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In a profession heavily dominated by men, female financial advisors need women to serve as mentors, role models, confidants and champions.
Over the last 18 years serving financial advisors as a referral and business coach, I’ve often heard female advisors confess that they experience a sense of loneliness and isolation. As it turns out, the lack of this layer of female support within the profession is bad for the health of female advisors.
In researching this topic for my Amazon best-selling book, A Woman’s Way: Empowering Female Financial Advisors to Authentically Lead and Flourish in a Man’s World, I discovered several studies by scholars who have proven that when women connect with other women for support, it’s not only good for their business, but it’s good for their health as well.
In an article posted on HuffPost Women in January 2013, “A Compelling Argument About Why Women Need Friendships,” by Dr. Randy Kamen, several studies were highlighted. One was a landmark study by Laura Klein and Shelley Taylor that revealed that women need other women when they are experiencing stress. The authors stated, “When life becomes challenging, women seek out friendships with other women as a means of regulating stress levels. A common female stress response is to ‘tend and befriend.’ That is, when women become stressed, their inclination is to nurture those around them and reach out to others.”
Total Health Magazine also featured an article, “Female Friendship Good for Your Health,” by Gloria Gilbere, PhD that stated, “Women connect with each other very differently by providing support systems that help each other deal with the stresses and difficult life experiences we all encounter. Physically, this quality girlfriend time helps us to create more serotonin, a neurotransmitter that helps combat depression, and can help create a general feeling of well-being.”
Here’s how serotonin works
Let me introduce you to Karol, a female financial advisor I had been coaching for several years. Karol had been struggling to gain the confidence necessary to believe she could actually make it on her own, despite everything that indicated she would flourish. She was stressed at the responsibility of being a business owner. Through our coaching experience, she found the confidence to leave the banking environment as a financial advisor and started a thriving advisor practice of her own with her assistant. One day Karol and I met for lunch to catch up and see how things were progressing with her new practice. During lunch, Karol looked at her new Fitbit heartrate monitor and said, “My heart rate while talking to you is lower now than it is when I wake up in the morning! How can that be?” You guessed it – serotonin stimulated by quality girlfriend time.
Girlfriend time creates this neurotransmitter in spades, and it does its thing to calm women down and relieve stress. Health professionals like Dr. Gilbere, along with my own experience, demonstrate that if there are no other female advisors to reach out to and confide in, the stress levels for female advisors can become excessive and debilitating.
Women need each other
Time with other females produces a beneficial hormone in the body that helps women stay calm, reduces anxiety and stress, and increases the overall quality of a woman’s health. A continued lack of female mentors and/or confidants who can not only provide a willing ear but also relate to the pressures of the financial profession will improve both the success of women advisor practices and their overall health. For women to stay and thrive in the financial profession, here is yet another reason why we need more women to become financial advisors. And yet another reason why industry conferences and associations need to provide female advisors with opportunities to spend time together and allow the serotonin to flow.
Michelle R. Donovan is a speaker and co-owner of Productivity Uncorked LLC, a coaching firm that helps female financial advisors enhance their productivity and create organic referral processes. She has written a Wall Street Journal Best Selling book, The 29% Solution (published in seven languages) and an Amazon Best Selling book, A Woman’s Way: Empowering Female Financial Advisors to Authentically Lead and Flourish in a Man’s World. To schedule a free 30-minute call with Michelle, reach out to her at [email protected].
www.ProductivityUncorked.com
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Advisor Perspectives welcomes guest contributions. The views presented here do not necessarily represent those of Advisor Perspectives.
