One of the top news stories in the New York metro region over the past month has been the grassroots movement Occupy Wall Street. One of the chief concerns among the protestors is the growing disparity between the top 1% of America's citizens, as measured by wealth, and the other 99%. Politics and personal opinion aside, the wealth gap is an undeniable fact that we have examined from various angles in both Private Wealth and its sister publication, Financial Advisor. The richer people become, the more distinct their attitudes and behaviors are about things such as risk tolerance, lifestyle, investments, privacy and spending. In short, money can have a transforming effect, especially if it is self-generated. In fact, the greater the impact wealth has on the lives of earners and their extended families, the greater the opportunity for experienced professionals to benefit. Affluent and newly affluent households place a higher value on those experts with demonstrated high-net-worth experience and those who have sensitivity to and solutions for the issues they're facing.
One of our editorial goals is to help readers become more attuned to the unique characteristics of the wealthy and then leverage the knowledge to greater advantage as they work with clients and pursue new high-net-worth business. In this issue, we're introducing the first in a series of new columns from Editor-at-Large Russ Alan Prince. Cultivating the Super-Rich will focus on the proven and systematic methods of working and sourcing business at the highest end of the wealth spectrum. The first four installments will take a closer look at some of the core ingredients of successful business development, beginning with an overview of how to best access and connect with ultra-affluent targets to deliver financial and other professional services.

As the resistance movement heads into its second month and new outposts crop up almost daily in other parts of the globe, the media coverage continues to draw attention to what Alan Silverleib at CNN calls an "overarching theme [of] ... populist anger over an out-of-touch corporate, financial and political elite." Regardless of your social ideals, or those of your target clientele, you both will need to acknowledge the realities of the situation and accommodate the increasingly divergent mind set of the rich and powerful to achieve a successful working partnership.