing workshop last month at the Affinia conference on Hamilton Island (is that place the world capital for golf carts?), an adviser shared a fee problem. An aged care expert in his team could not reconcile charging an advice fee equivalent to the price of...

What Makes an Ideal Advice Client – Part 5 – Takes Advice

What Makes an Ideal Advice Client – Part 5 – Takes Advice

I love planes. I firstly obtained a gliders license in an old Blanik soaring above Narromine in 1980. I qualified for my private fixed-wing pilot license in 1984 at Camden airport when paddocks and chicken sheds still surrounded it, and later a commercial helicopter...

What Makes an Ideal Advice Client – Part 4 – Achieving More

What Makes an Ideal Advice Client – Part 4 – Achieving More

Seen the Red Bull 'gives you wings' ads? Whether you like the drink or not, Red Bull's advertising clearly aims to inspire people to achieve more in their lives. A similar message for financial advice. ACHIEVE MORE Valuable advice provides clients with the progress...

What Makes an Ideal Advice Client – Part 3 – Complexities

What Makes an Ideal Advice Client – Part 3 – Complexities

I love Netflix. I understand why their shows have earned more Oscar nominations in recent times than all other studios combined. Considering how they have grown from just another DVD rental service to become the world’s largest creator and streamer of quality...

What Makes an Ideal Advice Client – Part 2 – Hard Advice!

What Makes an Ideal Advice Client – Part 2 – Hard Advice!

One thing seems clear about the upcoming Australian election. Neither major party has the integrity to prepare us for the inevitable tax increases and spending cuts ahead. Our immature political cycle couldn't handle it. Australia's net debt has risen from...

The Ideal Client – Part 1

The Ideal Client – Part 1

I doubt there is such a thing as ‘the ideal advice client’. The continual changes in regulations, alliances, networks, competitions, suppliers and markets make a clear definition difficult. Internally too, a firm’s experience, expertise, systems, teams and existing...

The ridiculous sophisticated investor…

The ridiculous sophisticated investor…

Back in the late 1800s, sea passage had its perils. Unfortunately, some of the worse were man-made and systemic to the business of delivering cargo worldwide. The over-insured and over-loaded 'Coffin Ships' provided a rewarding alternative for villainous ship owners...

Pods or Pools? Building Productive Advisory Teams

Pods or Pools? Building Productive Advisory Teams

Advice firms start like most things in life - tiny. Like parents and their newborns, tiny firms owe their early years to their founders. They grow client by client, either delivering value or not. The value deliverers attract more clients, service existing clients,...

How niches grow advisory firms…

How niches grow advisory firms…

Back in 1985, I thought I found the perfect niche. Cattle breeders embracing technology. I had their perfect 'solution' - basically, it was me providing a XT twin-floppy computer complete with green screen, 256Kb of memory, meagre software, on-site training and...

High-Net-Worth’s? It’s time for a re-think…

High-Net-Worth’s? It’s time for a re-think…

William Francis Sutton was an American bank robber. When asked why he robbed banks, he allegedly responded: "...because that's where the money is." Medicine has used "Sutton's Law" when training students as a metaphor to expedite focus on the most likely source of...

I can’t charge that!

I can’t charge that!

I'm an Elton John fan. Have been since about 1972 when he released Crocodile Rock. In early 2020, Anna and I saw him live in Coffs Harbour. I had bought front row seats for her birthday - Ok, really for me, as she isn't as big a fan. While the seats were ridiculously...

When to hire your next adviser?

When to hire your next adviser?

I've long admired the business and advisory skills of Fausto Pastro. I'm grateful that I met him in 1995, relatively early in my consulting career as he epitomised the foundational principles needed to build great advisory firms. I was quoting him again recently...

The vanishing insurance agent?

The vanishing insurance agent?

Know any life and personal insurance agents? My first training workshop was full of them. That was November 1989 at Greenmount Resort, Coolangatta. My "Agent as a Business Person" workshop aimed to assist attendees with the opportunities created by the Hawke...

Screening Prospects…

Screening Prospects…

Sometimes the most powerful approach to growth is "Next!" John Bowen - CEO - CEG Worldwide I first saw John Bowen present in Santa Monica in early 2002. Despite everyone's development nerves, we were still tight in the aftermath of the previous year's 9/11 attacks,...

Doing the real work, or still talk about doing it?

Doing the real work, or still talk about doing it?

"Advisers are not in the business of delivering advice, they are in the business of building a business that delivers advice" Mark P. Hurley, CEO Undiscovered Managers - Manly Pacific Hotel, 1999 I first heard the above quote listening to an American fund manager,...

