Nerd's Eye View blog

Evolving Your Leadership Style And Hiring Process As The Firm Grows From 1 To 20+ Team Members: #FASuccess Ep 451 With Maggie Kulyk

August 19, 2025 07:04 am 0 Comments CATEGORY: Financial Advisor Success Podcast

Welcome everyone! Welcome to the 451st episode of the Financial Advisor Success Podcast!

My guest on today's podcast is Maggie Kulyk. Maggie is the founder of Chicory Wealth, an RIA based in Decatur, Georgia, that operates virtually and oversees $760 million in assets under management for 480 client households.

What's unique about Maggie, though, is how she overcame her initial reluctance to be a manager to build a thriving business that now has more than 20 team members with robust hiring and career development processes in place.

In this episode, we talk in-depth about how Maggie went from being a self-described "terrible" manager to leading a sizeable firm with a growing staff count in part by evolving her approach to leadership over time (including by delegating responsibilities that don't match her strengths), how Maggie's firm took a major step forward after she made a key hire whose attention to detail and focus on systems complimented Maggie's strengths in vision setting and moving quickly once decisions are made, and how Maggie has found success by having her leadership team manage the hiring process (with her only seeing applicants at the final stage) to ensure a more sober-minded analysis of candidates (given her natural enthusiasm for people she meets).

We also talk about how Maggie overcame her initial reluctance to transition her clients to other advisors on her team in part by hiring and training homegrown advisors in her firm's style (often finding them through college financial planning programs as well as the Amplified Planning Externship program), how Maggie has found success in hiring by zeroing in on her firm's mission and values (and finding aspiring advisors who are attracted to them), and how Maggie's firm has implemented a career path for new hires to advance from an associate role to a client-facing advisor to dealing with complex client situations (carefully increasing the amount of revenue they are responsible for as they move up the advisor ladder).

And be certain to listen to the end, where Maggie shares why she decided to leave a broker-dealer platform to start her own RIA not based on the potential financial benefits of such a move, but rather because of a desire to be truly fee-only and to build a brand identity centered on socially conscious investing, how Maggie has implemented an internal purchase structure to give next-generation team members a path to firm ownership (without adding risk to their personal balance sheets) and to put the firm in a strong position to thrive when she eventually decides to retire, and how Maggie has found that while personal change has been an important part of her business-building journey, she's ultimately found success by always being true to herself and her values.

So, whether you're interested in learning about leveraging your strengths (and recognizing your weaknesses) as a leader, the challenges that come with transitioning from a smaller advisory practice to a larger business, or how to build a strong team by hiring candidates who are aligned with the firm's mission and values, then we hope you enjoy this episode of the Financial Advisor Success podcast, with Maggie Kulyk.

The 3 Concerns Keeping $25M+ Families Up at Night

August 18, 2025 07:01 am 0 Comments CATEGORY: Practice Management

Many advisors focus on attracting and serving high net worth individuals and families, and with only a limited number of such clients to go around, this can be a competitive space. The higher net worth that a family has, the more that an advisory firm has to stand out in order to gain them as clients. However, advisors who can speak directly to the concerns of this client niche can give themselves a unique – and differentiating – advantage to best serve this segment of the population!

In this 'hybrid' video-based article, Michael Kitces and John Bowen, CEO and founder of CEG Worldwide and CEG Insights (formerly Spectrem Group), dive into CEG's extensive data on what ultra-high net worth (UHNW) families are really worried about and how advisors can serve this group more effectively.

The first major concern is macroeconomic risk. Nearly 80% of UHNW families worry about inflation, market volatility, and geopolitical instability. While they recognize that no advisor can control these forces themselves, most families expect proactive strategies, clear communication, and coordinated access to top-tier specialists who can help them navigate economic uncertainty. Many families seek bespoke guidance at a high level of service on topics such as alternative investments, charitable planning, and estate planning. At the same time, expectations for investment returns have moderated, with many clients content with ‘just’ 6%-8% returns on investment if their portfolio comes with strong principal protection. For advisors, the new challenge lies in clearly aligning their investment philosophy with a client’s concerns: Perhaps by maintaining a consistent strategic allocation or by making tactical adjustments, but in either case showing an awareness of what’s going on in the world and an understanding of how to manage to the current reality.

