#FA Success Ep 363: Finding The Best Networking Approach For Prospects (And New Career Opportunities), With Christa Madison

Resources Featured In This Episode:

• Christa Madison
• Sebold Capital
• Northwestern Mutual
• Northwestern Mutual Training Program
• Monster
• Garrett Planning Network
• NAPFA
• RIA Channel
• Charles Schwab
• Fidelity
• MassMutual
• One Card Program
• Accenture
• Eventbrite
• XYPN

Looking for sample client service calendars, marketing plans, and more? Check out our FAS resource page!

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Full Transcript:

Michael: Welcome, Christa Madison, to the "Financial Advisor Success" Podcast.

Christa: Thank you so much. It's really nice to be here, and I'm honored to be included.

Michael: I appreciate you joining us today, and looking forward to the conversation talking about, as I think about just the sometimes or often painful way that we have to just literally navigate the industry to find the right job, the right firm, the right role for us. I've talked about this a little bit from my end on the podcast over the years that I found this phenomenon with a huge number of advisors that we try so hard to find the right firm to work with when we join the industry. And it almost always seems to come out that the one that actually works is not the 1st, it's the 3rd, sometimes the 4th, but usually the 3rd. We try a firm, we give it our best shot, but it turns out certain things don't fit or work. And we're usually young in the industry and learning what we don't know along the way.

So, then, you go to a 2nd firm that's different than the 1st, whatever you really didn't like about the 1st one, you always make sure the second one does better on that thing. But then often, we don't really hit it on the second one as well. But by now, you've done something at one extreme you didn't like, you have done something in the other extreme you didn't like, and you can start triangulating between the two. And I find by the time you get to the 3rd, often we find these really good roles that fit, that really sit well with us that we can really run with and grow our careers in. And so, on the one end, it's incredibly frustrating to me that we all have to do this in 3 hops with a lot of pain associated with it. But on the other end, there's value in, well, the journey itself, but the value in hearing others that have gone through this journey to try to see and learn more about what choices other people made so that maybe we can cut down on one of those hops for ourselves in the paths that we're taking.

So, I'm excited to talk about the path that you've had, especially because you've done one a little bit similar to mine and living in insurance world and brokerage world and RIA world and spanning the proverbial channels and just how hard it is, I feel like, to find your place in the industry sometimes.

Finding Financial Advice 'Accidentally' Through Northwestern Insurance [05:46]

Christa: Yeah, it's been tough. I feel like I am the antithesis of strategic career moves because I've seen it all, and I've done it all. I think when I graduated from college with my finance and economic background, Northwestern Mutual recruits heavy out of college universities. And I think everyone is somewhat familiar with their recruiting tactics. They hire as many people as they possibly can and throw them all up on a wall and see who sticks. They entice you with the idea of being your own business owner and unlimited earning potential. For me, that was attractive. And when I graduated, I didn't even realize there was a planning community and opportunities to just work with clients in a planning capacity.

So, I always actually enjoyed the planning work more than the actual insurance work, but I felt like my only choice to be included in that community was to go with an organization like Northwestern Mutual that would give me the capability to work with clients. If I had to place insurance products here and there to continue to do that, then I felt like that was my only choice.

Michael: So, you came in directly out of college, this was like first job out of college path for you?

Christa: Even sooner than that, actually. So, I am a little bit of an A-type – a little bit. My husband could probably confirm that. So, as I was in my junior year at school studying finance and economics, we didn't even have a personal financial planning class because that was how early it was in this community. I googled "top 10 internships in finance," and Northwestern Mutual was one of them. So, it was like the top 1 or 2. I know now that the reason why it's the top 1 or 2 is because as an intern, they license you. So, as an intern, you get insurance licensed, and they'll pay and represent you and sponsor you to get a license, which means from day 1, you can start and do client-facing work – from day 1, as an intern.

Christa: So, I made that my goal to go and get an internship at Northwestern Mutual because that was on the list of top internships, and I succeeded in that. Then I did a summer internship at Northwestern Mutual, and then I went back to school. And when I graduated, they transitioned me to a full-time representative.

Michael: So, when you were searching this out, did you know then that you wanted to do this financial planning, financial advice thing and that's what you were pursuing with finance econ as a background, or were you sort of a thing like 'just' finance/econ/business? I know there's a group of people, they just like the numbers in the money things and don't really actually have any idea of what they're going to do with it out of college until you start doing internships and find things that you try and say like, "Oh, this is actually neat. I think I might want to do this as my career."

Christa: Yeah. So, that's also another somewhat interesting story. So, my expertise, I would say that I get along with people really well and I connect with people really well. So, when I was in school, I wasn't really quite sure what I wanted to do. I was taking my gen. ed. classes and learning about psychology and I took an art class and I had no idea. My parents, my father was in printing, so he was in the arts, and my mother is a computer engineer, I guess is what you would call them now, but in her day it was a computer programmer. So, she did computer programming. And I initially declared my major in the arts because I wanted to go into printing like my dad did, but then very quickly, I did... you remember, I don't even know if it's around anymore, remember the website monster.com that had all the jobs listed on it?

