The Advisor Delta™

Narrator: Welcome to The Advisor Delta™, the practice management podcast dedicated to helping investment advisors grow their business and reach their goals. Whether you’re looking to scale your practice, streamline operations, adapt to emerging technology, or deliver value to clients - this is the place for actionable insights, thoughtful leadership and innovative strategies. Brought to you by Worldsource Wealth Management. Let’s dive in!

Trish: Hello and welcome. I'm your host, Trish Smart, a practice management consultant at Worldsource Wealth Management. Today we'll be diving into how you can structure your advisory team for maximum efficiency and growth to bring your practice to the next level. I've been in the industry for 25 years and I've had the opportunity to work with a variety of advisory teams, both large and small, and I have found that there are certain characteristics that they all share amongst the high performing teams. Today, we'll take a look at some of those characteristics and what really makes them stand out.
The first characteristic that comes to mind is that they're highly organized and role driven. Each member of the team knowing exactly what their role is, what tasks need to be done in a day, and how their role impacts the end client. Within the teams, you tend to see a lot of different personality types and styles, and I often think about those questionnaires that they fill out and you end up with a color result. You know, red for bold, maybe yellow or gold for organized and methodical. Blue was the feeling more going by the gut, but also a great team member, always energized and supportive. And then you have the green who are very analytical and need all the information upfront in order to then come up with a plan of how to carry out the task. So I think all of these different personality types and communication styles are integral to being on the team. I mean, if you have an advisor who is red, so spontaneous, loves to just jump right in, not a lot of details… you probably want somebody on the team who is gold, who is very process driven, who loves the check marks and the processes and the guides in order to help them feel on track and on task. And they're the ones that are making sure that all these tasks are being completed and sent in on time.
So while you can have a team full of very similar members and similar attributes, they can be hardworking, empathetic, service driven. All these different styles of communicating and working are very different, but all integral to making sure that the team is not only getting things done efficiently and effectively, but also driving things forward and making for a great client experience. So when it comes time to adding to that team, it could be a little bit tricky. You have a really great. Team that's kind of bopping along and you don't really want to disrupt that, but maybe adding a blue into the sea of reds and yellows or greens, probably a good idea. But before you go out and hire, maybe this is a good opportunity for you as the advisor to pause and really take a step back and think about what is your overall strategy? What is your goals that you're trying to accomplish? What are you trying to achieve by adding in this role? Is there somebody currently on your team that can step into a new role and you're back filling for that previous role?
Also, maybe take this as an opportunity to think about what your role is versus what you want it to be. Do you want to really focus on the particular activities that you really like to do? And frankly, there are some tasks that you have to do, but are there some that you can delegate to an associate? Are you looking at your succession plan eventually transitioning into retirement? Think about what that could look like. Do you need to bring in somebody who can fill your shoes eventually with some time mentoring and learning? So really, before you pull the trigger on bringing in that individual, think about what are you trying to accomplish? What is the strategy behind it? What are the skills and attributes that you need to bring in to really add to that team element? While you're in strategy mode, you might also want to take a look at the overall structure of your team.
Typically, a lot of advisors take the vertical approach that allows the advisor to really take control of the front facing client interaction. The day in and day out meetings with clients and supporting the clients and behind the scenes you have a team of support networks that generally have less touch points with your clients. There's another structure that as you grow, especially if you want to grow to a much larger organization, is perhaps you want to create synergies by bringing in a variety of different advisors, all with their own areas of expertise. This is where some firms evolve into a horizontal structure where there's a team of advisors, all partners within the team, and they have a support team that's backing them and making sure that everything's running well behind the scenes. There are pros and cons to both approaches, and it really depends on. How you want to carry out your business, but also how you potentially want to grow that business.
So moving away from maybe the structure of teams and more into the use of technology within the teams. I, you know, this isn't really part of building out teams, but more of an attitude that I see within successful teams. They're really believing that technology can be a really great partner within their practice to optimize their time and efficiencies. For many years now, we've seen CRMs incorporating them to track and prompt client touchpoints. Conquest has really come into the scene making it easier to insert client information, build out multiple what if scenarios, and they even leverage Ai Sam to pinpoint certain nuances to your plan and really help build out different scenarios that can help the client. AdvisorStream is another tool that we've been using and, and more and more integrating into client communications. These are all great platforms. Built out to be very user friendly with easy integration. Some have incorporated things like Next Best Action, and these really help teams to be more responsive and efficient. As with all technology, I think it's really important to step back and learn about the features and benefits of these platforms to make sure that you're leveraging it to the fullest potential.
So let's switch gears a little bit and talk about communication, which I think is absolutely integral to the overall client experience. And I certainly don't wanna go down too much of a rabbit hole, but I do think that the client communication piece really ties into, I. The other practice management component around service and segmentation plan. So we could really go off on a tangent here, but as it relates to a successful team, I think where it's important is for those communication strategies and where it falls into your service and segmentation plan. I think it's just integral to make sure that your team is aware of what are those segmentation plans, what are the processes, and who are the members who really are responsible for that communication to make sure that there's that consistency for your clients.
Another critical point here around communication is within your team. It's probably easier with a smaller team that spends a lot of time together to keep in touch and keep on top of the various issues that come up. But larger teams maybe should consider more of a formal weekly meeting. I've seen cases where rotating the chair chairperson can be really successful. They can bring forward the different agendas per week, but it covers off any current issues upcoming. Events, vacations, vacation coverage, so all critical to making sure that business is running to the fullest potential.
Lastly, I would say that successful teams use metrics to really track their goals, their priorities, and really make sure that those metrics really demonstrate what's important to them and their team, and really loop back to the individuals on that team. To really show how their contributions matter to the end client. Worldsource Wealth Management offers things like click to help with those metrics quickly and easily using dashboards and data to provide meaningful information right at your fingertips. The thing is, building out an effective, successful advisory team requires a lot of thought and strategy, which sometimes means that you do need to stop, step back, and check in with the overall big picture. But in the long term, that will pay off because with careful planning, there's a huge benefit to you, your team, and your clients.
So to recap, today we touched on six fundamental insights, which include having organized team with complimentary skills, building a team strategically through planning and recruitment, defining your team structure, whether or not it's horizontal or vertical, making technology your ally to excel today and prepare for tomorrow, engaging in clear and consistent communication both with your team and your clients and measuring success through KPIs or leveraging wealth management tools and dashboards. I. Remember, the most effective team structures are client-centric and prioritize clear communication between team members and clients. Each team member has a unique strength that should be leveraged and nurtured to improve team loyalty and productivity. An advisory practice that is prepared to adjust and adapt as the business changes will make room for new roles, shifting responsibilities and investing in new technologies as an advisor, make it a priority to continuously develop your skills in management, communication, and strategic planning so that you may effectively guide and inspire your team for continued success. Thanks everyone for tuning in. This is Trish Smart, and I look forward to helping you take your practice to the next level. Until next time.

Narrator: Thanks for tuning into The Advisor Delta™! We hope you found today’s episode valuable to supporting your practice. For more episodes and insights, don’t forget to subscribe and visit us at www.worldsourcewealth.com. And remember, together, we can take your practice to the NextLevel™. Until next time!
Worldsource Financial Management Inc. (a mutual fund dealer) and Worldsource Securities Inc. (an investment dealer), are divisions of Worldsource Group of Companies Inc., operating as Worldsource Wealth Management. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the participants only. This podcast is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial, legal, or professional advice. Listeners are encouraged to seek professional guidance for their specific needs. Worldsource Wealth Management does not endorse any products, services, or companies mentioned in this episode.