How many plates can you keep in the air?

How many plates can you keep in the air?

In late 2017, 31-year-old Miwa Sado tragically died due to karoshi - working too hard. She has become a martyr for the overworked worker. A portent to anyone addicted to activity-driven work habits. ACTIVITY-DRIVEN I see an increasing trend of these habits in today's...

What are your growth measures?

What are your growth measures?

What is growth in 2022? For some firms growth in revenue is easier than growth in team members. For some firms growth in profits is easier than growth in amount of time off. For some firms growth in clients is easier than growth in ideal clients. For some firms growth...

Stuck for the wrong reasons?

Stuck for the wrong reasons?

"The thing always happens that you believe in; and the belief in a thing makes it happen." Frank Lloyd Wright I had this good advisory firm client north of Brisbane. They were delivering great advice. Their prospect list was growing. They were forging solid advice...

2022 – It’s a Leadership Year, Ready?

2022 – It’s a Leadership Year, Ready?

"...a skinny Black girl descended from slaves and raised by a single mother can dream of becoming president only to find herself reciting for one." Flexibility is the new leadership means for advisory teams driving for prosperity in 2022. Particularly flexibility...

Financial Advice for the coming “Reconsideration” decade

Financial Advice for the coming “Reconsideration” decade

Is the first year of this decade over yet? Hardly. This week's Economist leaders suggest, what the 9/11 attacks did for air travel, covid-19 has done for what we consider 'normal' - tests, masks, lockdowns, tracing, documentation, zoom, climate impact, property...

Earning your recurring fees?

Earning your recurring fees?

Whose best interests are recurring advice fees serving? The clients or the advisory firms serving them? Possibly both. Possibly neither. PROLIFIC Recurring fees are everywhere. The valuations of most real estate firms are often dependent upon the recurring fees earned...

Free SOAs?

Free SOAs?

If you took some time to consider what are the "first things" in your business life, what would be your response? Think about it for a second. I remember attending a lecture by Roger Merrill soon after I started my business in early 1990's. Merrill was on tour...

Searching for your best 2022 plan?

Searching for your best 2022 plan?

Read Dan and Chip Heath's 2017 book - The Power of Moments? For advisory teams who believe their growth is attached to their client's growth, it's a good read. If you only read one chapter, start at Chapter 6 - Stretch for Insight. It stood out for me because it...

How to Build Advisory Value – via Control or Vulnerability?

How to Build Advisory Value – via Control or Vulnerability?

"Advisers often use value as a drunk uses a lamppost — for support rather than illumination" paraphrasing poet A.E. Housman What is the value of advice? It depends on whom advisers are serving - themselves or their clients? The client's common beliefs about the value...

The financial giants attempting to lead the advice debate….again.

The financial giants attempting to lead the advice debate….again.

On Thursday, 7th February 2017, Scott Morrison, then Federal Treasurer, started question time in our parliament holding a piece of coal aloft. It was a pre-election stunt to draw attention to his Government's commitment to Australia's coal mining sector. Ironically,...

Deliver value – not products, solutions or hours.

Deliver value – not products, solutions or hours.

My first paid job was repairing lawnmowers. It was an early lesson about value. I was 10. I loved engines and all things mechanical. Their smell, noise, shiny insides and, to me, their simplicity. Once my Dad told a neighbour that I had somehow repaired our broken...

The Use of ‘Go/No-Go’ Advice Clauses

The Use of ‘Go/No-Go’ Advice Clauses

Trust is central to advice. It acts like a road upon which all parties in an advisory relationship advance. Without the road, advisory relationships are doomed. A trusted relationship is one where someone is trusting and someone else is being trusted. David Maister...

Reinventing Advice – Less is More

Reinventing Advice – Less is More

Imagine a knee surgeon tired of fixing knees. She has a good medical practice, a good reputation and a long waiting list. But something is missing. She isn't ready to retire. She wants to change how she works. That is difficult considering her business model. OPTIONS...

What is Advice?

What is Advice?

What is advice? Advice isn't information. Information is a cog within an advice framework, much like cogs within a watch. Technically, it’s crucial to understand the performance of each cog, but by itself, information can add to the confusion of the advisee who lacks...

Working ‘on it’ or ‘in it’? Which one, but not both…

Working ‘on it’ or ‘in it’? Which one, but not both…

My doctor has cancer. At the time of writing, she is undertaking treatment and hopefully on a path to full recovery. I began seeing her just over twenty years ago when I started running long distances.  My running buddy was a patient of hers and some of the surprises...

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