The second concern for these families centers on security and legacy. Beyond market risk, UHNW families fear threats such as litigation, divorce, and cyberattacks. Multi-generational wealth transfer raises the additional challenge of "will my heirs squander it?": More than three-quarters of UHNW families worry about wasteful heirs and want advisors to engage their children and grandchildren early to prepare them for stewardship responsibilities. At times, this may even extend to creating governance structures (sometimes formalized as family constitutions) that define decision-making and preserve values. Cybersecurity has also emerged as a priority, with many willing to pay for specialized protection, which gives advisors who can connect clients with the right services the opportunity to provide peace of mind without necessarily being cybersecurity experts themselves.

The third concern is quality of life and significance. Many in this wealth bracket are older and acutely aware that without health, wealth is less meaningful. They want access to concierge health and longevity services, along with strategies to ensure that their wealth supports a purposeful, multi-generational legacy. Advisors in this space must think less like "family CFOs" and more like general managers, orchestrating vetted specialists across legal, tax, investment, insurance, philanthropy, and wellness. Importantly, these teams don’t need to be built in-house; clients simply want a coordinated, high-caliber network that works seamlessly on their behalf.

For advisors, moving into the UHNW segment is not a matter of scaling up existing mass-affluent practices or building out more and more in-house services. Instead, it requires fewer but deeper client relationships and robust external partnerships to connect clients with a vetted team of experts to meet their needs. Serving UHNW also demands a proactive, holistic approach that addresses not just financial needs, but also family dynamics, personal security, and quality of life.

Ultimately, the reward of serving UHNW clients is both financial and professional – commanding higher fees for delivering truly differentiated value in a space where 60% of successful entrepreneurs are open to changing advisors within the next two years. Advisors willing to embrace this shift can position themselves as indispensable partners in protecting fortunes, guiding families, and helping clients live lives of lasting significance!

Weekend Reading For Financial Planners (August 16–17)

August 15, 2025 02:00 pm 0 Comments CATEGORY: Weekend Reading

Enjoy the current installment of "Weekend Reading For Financial Planners" – this week's edition kicks off with the news that while a report by Microsoft finding that users of its Copilot Artificial Intelligence (AI) tool were able to successfully complete many tasks associated with financial advice (putting financial advisors in the upper tier of job functions that AI could potentially perform), a separate survey from Northwestern Mutual found that Americans continue to overwhelmingly trust human advisors over AI tools for tasks such as creating a retirement plan, suggesting that while many of the functions performed by a financial advisor could theoretically be done with the assistance of an AI tool, consumers are (at least so far) not convinced that relying on AI is a superior approach (though they did largely express support for their human advisors leveraging AI technology, suggesting that AI tools could be more of a force multiplier for advisors rather than a competitor).

Also in industry news this week:

Morningstar's latest "Mind The Gap" report finds that investors continue to frequently underperform in the total performance of the funds they invest in (due to market timing and other behaviors), suggesting a continued valuable role for advisors in helping them stay on track with their investments (even if clients don't necessarily think they're engaging in 'bad' behavior)
A recent regulatory sanction indicates that merely introducing a communications archiving tool is not sufficient for firms to remain compliant with relevant regulations and that more active oversight is necessary

From there, we have several articles on insurance planning:

Recent data indicate that property and casualty insurance premium increases continue to outpace the broader inflation rate, particularly for clients living in disaster-prone areas
The value for clients of maintaining adequate disability insurance and potential pitfalls to monitor when evaluating different types of coverage
A framework for helping clients determine the 'right' amount of insurance needed for their particular circumstances

We also have a number of articles on investment planning:

Why recent momentum for adding private market investments to workers' 401(k) options could create litigation concerns (and lead to E&O insurance hikes) for RIAs advising on business-owner clients' 401(k) plans
How the introduction of private market investments into target-date and other allocation funds could give clients exposure to these assets without actively choosing to do so
Why some advisors and investors might choose to invest in asset managers sponsoring alternative asset funds rather than buying the funds themselves

We wrap up with three final articles, all about living abroad:

Four ways for clients to retire abroad, from leveraging a "golden visa" to taking extended 90-day stays in multiple countries each year
The ups and downs of life as a "digital nomad", from the opportunities for adventure to the weight of handling the logistics of frequent moves
Key issues for advisors working with cross-border clients, including the tax implications of moving to a particular country to the logistics of banking and fund transfers while abroad

Enjoy the 'light' reading!

