Editor's Note: The following article is an excerpt from The Ultra High Net Worth Banker's Handbook, by Weber and Meier.

What do high-net-worth clients expect from a private banker?

We would recommend that you build trust, keep learning and be prepared. Most importantly, imagine walking in your client's shoes and figuring out what he expects from you as his private banker.

A short form of our recommendations would be: Build trust and become a partner.

Build trust through continuous contact to avoid surprises. Show up in difficult moments, explain the risks and-if something goes wrong-be open about it. Be credible, reliable and intimate, but not self-centered.

Become A Lifelong Learner
Lifelong learning has to encompass your financial knowledge and political and economic understanding of the world. But most importantly, you have to work on skills such as empathy, communication and coaching by searching for feedback. As a lifelong learner, you will deliver added value to your clients and establish deeper relationships, which after all is the essence of our craft.

Learn about your market and financial solutions, but most importantly, learn about yourself. Learn how to improve your energy level and performance. Learn how to control your emotions and your state of mind. Ultra-high-net-worth clients are generally educated and successful people. Look at your work as a privilege: You're exposed to people you can learn from.

Who can teach you more about your weaknesses as a private banker than the client who closes an account? Who can teach you more about your strengths than a client who substantially increases his assets with you? Learn from such circumstances by politely asking your client for a debriefing. Ask the client who closed the account for an honest appraisal of your performance. A heart-to-heart discussion with your departing client might open the door to contacting him later and, possibly, winning him back.

Use a professional communications or performance coach and, more importantly, set up a network of peer coaches, i.e., colleagues working in different, non-competing markets with whom you can discuss different issues.

Learn from executive courses and from experts during industry events.

Be Professional Through Preparation
Proper preparation prevents poor performance. Preparation improves your self-esteem during conversations with a client or his advisors. It shows the client that you take him seriously and that you put effort into the relationship.

Family offices often choose their service providers through a competitive selection process-a beauty contest. Several providers are invited to make a sales pitch and then the family office selects one of the competing providers.

Structured thinking about how best to win the deal is the best way to prepare for this situation. Research the potential client and try to understand his selection criteria and the selection process. Such preparation will increase your efficiency in getting deals closed.

You can rehearse the opening or closing of your sales talk, or prepare a good story that makes a relevant point. You can prepare by resting the day before the presentation.

Preparation, like education, is time well invested.
There are some basic questions that should be pondered before seeing the potential client.  

For example, what are the selection criteria?
If it's someone you have dealt with before, you might have some knowledge of his decision process. If not, the best thing is to ask the client directly.

Having a strong relationship with the client gives you permission to ask probing criteria questions. If the relationship is not yet strong, you should ask for permission to ask those types of questions. This is especially true when investigating the decision-making process. You have to make sure the client understands your questions are important for you to learn about him, which will enhance your ability to add value to your services.

Private conversations with decision makers, and their friends and business partners, might give you an idea of what their primary concerns are. Keeping these main issues in mind while delivering the pitch will make the difference. For example, we pitched to a family that needed a manager for their family fund. We learned they were in the process of acquiring an airline and needed a partner. Thus, we included in the pitch an example of a family that sold a stake in an airline, with us advising them and subsequently managing the proceeds. This generated immediate interest and we won the asset management and M&A mandate.

The structure of our pitches are based on the following elements:
What is at stake? (Explain the business case.)
Why should the client care? (The answer to this question can easily be used as an opening.)
Refrain (We repeat and emphasize the main theme.)

Intentional Empathy
Put yourself in the shoes of your client. Be empathetic, especially if you are in a high-pressure situation. Ask yourself, "If I were the client, what would I want to experience now?"

As pressure mounts during a client meeting, the banker has the tendency to focus on his fears-namely that the client will close the account-and that puts the banker on the defensive. If the banker, during such a high-pressure situation, can instead focus on what the client is experiencing and what the client might want, the outcome is potentially much better.

Seek to understand the mindset of your client-what he might feel, what he would like to understand and what he would like to be assured of. If the client is angry at you, a good empathetic question can help, such as, "I understand your anger, what can we do about it together?" At first, the client might be surprised. But then he will appreciate the question because it shows you want to work together towards a solution.

To be intentionally empathic, you have to use the concept of the mind's eye or visualization. If you see the angry client as a threat, you will become defensive or, at worst, aggressive. If you notice yourself reacting that way, you will have to change your view and visualize a person who needs help. This change of mental perspective will put you in a much more resourceful state of mind.

Intentional empathy is about intentionally putting yourself in your client's situation.

Focus
Focus is arguably the key success factor in any profession.

It is therefore important that you are able to focus on the things you absolutely must do to be successful. If you have a large number of clients, your focus should be completely on giving them the best service you possibly can. If you are growing your business, the focus on superior service will lead to client referrals.

If you are the more intellectual and introverted type, you have to make an extra effort to "show up"-to overcome your fear of rejection and to spend the maximum time with clients and prospects.

Understand what holds you back and overcome limiting beliefs by taking action. Don't wait to do tasks such as contacting a client or prospect when you "feel like it." Do them when they need to be done.

For example, advisors naturally may not "feel like" contacting clients when things go bad. But those are exactly the moments when clients need the most handholding. Success is often linked to doing things other people don't "feel like doing."

Understand your procrastinations and your fears-most importantly the fear of rejection. Understand how they limit your potential. Reprogram your mind's eye so it sees opportunities instead of obstacles. Focus on activities that are important, plan for them and implement them. Focus on doing. Don't get distracted.

The most important questions for success:
How can I best add value to my clients?
How can I deepen the relationship?
How can I grow my passion for the job?
What do I want to achieve? Now, next year, in three years, in ten years?
Where do I invest my most precious resource: time?
What must be done?
How can I make sure I do what must be done, do it as soon as possible and don't get distracted?
What can I prepare?
What activities make the difference?
How can I make sure I come across opportunities?
How can I relax and be effective under pressure?
How can I motivate myself?
How can I increase my resilience?

The Ultra High Net Worth Banker's Handbook, by Heinrich Weber and Stephan Meier, is published by Harriman House Ltd. The book is available at www.harriman-house.com.