Transitioning from an Individual to a Team Client-Facing Structure
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View Membership BenefitsBeverly Flaxington is a practice management consultant. She answers questions from advisors facing human resource issues. To submit yours, email us here.
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Dear Bev,
We have a great advisory team that works together very well with a lot of mutual respect and support. We’re implementing a new process whereby we are focused on planning for succession and thereby assigning advisors to work with one another, including a junior advisor and a couple of support people. I call this “pods” because we are moving from a siloed approach to more of a team structure. I believe the objective and the decision to do this both make sense.
But one area where we need help is in collaboration and being honest with one another.
For example, last week the “pod” I am in had a difficult meeting with a client whose spouse is dealing with early dementia. While she (the spouse) is still able to have an educated opinion, they both want to revisit their wills, estate plans and portfolio allocation,s assuming she might have to go into assisted living at some point. It’s a terribly sad situation. I have enjoyed both husband and wife so much and watching her decline has been difficult for me personally.
We introduced the team, and my junior advisor was tasked with understanding what decisions have been made to date for their plans relative to what they probably need – a gap analysis, if you will. The junior advisor didn’t have accurate information on a couple of areas and the couple became very agitated. Their emotional states are high, and this process is difficult for them.
Following the meeting, once the couple had left our offices, one of the support team members said to my junior advisor in the hallway, “Well you couldn’t have made that more difficult on them if you had tried!” The junior advisor, a late 20s man who hasn’t been in the profession very long, stormed out of the office and didn’t come back to work for two days.
I didn’t think the incorrect data was a crisis – it did create some anxiety for our clients, but they know us well enough to trust we will fix it and move on.
It brought up the idea of effectively working together as a team with longstanding clients who are used to dealing with just me or one of our other advisors solo. We made the decision to create these pods because a business necessity, but did we think about the clients and how this will appear to them and how to engage with them most effectively?
Then there is the problem of unhappy team members. The explosive dialogue outside of our conference room was in earshot of many of our team members and made for a very uncomfortable couple of days. Eventually, my junior member returned, and while he and the support person haven’t been overly friendly toward one another, they aren’t fighting overtly.
What should I be thinking about as one of the leaders of these pods? I want to ensure we are doing the right things by our clients while maintaining our need to provide for succession longer term. I was shaken up by the whole incident, as I’m not someone who gets boisterous and angry over small things. My clients trust me because I stay even keel no matter what they need.
I could use some guidance about how best to organize and proceed.
K.C.
Dear K.C.,
Your note brings up several very important issues when moving from an individual to a team orientation. I applaud what you are doing for your clients and for succession in your firm, and I especially applaud your willingness to reach out and ascertain ways you can be most effective in helping make the shift successful for clients and for team members. There are many issues embedded in your inquiry. I’ll take each one and outline some considerations for you and actions you could take. I have created several team building programs, and I’ve worked with literally hundreds of successful teams, large and small. There are some obstacles that crop up no matter how well the team is doing. There are also some basic best practices that, when implemented, will help the team thrive and grow together.
- The end goal is getting better at giving feedback. Your support person was triggered in this meeting by hearing your junior advisor give incorrect information, and watching the client try and figure out what was wrong and why. The support person did not self-regulate and consider a way to provide their input to their colleague. They reacted in a way that would likely cause most anyone to become defensive. Your junior advisor was either not ready for the feedback or was embarrassed himself after the meeting and couldn’t “hear” what was underneath his teammate’s comments. Both ended up spouting out in a way that was unproductive and unnecessary, and bad feelings ensued. Feedback is challenging for most professionals even under the best of circumstances. I’ve seen senior leaders with many years of experience try and avoid it at all costs! In some of the training I do, I acknowledge research that shows most people will say “no” to the invitation of receiving feedback! It is likely because we don’t like to be told what we’ve done wrong and what we need to fix! But without being able to give and take feedback, teams won’t improve and won’t find their rhythm. It is imperative to become excellent at it. The first step is to call your team together and acknowledge what happened – emotions running high, the clients in a difficult situation, a new approach to working with clients and important information that was inaccurate all wound up together. If you can become objective about the scenario and show how typical it is for situations to unravel like this, it could take out the personal sting that both sides experienced. Next, create a way of incorporating feedback – schedule time after every meeting for a debrief. Be specific with the feedback – share two good things you observed about each colleague, and one area for improvement. Each person should do this with each of their colleagues. Allocate the right amount of time to do it well. The more you do it, the easier it becomes, and the more comfortable people are talking to one another in an objective manner.
- Be clear on who is doing what within your “pod” and how this impacts the client. I have to wonder if your support person became triggered because they were the person who should have gathered the data rather than the junior advisor. That is just a supposition on my part, but it points out that even though you may know each person’s title and role, they may not be clear how their roles interact with one another, who specifically is responsible for what area and how they are coming together in a collaborative manner to work with the client. Have a meeting to look at this together. Talk about what needs to happen, what information gets gathered and imparted, and what the client is expecting. Then determine how best to assign responsibilities. Use the time to inquire whether each team member is doing what they enjoy and what they are good at. If you push people into areas where they aren’t comfortable, they won’t be as successful, and this will be evident in these meetings from time to time.
- Consider how you present the team experience to the client. It sounds like your whole “pod” was in the meeting, if I am reading your note correctly. Just because you are working internally together, it doesn’t mean having the entire team show up en masse for your client is the right thing! You can collaborate and communicate and create as a team, but when it comes to the in person, perhaps only one or two people should go for any given meeting. Implement a process to plan for every prospect or client engagement and include your entire pod. This way, everyone has a voice, but not everyone has to be with the prospect or client every time.
- Become a facilitator of discussions between team members. If you are the leader of the team, unfortunately sometimes you are going to have to be the one to pull individuals together and help them talk in an objective, non-accusatory manner. The support person and your junior advisor may appear to be working together well. But if something like what happened between them isn’t addressed, it simmers under the surface. It will likely be a matter of time before something erupts again for one or the other. While no one likes these conversations, they are often air-clearing once completed. You can’t tell them to work it out on their own; they will likely need someone to keep the conversation on track and objective.
- Last but most important of all – communicate what is happening and why to your clients and check in with yourselves to make sure what you are doing is in fact best for the clients. If you have a hard time communicating why this makes sense and how it is positive and supportive for the clients, reconsider what you are doing and how you are doing it. If you can’t justify the importance for the client, that might be some of the source of the trouble. Examine this as part of your process.
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. The firm has won the Wealthbriefing WealthTech award for Best Training Solution for 2022 and 2023. Beverly is currently an adjunct professor at Suffolk University teaching undergraduate and graduate students Entrepreneurship and Leading Teams. She 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.
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