In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is.
-Yogi Berra

Financial planning has an identity problem. It does not know what it is. Let's face it: Neither do its practitioners.

Is financial planning an elegant delivery system for financial services industry product? Or is it an authentic profession with fiduciary level accountability? Who knows? Rival theories bounce off the walls and collide in midair, but there are no containers to hold them.

The profession is the offspring of many, but it sorely lacks a sense of self. Like an orphaned prodigy, financial planning has been nurtured by hundreds of well-intentioned aunts and uncles, all with different messages and motives. Our ostensible academics are also the unclaimed stepchildren of those aunts and uncles, all with better things to do than address the needs of a profession dedicated to individuals and their well-being. Unfortunately, this means we have developed virtually no functional or identifiable theory.

It is too bad for us. Without such theory and the development of attendant philosophies, models, concepts, principles, techniques and systems, it is effectively impossible for the profession to grow and mature into its full potential. Instead, our situation is a bit like that old television show, What's My Line? This was the game show where three plausible individuals each introduced themselves with the same name and a straight face claiming the identity of the special individual of notable achievement. "I am the real financial planner." "I am the real financial planner." "I am the real financial planner."

Under current theory, how could we know? Rather, we are left to talk past each other in terms of products, expansions of net worth, holistic practices, AUM, compensation modalities, fiduciary duties, sustainability and so forth and so on. These are issues that might matter, but they are merely collateral to our essence, regrettably pitting good folks against each other. Yet rather than making professional dialogue and exploration as productive as possible, we are unfortunately limited in our abilities to hold the sorts of conversations that enable us to grow individually and as a group.

Without proper theory, how can we understand our profession's mission, context and function? At the end of the day, how can we know its purpose? What is its point? Lest you doubt the confusion, try playing the "I am the real financial planner" game in any professional gathering.

We operate in a complex world where everyone else asserts their theories and creates realities that affect our work ... but it seems like we just ... kind ... of ... don't ... get what that means to us. We can't exactly put it into words. We know what we mean, but we don't. We know what it means to "get it," but, again, we don't. We listen to the economists blather on about consumer whatever but we don't talk back when their theories offend our notions of truth or relevance to the daily lives of our clients. It is the same with the politicians, the academics, the pundits, the executives, the marketers, the media ... namely all the folks who would set the world's agendas for our work. They act like they know, but they don't know.

Of course, when it is all said and done, this is mostly on us. We don't step up and we don't talk back even though these don't capture essential aspects of financial planning.

Take jobs. It is one thing to be "pro" job growth and talk passionately of "hard-working Americans." It is entirely another to be out of work, with yesterday's skills and habits, a scared spouse, an underwater house and a hungry family while living in an economically depressed part of the country. You can even believe in the macroeconomic joys of "creative destruction," at least until it is your life that gets in the way of those tempestuous forces.

These folks work with the many. They do denominators. The objects of their thoughts are faceless. They do not bleed.

Not so with financial planning. With financial planning, it is all about the individual. It is all about the client, the one to whom we owe a fiduciary duty. We know it is different when the unemployment statistic is you.

I was searching for a speech title recently when serendipity struck: "One to the Power of One." I am not quite sure of its origins, but it stuck in my head and I played with it for a while. It is probably not original to me, though Google does not shed any light upon the apparent redundancy. Certainly, "The Power of One" has been used in both song and story. Then I realized that this might be the missing key for the development of financial planning theory. More powerfully, this might be especially true when it comes to money issues, per se. As a society and culture, we spend so much time and energy with the broad strokes of money that we miss an essence-that essence of "one." The way we come.

In contrast, financial planning captures that essence. The advisor-one-and the client-one-combine in a uniquely powerful and singular relationship-one-constituting an indivisible numerator-the essence of "one to the power of one."

"One." It does not act like other numbers. For most living beings, one is indivisible. For objects, if you cut one in two, it simply becomes two ones. One divided by one is one. One to the power of one is one. One is whole and complete unto itself. One is special. No other number is like one.

One is the power number. It compels companies and athletic teams to strive to become it in their field of endeavor. The cry, "We're number one!" rallies teams throughout the land.

"One" is important historically and spiritually. Notions of monotheism and the "One True God" generated tectonic shifts in humanity's relationships with both the divine and with each other. More importantly, religion affirms the infinite value of each one of us. Romantics search for "the one" who will complete them as their "one true love." Then they will frequently describe the consequent relationship in terms of being "as one" with each other.

Most important, for our purposes, "one" is the essence of both the financial planning relationship and the financial planning profession. "One" is what makes us different from all those others. We work with numerators, one at a time. This reality imbues us with a unique perspective.