Find Your ‘Cyborg Advisor’ Sweet Spot: Blend AI Into Your Firm By Understanding How Clients Make Financial Decisions

August 13, 2025 07:01 am 0 Comments CATEGORY: Practice Management, Technology & Advisor FinTech

Financial advice and technology have grown alongside each other – as technology has evolved and expanded, so too have advisory firm services. And as trading, portfolio rebalancing, and financial plan construction have become more efficient, advisors have increasingly focused on holistic advice, financial psychology, and behavioral coaching to complement their technical expertise. Now, with the rapid growth of AI across the financial services industry, questions about whether technology might one day replace human advisors are taking on renewed importance.

In this article, Derek Tharp, Lead Researcher at Kitces.com and Associate Professor of Finance at the University of Southern Maine, explores how advisors can use AI as a tool to augment – not replace – their advice and client relationships. While AI excels at tasks like prediction and computation, it struggles to understand human values, especially since people often don't have a clear or consistent understanding of their own. A client's reluctance to invest in equities or delay Social Security, for instance, may stem from deep-seated beliefs, personal preferences, or a mix of both. And as advisors know, financial advice often goes beyond identifying the 'correct' or 'most optimal' answer – it's also about connection, reassurance, and helping clients uncover their true priorities. While AI can mimic language patterns and simulate empathy, it lacks the lived human perspective necessary for genuine emotional resonance – which can limit the trust clients are willing to place in it, especially when navigating sensitive or complex life decisions.

That said, AI brings real strengths – particularly in data analysis, operational consistency, and computational efficiency. Tools powered by Large Language Models (LLMs) can summarize meeting notes, automate routine communications, and eventually synthesize insights across disparate systems. Advisors adopting these tools will need to ensure that the AI's output is current and that the technology integrates well with their workflows. But when used thoughtfully, AI can help advisors be more present, especially in client meetings!

This emerging hybrid model of the 'cyborg advisor' blends the technical precision of machines with the emotional intelligence and nuanced judgment of human professionals. Looking ahead, AI integration may center around CRMs, financial planning software, document management systems, or middleware AI assistants. Each approach has advantages and tradeoffs. Financial planning software may be particularly well-positioned to become the central hub, with its ability to generate accurate projections and precisely modeled planning scenarios. But CRMs, with their centralized data and integration potential, also have a strong case – especially if they expand their planning functionality. Whatever the tool, these systems can help advisors work smarter, provide more value to clients, and enhance the planning process – all without compromising the integrity of human judgment.

Ultimately, financial planning is rooted in trust, empathy, and the ability to navigate personal values – with a foundation of technical knowledge. As advice continues to evolve, advisors can combine their human strengths with the efficiency of AI to create better client outcomes. Those who embrace this hybrid approach – using AI to enhance, rather than replace, their capabilities – will be well-positioned to thrive in the changing landscape of financial advice!

Adding $80M To Your Practice In 7 Years By Providing Financial Education Through Local Seminars: #FASuccess Ep 450 With Ryan Morrissey

August 12, 2025 07:02 am 0 Comments CATEGORY: Financial Advisor Success Podcast

Welcome everyone! Welcome to the 450th episode of the Financial Advisor Success Podcast!

My guest on today's podcast is Ryan Morrissey. Ryan is the founder of Morrissey Wealth Management, an RIA based in North Haven, Connecticut, that oversees $140 million in assets under management for 150 client households.

What's unique about Ryan, though, is how he has added $80 million of client assets during the past seven years primarily by holding in-person educational retirement planning seminars that attract his ideal target client.

