After working as an associate financial advisor for eight years, Nicolas Anstis was ready to take charge with his own practice in 2010. He faced the challenge of tackling the many tasks involved in launching a business. It was a significant amount of work for one person.
“I couldn’t manage 200 clients by myself, plus brand myself and do all of the administration,” says Anstis, owner of Financial Health Partners in Ottawa. “I was a one-man shop at that point.”
The solution came in the form of coaching by his best friend, Tristan Hovey, a former consultant who specialized in helping professionals in various industries improve their business strategies.
Adding to the payroll
Anstis, who also does a substantial amount of business for Great-West Life Assurance Co. (GWL), was concerned about adding to his payroll. “I wasn’t making as much money,” he says. “I was on my own, and I was concerned about cash flow and expenses.”
However, when the friends began to work, Anstis was encouraged by the results.
Anstis and Hovey developed strategies for branding, client services and administrative duties. They created a schedule for every task and deadlines were strictly followed.
Anstis was able to triple his income over the course of a year and a half, an accomplishment he attributes largely to the coaching relationship he developed with Hovey. That success made Anstis eligible for GWL’s business solutions consulting program, in which the firm’s top-producing advisors learn from high-level consultants who help the advisors further improve profitability.
A partnership
“Coaching is a partnership when it’s built on taking action and moving forward,” says Joanne Ferguson, president of Advisor Pathways Inc. in Toronto. “It’s not about the past.”
If you are considering working with a coach, Ferguson says, you must first ask one key question: “Do I want to dig deep and really try to create some behavioural change that’s going to help me grow as an individual?”
If you are not willing to put in the work to make that change, Ferguson says, coaching will not have an effect on your business.
To illustrate this point, George Hartman, managing partner and co-founder of Accretive Advisor Inc. in Toronto, uses the example of an advisor whose goal is to double his assets under management within a year.
Hartman would want to discuss what actions that advisor would have to take in order to achieve that extraordinary growth. Says Hartman: “If he says, ‘I just want you to wave your magic wand and have people lined up at the door,’ I say, ‘I can’t do that’.”
Ineffective styles
However, the blame for an unsuccessful advisor/coach relationship is not always at the feet of the advisor. Hartman cites two examples of ineffective coaching styles, of which you should be wary.
The first is a rigid, “one size fits all” approach, in which there is the assumption that all advisors have the same problems and, therefore, a single solution will work for everyone.
“Sometimes, advisors either can’t or won’t follow those solutions,” Hartman says, “because they don’t make sense to them.”
He calls his second ineffective example an “ad hoc” approach – one that is more style than substance.
“This approach focuses more on motivation,” Hartman says, “and less on the discipline around investigation and then customizing a solution.”
A more effective, customized plan is based on the information you give your coach. If you work with a coach, Hartman says, you should provide key information, such as: why you are considering a coaching relationship; what is bothering you about your practice; and your vision for your practice.
Build a strategy
The answers to these types of questions will help your coach build a strategy. These strategies are not “rocket science,” says Hartman; it is the partnership between you and your coach that will make the difference.
When you are accountable to someone for your results, there is a stronger motivation to follow through on your plans.
Anstis enjoyed the change of structure that forced him to answer to someone.
“As an advisor, I own my business,” Astis says. “I don’t have to be accountable to anyone except myself. But with a business coach, you are accountable to someone.”
Anstis believes the coaching relationship is something that should particularly appeal to advisors whose businesses consist of long-term planning for clients.
“Most advisors have a plan, process or methodology when working with clients,” Anstis says. “Why wouldn’t advisors have a course of action for where their business is going?
“The business coach,” he adds, “is like the advisor for the advisory business.”
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