3. Assisting (and sometimes challenging) their clients in making wise financial choices; and
4. Setting realistic financial goals for their clients that best suit their situation.
Money-centered advisors work themselves into a regrettable role as a financial hireling rolling in a wheelbarrow each year with the client’s take for the season, and then waiting on the client’s judgment of their most recent performance.
That’s not the case with life-centered planners, who follow more successful principles of client engagement:
1. “I’m not working for you, I’m working with you.” This means: “I’m going to need your full attention and cooperation to make sure you get where you want to be.”
2. “Our work is to assist you in making wise financial decisions, not in beating market averages. These decisions aren’t limited to investments, but include debt, spending, risk management, income and giving as well.”
3. “We’re focused on personal progress, not comparative results. Our business is to help you move forward from where you are to where you want to be.”
4. “Life-centered planners measure success by ‘return on life’—in other words, by getting you the best life possible with the money you have—not a return on investment. We can’t control every factor that determines ROI, but we can exercise much greater influence over what determines ‘ROL.’”
5. “Our review process puts your narrative ahead of your numbers. We need to stay current with what is happening and what is changing in your life, and to make sure your financial plan reflects that story.”
One of the greatest joys of my career is that I get firsthand feedback from advisors who have made the career-defining migration and transformation from money-centric practices to life-centered planning practices. In a note I received last month, one advisor spoke to the satisfaction of doing things the best way possible—where everyone involved immediately senses both the value and the joy of a proper focus.