In this episode, we talk in-depth about how Ryan organizes his seminars as two three-hour classes held over the course of two weeks (which gives him plenty of time to build a personal connection with attendees), how Ryan offers a personal consultation to seminar participants as an optional third “session” (framing it as something they have already paid for as part of the class fee), and how Ryan typically gets two new clients from each class session (representing an average total of $1.7 million in assets) generating revenue that exceeds his costs for holding the seminars in their first year with his firm alone.

We also talk about how Ryan gets logistical support for his seminars by offering them through local public adult education programs (which secure appropriate classroom space and facilitate participant registration), how Ryan has found that charging for the seminars has led to greater participant engagement (and why he’s willing to let the adult education programs keep the registration fees from his seminars given the revenue that comes from new clients who find him through the classes), and how Ryan markets his seminars by sending mailers targeted at households in his area that fit his target age and wealth profile.

And be certain to listen to the end, where Ryan shares his experiences working in the wirehouse, independent broker-dealer, and RIA channels (and how he’s thrived after gaining the independence that firm ownership can provide), how Ryan has navigated ongoing compliance obligations as an independent RIA (first successfully handling it by himself and now working with a compliance firm as he’s passed the threshold for SEC registration), and how Ryan ultimately experienced significant client and AUM growth after making the leap to firm ownership, going fee-only, and simplifying his service and investment planning offerings.

So, whether you’re interested in learning about how to organize effective in-person educational seminars, finding key outsourcing partners to reduce the time needed to put them on, or getting a strong return (in the form of new clients) on marketing dollars spent on promoting seminars, then we hope you enjoy this episode of the Financial Advisor Success podcast, with Ryan Morrissey.

How 3-Member “Triangle Teams” Maximize Per-Advisor and Per-Employee Revenue (Latest From Kitces Research)

August 11, 2025 07:01 am 0 Comments CATEGORY: Practice Management, Research

The smallest advisory firms – especially those run by unsupported solo advisors – often find that early success brings growing operational demands that strain their time, energy, and wellbeing. Yet after adding team members to grow their firms, many advisors discover that their capacity challenges are replaced by new inefficiencies stemming from the need to coordinate across multiple people, leaving them without the calendar control they had hoped to gain.

In this article, Mark Tenenbaum, Kitces.com's Director of Advisor Research, explores findings from the latest Kitces Research study on advisor productivity, "How Financial Planners Actually Do Financial Planning". The research highlights that the three-member "Triangle Team" – consisting of one lead advisor and two support staff, typically a Client Service Associate and an Associate Advisor – tends to be the most effective team structure for maximizing productivity. The typical Triangle Teams produce an impressive $1.2 million in average revenue per advisor and $412,000 per employee, outperforming all other team configurations, including the popular "Diamond Team" structure, which adds two Service Advisors but results in lower productivity per advisor and per employee.

The success of Triangle Teams lies in their ability to balance what Kitces Research describes as the "leverage-coordination trade-off". Smaller teams consisting of one or two members inherently avoid the coordination challenges that increase with team size, but they often lack the staffing leverage needed to free up the Senior Advisor to focus on business development. By contrast, larger teams provide advisors with this leverage, but their additional seats often fail to translate into productivity gains because they introduce two key inefficiencies relating to coordinating across too many members: the "Management Tax" and the "Shared-Clients Tax".

These two inefficiencies take shape in distinct but compounding ways. The Management Tax occurs when Senior Advisors must spend more time onboarding, training, and managing staff – time that doesn't scale with team size. The Shared-Clients Tax arises when multiple lead advisors serve the same clients, requiring additional meetings, handoffs, and coordination that detract from client-facing work. Triangle Teams strike the optimal balance: Two support staff provide enough leverage to offload lower-value tasks while staying lean enough to avoid excessive coordination demands.

For solo or two-member practices, moving toward a 1+2 Triangle Team structure can be a strategic path to growth. Hiring a CSA first, followed by an Associate Advisor, can significantly boost productivity – if timed between the "profitability wall" (when hiring becomes financially viable) and the "capacity wall" (when help becomes urgently necessary). Proactive planning and structured onboarding – especially for Associate Advisors – are essential for success.

