With the fiduciary standard in the public spotlight, clients want financial planners they can trust. To cultivate that trust, associate or less experienced planners are required to wear many hats and master many skills, including competence, client understanding, client service and communication, planning, relationship, client interaction and leadership skills. Mastering these skills will help associate planners on their way to becoming senior planners.
Stay up to date with current tax laws, estate laws, planning strategies and the economy. Read the business headlines each day; subscribe to various planning and investment periodicals and listen to the business reports.
Join your local Financial Planning Association chapter and get involved! Attend meetings, network and learn from other members. Read books on how to become more efficient. Be receptive to new ideas and approaches. At our firm, we attempt to improve our clients’ lives through the process of financial life planning, a process that defines our clients’ unique goals, risk tolerance and individual investment strategies.
Act as the quarterback for what needs to be completed. You will be working with clients’ other advisers (lawyers, accountants, etc.), your firm’s administrative staff and account custodians daily.
To keep track of all of the moving parts, consider keeping a work-in-progress Word document for each client. This document should include a list of outstanding items, follow-up questions to ask the client, action items, pertinent facts about the client and explanations of why certain data was entered into the planning software.
Set reminders to ensure things get done. Use your CRM system whenever possible. Time management and organizational skills are very important to your ability to move from associate planner to successful senior planner. Coordinate your calendar, e-mail and smartphone to manage your schedule effectively.
If you tell a client that you will do something, ensure that you do it. This will help deepen the relationship and develop trust, which, as we all know, is critical.
Having a deep understanding of your client is important, but technical skills are essential in order to provide top-quality advice. When preparing financial projections, thoroughly review tax returns, estate documents, etc. Do not call or e-mail a client each time a question arises; instead make a list of questions and contact the client with all outstanding issues at one time.
Input the data into financial planning software to develop a preliminary analysis that outlines the planning assumptions. Are the existing estate documents, investment allocations and risk management policies in line with the client’s goals? After reviewing the initial plan with the client, develop a final plan with specific recommendations and strategies to help clients achieve their goals.
Ensure that illustrations and recommendations are easy to understand from the client’s point of view. Check, check and double check the reports for accuracy. Do they pass the smell test? For example, if your clients are retired and not contributing to their retirement accounts, but their accounts seem to be increasing more than the assumed rate of return, something is not right. Another example is if the Monte Carlo success rate seems too low based on your clients’ spending patterns and net worth. Check account growth rates, account depletion, inflows, outflows, savings and other planning assumptions. Have another associate planner review your plan before sending it to the senior planner for his or her review.
Look clients in the eyes and offer a firm handshake to communicate confidence and warmth. Be pleasant, smile, speak appropriately and engage in positive nonverbal communication cues. Never use slang. Return phone calls and e-mails promptly. Always dress professionally for client meetings.
During client meetings, know your firm’s culture and the senior planner’s preferences with regard to how he or she likes to run meetings. During meetings, take thorough notes so the senior planner can stay actively engaged in the client interaction. Add to the conversation when appropriate. Do not talk negatively about clients’ other advisers. It is not advisable to second guess the senior planner in front of clients. If you believe something the senior planner said was incorrect, talk to him or her alone after the meeting.
After client meetings, complete the post-meeting notes as soon as possible while everything is fresh in your mind. Summarize the meeting notes and send them to the senior planner to review before sending to the client. Meeting notes should provide a summary and the next steps for the clients as well as the planner. Check in with your clients regarding their personal goals. Did they run the marathon? How was the trip to Africa? How are the new grandchildren? After strategy sessions with the senior planner, outline the intended course of action and send it to the senior planner to review. Confirm that the two of you are on the same page to avoid any potential misunderstandings.
If you have client interaction without the senior planner present, inform him via e-mail or the CRM system to keep him abreast of the situation. Do not overwhelm the senior planner with constant phone calls. Prepare for meetings as if you will be the only planner in the room. Think like a senior planner. How will you approach the various topics and potential issues? What information and research should be available for the meeting? Thinking as if you are a senior planner should be beneficial for developing your advisory skills; it will also save valuable time for the senior planner.
There may not be any sales goals for an associate planner, but as you approach senior planner status, you may be expected to assist in attracting new business. Develop an elevator speech that helps sets your company apart from others (be sure to have this approved by the firm’s leaders). Observe how the senior planners in your firm develop business and ask questions about your firm’s sales process.
Get active at your firm. At our firm, we have many committees such as financial planning, data task force, marketing, investments and retirement plans. If you believe that a new committee would be helpful at your firm, develop one. The associate planners in our firm started a committee called APEX, which stands for associate planners’ excellence committee. The APEX mission is to share ideas that will optimize efficiency and create best practices in the financial life planning process while assisting each other in developing skills as financial life planners at our firm.
But when working on projects, don’t bite off more than you can chew. If you say you are going to do something, be sure you can complete it diligently. Make sure that your client priorities are fulfilled, because client needs take precedent over all else.
Solicit feedback from senior planners. Always look to improve and do not take constructive criticism personally. Ask other senior planners for tips; find out what has worked well and not so well in their experiences. Ask to observe and to assist in a meeting of a senior planner with whom you have not worked—it would be a good opportunity to learn from his or her particular style, which may be vastly different from what you have witnessed.
Following these tips will help you become effective and efficient in the quest to become a senior financial planner. Develop the essential skills, solicit feedback, stay up to date with relevant planning topics, ask questions, stay organized and above all else, put the clients’ interests first.