Beverly Flaxington is a practice management consultant. She answers questions from advisors facing human resource issues. To submit yours, email us here.
Advisor Perspectives welcomes guest contributions. The views presented here do not necessarily represent those of Advisor Perspectives.
Dear Bev,
I appreciate your work and agree that our industry needs more human-behavior contributions. While we talk about behavioral economics and investor profiles, we don’t put enough emphasis on the behavioral problems and implications within our teams.
To wit, we have someone in our office who fills the COO role (and is one of the original founders). He isn’t a great salesperson, so he has taken over managing all of our operations, HR, administrative and other functions. He is under 50, but he is stuck in his ways. He won’t listen to reason on anything, thinks he knows everything and shuts people down literally in the middle of their sentences. He has a number of his own clients he continues to manage. They provide a great deal of revenue to our advisory firm, so he walks around like he is untouchable.
I was recently made partner (there are five of us) and I believe we should do something about his behavior. It affects people on our team and many people comment on how brash and abrasive he is. He founded the firm with one other partner who is still here (two others have retired) and the remaining partner is a see-no-evil-type of guy. He doesn’t like to hear negativity and overtly says he will not deal with conflict.
I’ve spoken to the other two partners and they want to confront the difficult partner. Can you recommend approaches that could work for us and give us some support in the process?
E.G.
Dear E.G.,
If you could hear me as I read your note, you would notice an audible sigh. I couldn’t agree more with your statement that we don’t focus on the human element enough from an employee and leadership perspective. But one thing I have learned having done this work now for 20+ years is that there are times where you just aren’t going to change someone. Certain circumstances conspire to prevent you, the person delivering the news, from being heard and the person who needs to hear the news from hearing and understanding.
You have circumstances working against you – his contribution to the firm, his long-standing position, the unwillingness of his long-time peer to engage in the discussion and, possibly, an unwillingness on his part to look at the impact of his behavior.
I know the saying, “If I had a dollar for every time…..” is a hackneyed one, but it fits given the number of times one of my clients has tried to “fix” someone who doesn’t want to be fixed. There is a reason every 12-step or self-help program asks you first to say you have a problem. That’s because no human being will make a change if they aren’t willing to admit there is something to change in the first place!
We can give up nagging, cajoling, threatening and punishing because unless we can help someone see how their behavior is hurting others, and probably themselves, they won’t work to shift it.
Is there any hope? I don’t know if you have tried recommending a coach for this person. Sometimes an outsider has an ability to see behaviors and describe why they are hurtful in a way that people on the inside are unable to do. Many people I’ve worked with have made dramatic shifts in their behavior when they have an “aha” experience and implement new ideas. That said, I’ve coached enough people to tell you there is also a percentage who will never change and don’t want to, so this isn’t a panacea.
You could take this partner out for coffee and have a one-on-one conversation with him. Reflect back some of what you see and ask him if he acknowledges it too. I’ve been surprised over the years at how many people are almost waiting for someone to call them out and once that happens, they will admit fault and sometimes ask for help. Again, my sense here is that this is a long shot but it is probably a long shot worth taking.
I’m hesitant to support your “intervention” idea where three of the partners (including you) confront this partner. You don’t have full support and you could be creating a divide of 3 against 2 in doing so. Then you will be like our elected leaders in Washington and unable to come to common ground because you will be so busy taking sides on topics. This isn’t good for your firm.
Try the coach or the coffee approach and see how far you get – I won’t be totally surprised if you write and ask for additional ideas. Unfortunately I won’t have many to give you!
Dear Bev,
One of my key support people has expressed an interest in working more closely with our clients. She came to us two years ago from a large bank organization and never had to have a license or credentials. We require all staff to pass the series 65, which she has done. But we’re finding more and more clients require a planning element. We are pushing her to complete her CFP®.
She has been a very loyal employee for the last couple of years. But now she is pushing back, saying this isn’t what she signed up for and she doesn’t want to spend her nights and weekends studying. She has two young children and we let her go home two days a week at 3 p.m. so she can relieve her childcare provider.
My partner and I are wondering if we are exerting too much pressure. We didn’t make this a requirement when we hired her, but it is clearly a bonus for our clients and for our firm, and we believe will be for her career. Is this unusual? Should we drop the subject?
T.C.
Dear T.C.,
Your inquiry worries me from two perspectives – this wasn’t a discussion that took place before she was hired and she is a mother of two young children and is probably doing her best to cover her life bases without another large initiative thrown into the mix!
I don’t know if your firm has a career path and this is one of the requirements for moving into an advisory capacity. It sounds like she was hired in for one job but now wants to expand her reach and work “more closely” with clients. If your firm requires the CFP® in order to do that, then your position is completely justified. This could be a good idea because it would enhance the firm and her professional capabilities. But it is a new idea. You have to consider whether it is fair to bring this up at this stage in her career. Wanting her nights and weekends for her family along with leaving early two days to go home and manage two young children makes sense to me. Of course there are many women who have young children, hold down a full-time professional job and go to school or get a credential while doing both (and more!), but this is personal choice. It sounds like her personal choice is that she doesn’t want to sacrifice her time for this.
Consider whether this is an absolute requirement for her to advance. If it is, you need to discuss this with her and give her options. If she doesn’t want to do it, that is her choice but then you have to determine if you are losing a good resource who could be working more closely with clients and alleviating some of your workload. You need to have an open discussion and then see where each of you come out after this.
Beverly Flaxington co-founded The Collaborative, a consulting firm devoted to business building for the financial services industry in 1995. The firm also founded and manages the Advisors Sales Academy. She is currently an adjunct professor at Suffolk University teaching undergraduate students Entrepreneurship. Beverly is a Certified Professional Behavioral Analyst (CPBA) and Certified Professional Values Analyst (CPVA).
She has spent over 25 years in the investment industry and has been featured in Selling Power Magazine and quoted in hundreds of media outlets, including The Wall Street Journal, MSNBC.com, Investment News and Solutions Magazine for the FPA. She speaks frequently at investment industry conferences and is a speaker for the CFA Institute.
More ETF Topics >