Larger teams that aren't positioned to reduce headcount can still improve efficiency by implementing systematized workflows and quarterly client service calendars. Defined processes ease the delegation burden on Senior Advisors, while quarterly client service calendars help prevent overservicing and clarify responsibilities. According to Kitces Research, teams that use four planning periods per year – each focused on a single planning domain – tend to achieve the best mix of client value and internal efficiency.

Ultimately, while three-member Triangle Teams can be a powerful model for enhancing productivity, each firm has the opportunity to define the team structure that best supports its unique mission and the lives its advisors want to lead. Whether the goal is to scale revenue, create more time for client relationships, or design a business that sustains a fulfilling lifestyle, understanding the trade-offs between leverage, coordination, and growth can help advisors make satisfying decisions with greater clarity and confidence!

Weekend Reading For Financial Planners (August 9–10)

August 8, 2025 02:00 pm 0 Comments CATEGORY: Weekend Reading

Enjoy the current installment of "Weekend Reading For Financial Planners" – this week's edition kicks off with the news that a recent report from The Ensemble Practice finds that advisory firms are in a period of "prosperous stagnation" with strong profitability (with the firms surveyed showing a record average operating profit margin of 39.2% in 2024) but organic growth falling short of targets (an average of 3.1% below the average firm growth goal of 10.0%). The report suggests that while many firms have streamlined operations and experienced tailwinds from strong equity markets the past couple years, bringing on new clients has been a challenge for some (highlighting that fast-growing firms tend to allocate larger shares of their budgets to marketing, expenditures which could crimp profitability in the short run but lead to greater opportunities in the long run).

Also in industry news this week:

Artificial Intelligence (AI), anti-money laundering, and cybersecurity top the list of concerns amongst RIA compliance officers, according to a recent survey, as firms adjust to a rapidly evolving technological and regulatory environment
An Executive Order signed this week intends to clear the way for 401(k)s to be able to offer private equity, cryptocurrencies, and other alternative assets in their investment lineups

From there, we have several articles on retirement planning:

The potential value of incorporating "income risk" (which can be a particular concern for clients nearing retirement, as well as those just staring out) when considering client portfolio allocations
Four ways to beat "sequence of return risk", including incorporating flexible spending rules, holding "buffer" assets, and more
Why a "rising equity glidepath" in retirement can improve client outcomes and how advisors can effectively communicate this (perhaps counterintuitive) strategy to clients

We also have a number of articles on practice management:

Why establishing a strong firm culture is not just a matter of having an established mission and values, but is also a matter of understanding the employee experience and getting buy-in from all team members
How an effective firm-wide retreat can both bring the team closer together and give the business a clearer sense of direction for the coming months
How establishing a "Culture Committee" helped one firm improve employee morale and retention after a particularly stressful period

We wrap up with three final articles, all about college planning:

Eight to-dos for clients and their children heading to college this fall, from ensuring proper insurance coverage to getting key legal documents in place
How the Common Data Set document can help families find colleges where their student might receive a generous merit aid award
How a student's post-college success is determined by factors that go well beyond the prestige of the school they attend

Enjoy the 'light' reading!

Helping Clients Navigate AI Career Challenges By Building Financial Planning Resiliency: Kitces & Carl Ep 170

August 7, 2025 07:03 am 0 Comments CATEGORY: Kitces & Carl Podcast

AI's increasing development and integration in the workplace presents many opportunities for increased efficiency and production – and, with that efficiency, the potential for significant disruption to those working in highly-automatable industries. As these changes accelerate, many clients may begin to fear not just job displacement, but full-blown career obsolescence. Unlike a temporary market downturn, this type of uncertainty can feel more existential, raising difficult questions about professional identity and long-term viability.

In the 170th episode of Kitces & Carl, Michael Kitces and client communication expert Carl Richards explore how financial advisors can support clients whose careers may be disrupted by the rise of artificial intelligence. While AI may or may not reach the level of job elimination that some fear, it does represent an irreducible uncertainty – a risk that can't be fully defined or planned around, especially in fields such as law and software engineering. And when faced with such irreducible uncertainty, the most effective approach is not necessarily to aim for detailed prediction, but instead to focus on simplification, adaptability, and resilience. In this context, planning shifts from optimizing for known risks to preparing for unknown disruptions.