When bad news happens in our world, a very particular someone gets hurt. It is not just data when that very particular someone has a name. Moreover, that very particular someone generally has other particular someones they love, to whom they are accountable or for whom they have responsibilities. When that particular someone is a client, he has placed his trust and confidence in us. He has relied on us in that very special way.

When we accept a client's trust, confidence and reliance, we have a singular relationship that is utterly unique. Every such fiduciary relationship is unlike any other relationship that has ever been. Ever. Such relationships are the essence of one to the power of one.

How Do We Use This?
First and foremost, we ourselves need to perceive the differences between numerators and denominators. Then we need to drive it home whenever and wherever we see the confusion.

Similarly, we need to put space between advisors and the financial services industry. "Advisors" are not "producers." We advise. We work as fiduciaries on the client's behalf, hopefully to make his life better. "Producers" are recognized for making sales on behalf of their particular industry. There is nothing wrong with that. To the contrary, they may very well make an individual's life better, especially the better ones who work with financial planners. Nonetheless, at the end of the day, their motivation is sales and they eschew the term "fiduciary." Seldom are they recognized for helping someone make a terrific, financially significant decision that does not accompany a sale. They know whose interests come first.

It is a matter of function and perspective. Consider the chef and her food sources. It is the chef's job to use her skills with food and its presentation to provide an exquisite dining experience. It is the grocer's job to provide excellent raw materials that meet the chef's expectations and needs. The grocer serves many. The chef is not in the grocery business. She serves one at a time. On the one hand, the grocer is not responsible for the quality of a dining experience beyond the excellent ingredients he has promised. On the other hand, the chef is absolutely accountable to her diner for keeping her promises. The grocer is not the chef and the chef is not the grocer.

And so it is with the proper relationship between the financial planning profession and the financial services industry. We are not them. They are not us. They ought not and cannot provide our theory.

Many suggest that the so-called behavioral sciences bring us up close and personal. Guess what? "Behavioral" is not a financial planning term. It is a macro term. It roots in denominators, not numerators. While a thorough understanding of "behavioral" might help you better understand a client's actions, thereby increasing your general skill levels, it can give you no more precision with respect to the future than the last 70 years' worth of market data, trends in industrial sectors or various sets of marriage statistics. It is still not an answer for how to give your client your best work. Past still fails to become prologue.

It doesn't help that so much CFP history and training is rooted in financial product. Nor is it particularly healthy that the CFP Board's "Subject Topics Accepted for CE Credit" relies on relatively old product content and aged subject matter. There is nothing wrong with financial product, nor should these subject matters be ignored, but they are of the financial services industry, not the financial planning profession. Most of what constitutes testable CFP subject matter is from the grocery store, not the restaurant.

We need our own theory. We need theory and education for "One to the Power of One" that drives home the distinctions between macroeconomics and "finology," (that recently birthed branch of professional theory that will be describing the relationship between financial planning and individuals and money). From there, we can have theory that talks about individuals and money, such as money autobiographies or the personal money scripts that run constantly in our heads. Or our various responses to the extraordinary pressures being placed upon individuals in this money-based culture.

It is tough to know what a school of finology might include. To claim foreknowledge would just be guessing. However, it is not hard to see work involving history, philosophy or psychology. Could we relate to the money stories we find in some of the world's most famous novels? I am thinking about folks like Twain, Dickens, Steinbeck, O. Henry and Solzhenitsyn, authors who have written so poignantly about individuals in stressed economic times.

What about financial folklore? Fairy tales are often morality tales for individual relationships with money. Midas. Cinderella. Johnny Appleseed. Should these be studied in order for us to understand our antecedents? How about organized value systems of the ages? Religious traditions have power impacts upon common value systems. The origins and evolution of macroeconomic theory have had finological implications. How do they feed into the issues of today?

Do I know what appropriate theory should be? Heavens, no. Our garden of knowledge needs to emerge and mature organically. This garden is not likely to be a clean, centrally planned monolith, carefully designed by "Those who know." Truth is, we don't know what might grow, but we do know that inquiring minds with fertile seeds can accomplish amazing results.

Financial planning deserves its own theory. It deserves a garden of knowledge on a par with other professions that serve individuals. "One to the Power of One." It is a solid container and potentially powerful theory in itself.

Richard B. Wagner, JD, CFP, is the principal of WorthLiving LLC, based in Denver. He is the 2003 recipient of the Financial Planning Association's P. Kemp Fain Jr. Award, which recognizes a member who has made outstanding contributions to the profession.