Technical Knowledge
If you want to give your clients tax-wise advice, you’ll have to be fluent in several topics: tax planning; estate planning; charitable vehicle evaluation and selection; and asset management within endowments. (If you aren’t, you’ll need team members who are.) If you are versed in these topics, you’ll be able to work across both the taxable and the tax-exempt side of clients’ investment portfolios, constructing cross-disciplinary solutions in concert with other professionals on your team and giving more complete and confident recommendations to clients.
Technology can help. Many fintech platforms offer wizards to guide you and your clients through complex processes to successful completion, while templated forms can minimize your compliance risks and increase consistency in unfamiliar areas.
A Network Of Specialists
It will help you to have a virtual roster of experts who can complement your work and allow you to expand (and contract) the services you provide without additional overhead. This can be especially useful in specialty areas that may not pertain to your entire client base. For example, philanthropic consultants can assist you with activities such as setting goals, making grants, developing missions and researching nonprofits. There are also professional facilitators and psychologists who specialize in family or multigenerational dynamics and can add value and insights when you’re navigating complex topics such as succession planning.
When you help your charitable clients align their philanthropic, wealth management and legacy planning objectives, they’re better equipped to make decisions and it allows family members from different generations to forge connections that help strengthen and perpetuate the family legacy.
Advisors who add philanthropic expertise to their practices will help their practices evolve and create a more holistic approach to wealth management.
Hannah Shaw Grove is chief marketing officer for Foundation Source, the nation’s largest provider of specialized support services for private and family foundations.