One core strategy is to simplify wherever possible – reducing discretionary spending, trimming financial commitments, increasing liquidity, and revisiting allocation choices with a focus on flexibility rather than long-term growth. For example, instead of maximizing tax efficiency through pre-tax retirement contributions, clients may choose to allocate more toward savings vehicles that can be accessed without penalties if needed. Shifting to more conservative, liquid investments can also create optionality to fund retraining, bridge career transitions, or launch entirely new ventures in less automatable fields. Similarly, clients concerned about AI-related disruption may opt to delay large purchases until there's more clarity around how their industry will be affected.

Helping clients navigate AI-related disruption reinforces the advisor's role not only as a financial expert but also as a trusted thinking partner. Clients facing career instability – or even a loss of professional identity – need space to voice their concerns and explore potential paths forward. Often, simple questions like, "What might happen next?" or "How would we need to prepare for that?" can open up space for meaningful reflection and reveal tangible next steps. In this way, advisors can help clients balance long-term uncertainty with shorter-term action – anchoring their sense of agency when outcomes remain unclear.

Ultimately, the key point is that it's difficult to predict how AI will reshape specific career fields. For clients whose livelihoods may be at risk, advisors can work collaboratively to create an individualized, practical plan to reduce the financial strain of potential career disruption. That kind of planning can offer clients substantive peace of mind, ensuring that they understand their options amidst an ever-changing landscape – all while giving the advisor a chance to reaffirm their value in a rapidly evolving world!

Creating An Alternative Custody Fee Model To Offer Advisors Better Fiduciary Alignment

August 6, 2025 07:03 am 0 Comments CATEGORY: Regulation & Compliance

Financial advisors at RIAs have a fiduciary obligation to their clients, which includes both a Duty of Loyalty (to avoid – or at least disclose and take steps to mitigate – any conflicts of interest) and a Duty of Care (to act with prudence when making investment recommendations, considering both their investment opportunity and benefits along with the associated costs). However, while certain costs (e.g., fund expense ratios or ticket charges on trades) are relatively transparent, RIA custodians also earn revenue in various ways from client portfolios in exchange for the custodian's services. Which means RIAs that place clients at a particular RIA custodial platform also have a fiduciary obligation to ensure that their clients are paying reasonable expenses to the platform in exchange for the services they receive. That said, when it comes to RIA custodians, there is no explicit fee for services – nor really any way to determine the total costs clients actually pay (i.e., that their RIA custodian earns) for custodial-related services – making it difficult for firms to determine whether their current custodial relationships are truly aligned with their fiduciary obligation to their clients.

Notably, RIAs aren't necessarily required to choose the lowest-cost custodial option for their clients. Nonetheless, if an RIA did choose a more expensive one, the firm would, at a minimum, have a fiduciary obligation to justify why that option was chosen and how it would benefit the client (e.g., a particular custodian might offer superior technology to execute trades and better service to resolve client issues). Though, given the lack of price transparency amongst custodians, such a calculation is again nearly impossible to make!

With the current RIA custody model creating challenges for advisory firms to fulfill their fiduciary responsibilities to their clients – and putting their interests at odds with those of the custodians they work with (with a firm trying to minimize custodian-related client costs and the custodian having an interest in generating more revenue from each RIA client) – both RIA firms and custodians have an interest in finding an alternative.

One possible option would be for the RIA custodian to charge a basis-point fee to each client of RIAs on its platform, equal to the average fees they're earning under the current model (so the custodian continues to earn the revenue it needs to provide its services), and then apply a credit to the client's statement for any other revenue the custodian is earning. In many cases, this might fully offset the custodial fee anyway, but it would be done at the client's discretion as to how they wish to pay! In turn, custodians would be incentivized to better 'stock the shelves' of their custodial platform with unique offerings (e.g., highest-yielding cash sweeps, lower-cost investment products) to attract advisors and their clients to the platform to pay the fee (and thus grow their own assets).

