Developing company team spirit: Includes chart

Most notable for garnering complaints is National Bank Financial Ltd. With its 750 advisors across the country, the Montreal-based firm has to deal not only with the geographical challenge of running a national practice but with cultural and linguistic differences as well.

“Being in Western Canada makes it difficult,” says a National Bank Financial advisor in British Columbia. “The perception out here is that this is a Quebec-based firm rather than a national firm.”

The majority of National Bank Financial advisors based in Western Canada list the firm’s lack of image outside Quebec as one of the worst aspects of being employed by the firm, with some citing the threat of Quebec separation as a deterrent to some investors.

Others claim that the dearth of branches in provinces outside Quebec make referral business and marketing impossible.

“We don’t have the same positioning as the other bank-owned firms — at least, not on the East Coast,” says an advisor in the Maritimes. “In Quebec, it’s probably different, but here we just don’t have the brand recognition.”

In Quebec, the red National Bank Financial logo is almost as recognizable as McDonald’s golden arches, says Gordon Gibson, National Bank Financial’s senior vice president and managing director. “There are different challenges in different markets,” he says. “In the rest of Canada, we are not a brand name, and I don’t think we will become one anytime soon. We think that the advisor is the brand, so in the rest of Canada we prefer to hire advisors who can market themselves.”

But National Bank Financial does have some strategies for being inclusive with offices in the rest of the country. One such example is the President’s Congress, which was put in place this year to offer every advisor an opportunity to have contact with the rest of the firm.

“As we grow, we can be present more and visit branches more often,” Gibson says. “We try to get close that way. It’s a work in progress, but we are trying to make everyone feel as much a part of the community as possible. Bringing advisors from all over Canada closer and making them feel a part of the company is still a challenge. And it is one of many.”

Several advisors at Toronto-based Blackmont Capital Inc. and Vancouver-based Canaccord Capital Inc. also share feelings of disconnection from head offices that are situated in different parts of the country.

“There is still an eastern corporate culture,” says a Blackmont advisor in Western Canada. Blackmont advisors rated the firm’s image with the public an average of 5.6, a score that dipped to 4.3 in the Western provinces.

“The East and West don’t always get along, and there is a different attitude in Toronto than we have out here,” the advisor says.

Blackmont’s Toronto-based executive vice president and head of wealth management, Bruce Kagan, has been mindful of brand recognition since the firm changed its name to Blackmont from First Associates Investments Inc. six months ago.

“Quite frankly, it takes a bit of time,” Kagan says. “We are doing events in all our major cities, and there is community involvement taking place at all our centres to get our name out. We are doing everything we can right now. But it takes time.”

Conversely, although Toronto is often seen by the rest of Canada as the self-appointed centre of the universe, Canaccord advisors say it is just another city in which their firm’s name is not on the radar. “In Ontario, Canaccord is generally not a household name,” says a Canaccord advisor in Ontario.

Adds another Quebec advisor: “In the West, we have an amazing image. Here, what image?”

Bob Larose, Canaccord’s Vancouver-based executive vice president of private client services, doesn’t have a definitive solution to the problem: “We’re going to get together in the next month or two to talk about a branding strategy.”

@page_break@At CIBC Wood Gundy, the Connected Leadership program is a new initiative designed to foster closer relations between top advisors and the firm’s senior management through a series of educational retreats and forums.

There is no simple solution to the problems of alienation and branding imposed by Canada’s geography, but the majority of brokerages have plans in place to make advisors feel part of their corporate communities and to make their firms’ names known. For everyday marketing, for example, Tom Monahan, head of Toronto-based Wood Gundy, prefers sponsorship to television branding.

“We do a fair amount of charity work — we co-sponsored CIBC‘s Run for the Cure. We are always looking for sponsorship opportunities in which we can get to advisors and clients in the communities in which they live,” Monahan says. “This allows advisors to bring clients out and build relationships.” IE