While the concept of such an 'upside-down' fiduciary model for RIA custody is relatively straightforward to re-align the interests of the custodian, the advisor, and their client, doing so would come with non-trivial complexities and questions – not only in terms of systems but also in determining fairness to RIAs and their clients. For example, a custodian would have to determine whether the statement credit would be allocated across all clients on their platform at the client, account, or individual holding level. Also, such a move could lead to uncomfortable conversations for advisors (e.g., if they choose a more expensive custodian that provides them with practice management support or client referrals, which benefit the advisory firm but don't actually benefit the client that incurred the cost).

Though, arguably the biggest challenge of instituting a basis-point fee and statement credit system is behavioral. Simply put, clients (and their advisors) aren't used to paying an outright fee for custody. And when something has been provided for 'free' for so long, any fee – no matter how reasonable – can induce sticker shock (even if much, or even all, of the fee is being rebated through the statement credits)! Though notably, the entire evolution of the RIA movement for the past 20 years has been the transition from opaque commissions (on investment products) to transparent advisory fees, which consumers have ultimately come to prefer because of the better alignment with their advisor… suggesting that, in the long run, custodians stand to benefit from a more fiduciary pricing model for RIA custody in the same manner that RIAs themselves have benefited in the marketplace.

Ultimately, the key point is that the current RIA custody model presents fiduciary challenges for advisors, who have no feasible way to compare the costs for their clients of different custodians they might work with to ensure clients are receiving benefits commensurate with their cost (as custodial revenue yield, and thus pricing, can vary significantly from one platform to another). Which suggests that an alternative approach – pairing a clear basis-point fee for the client with statement credits for revenue generated by their use of custodial services – not only offers greater transparency in the costs for custodial services but also better aligns the interests of clients, advisors, and the custodians they work with. And, in the end, that alignment would allow advisors to more effectively fulfill their fiduciary obligations to clients!

Growing To $2B AUM Organically By Setting High Client Service Standards (And Really Sticking To Them!): #FASuccess Ep 449 With Michelle Perry Higgins

August 5, 2025 07:03 am 0 Comments CATEGORY: Financial Advisor Success Podcast

Welcome everyone! Welcome to the 449th episode of the Financial Advisor Success Podcast!

My guest on today's podcast is Michelle Perry Higgins. Michelle is a principal of California Financial Advisors, an RIA based in San Ramon, California, that oversees $2 billion in assets under management for approximately 1,500 client households.

What's unique about Michelle, though, is how her firm has grown to $2 billion of AUM entirely organically and has achieved a greater than 99% client retention rate, in part by setting high standards for client service (and sticking to them over time).

In this episode, we talk in-depth about how Michelle prioritizes her clients' time (ensuring they never wait more than 5 minutes for a meeting and always receive a same-day call back when they contact the office), how Michelle created what she calls an "Everything Binder" that allows clients to put all of their key information in one place (providing clients with peace of mind by easing the transition for loved ones if the client becomes incapacitated or passes away), and how Michelle builds a half hour into her schedule after client meetings to record notes into her CRM so that she doesn't forget any important messages the client communicated during their conversation.

We also talk about how Michelle has achieved strong client satisfaction by spending the majority of time during meetings listening to what they have to say (and avoiding jargon when it comes time for her to discuss technical planning topics), how Michelle seeks to go a level deeper when talking to clients about their personal lives (for example, not just asking about where they went on vacation but also whether they had any money conflicts during the trip), and how Michelle ends each client meeting by asking whether there are any issues the client wants to talk through (which may or may not be financial-related and helps her gauge their satisfaction with her service).

And be certain to listen to the end, where Michelle shares how she has built California Financial Advisors with three of her partners over the course of 30-plus years (and why they maintain an "eat what you kill" approach towards compensation), how Michelle has found significant value from operating an internship program (both professionally by identifying talented students who could become the next generation of advisors at her firm, and personally by being able to mentor aspiring advisors), and how Michelle has navigated the challenges of being successful as a financial advisor and as a parent at the same time (including the joys she's had and the sacrifices she's made along the way).

So, whether you're interested in learning about setting and maintaining high client service standards, fostering deeper client conversations, or making a partnership last over multiple decades, then we hope you enjoy this episode of the Financial Advisor Success podcast, with Michelle Perry Higgins.