Michael: Yes, absolutely. Like the indeed.com of its era.

Christa: Yes, yes, yes. I might be dating myself now, but I'm okay with that. So, I did a search on Monster one day in my dorm on how many fine arts jobs were available in my hometown thinking like, "Well, if I graduate with this degree, what are my job opportunities?" And I got 3 jobs returned and 2 of them were telemarketing jobs that had nothing to do with what I was studying for. So, I was like, "Well..."

Michael: This is very forward-looking of you to realize maybe that arts degree might be a little bit challenging for future jobs.

Christa: Yes. I very much was like, "I think I should probably change my major." My school had a great business department and a great business school that was built by State Farm because State Farm's headquarters was where I went to school. And I started there, and I've always been pretty good at math and I've always enjoyed learning about the stock market in general. So, I said, "Okay, I'm going to change my major to," at first I started accounting, and no offense to all of my wonderful contacts in accounting that I work for now, it wasn't my area that I enjoyed being in.

So, I very quickly transitioned to finance just because of all the classes that I had that was the closest track to finishing. And that's where I fell in love because it gave... This is going to sound a little strange, in finance, there's multiple solutions to a problem. In accounting, there's only 1. And that's by design. It should be that way. And I was able to tap into my ability to be creative and connect with people and think outside the box in finance, but I wasn't able to do that in accounting. So, that's definitely...

Michael: So, that's what pulled you from the accounting side to the finance econ side of the world?

Christa: Yeah. And actually, the economics, I only had to take 2 extra classes to get a double major, so I was like, "Why not?" And then I didn't know what I wanted to do with it. And that's when I was like, "Well, I probably should get an internship before I graduated," and Googled internships. I was thinking that I would probably go work for a bank or something in that financial arena, but then when Northwestern Mutual popped up, I went and checked them out. So, it was so random how I came across this field. And then once I started working with direct clients, I started falling in love with... more of the getting to know them and their stories and building good relationships with my clients.

The product sales, I never really enjoyed too much. I was never top of my recruiting class because I very much still wanted to do what was appropriate in every situation for every client. But once I started working with them... I was the first person in my 20-person recruiting class to finish my series exams because I was running around signing up all my friends with Roth IRAs because that to me was more important. So, that's how I started falling in love with the planning thing.

Michael: I guess notable, you weren't running around all your friends to open up permanent life insurance, retirement savings contracts. You were running around opening up Roth IRAs.

Christa: Much to the chagrin of my managing supervisor, frustrated with me by putting $100 a month deposits into Roth IRAs when that should have gone into life insurance. So, I guess it's serendipitous that I am now in this planning world that I'm so passionate about. It just took me a while to find the community that I've thrived in.

Michael: So, how did this play out for you at the insurance company? You're go-getter-ing well, you're getting clients, you're getting licensed fast, you're getting clients, but they're not necessarily buying the primary thing that the insurance company might've been hoping that you were going to be selling. So, how does this play out over the next year or few? Did that become a problem?

Christa: I was there for 3 years – probably a year too long, but I'm not a quitter. So, when things get hard, I just push through it. I'm not sure how many listeners are used to how insurance contracts are built, it sounds like, Michael, you're familiar with it, but when you are a captive insurance representative, you have a minimum amount of production basically that you have to do every single year. And if you don't hit that minimum amount, you're done. They let you go. So, I was just barely hitting that minimum amount because I was doing, oddly enough, which now makes sense for where I'm at, I was doing more planning than the actual insurance work, and the insurance work was just something I had to do in order to continue the planning.

But I wasn't charging for the planning, so I was doing the insurance work and doing the planning for free. And then if we came across some insurance need, I said, "Okay, fine, now we have an insurance need." So, I was there for...

Michael: And why weren't you charging for the planning work even though you could or wasn't an option at that point?

Christa: I didn't know it was an option. I didn't even know that was an option. And I know this now and I didn't know when I was there, but I didn't have my Series 65, which would've allowed me to charge for advice. And at the time... Again, I want to reference the fact that when I graduated, the fee-for-advice was new, no one was really doing it in my office.

Michael: Can I ask, when did you graduate? When were you entering into Northwestern Mutual?

Christa: 2006 is when I graduated college and I was working for Northwestern Mutual in 2005 because I started as an intern my junior year.

Michael: Yeah. Like hourly model is out there with Garrett Planning Network, but not a lot, NAPFA is a much, much smaller group at that time. RIA channel was significantly smaller at that time. And, like, very, very few people were doing any material standalone planning fees, and almost no one had a standalone just charge fees for financial planning model.

Christa: Right. But also keep in consideration that Northwestern Mutual, they make money off of insurance sales. So, they didn't want people to focus on fee planning. Now they're switching their tune because they're losing lots of people who want to do planning and them not giving them the capability to do that. But I found out a couple of years after I left Northwestern Mutual that they had this rule, which I'm sure has been lifted now, where only a certain number of advisors in the office could hold their Series 65 and could charge for planning. And in my office, that was 3.

So, there were 3 advisors in my office that had Series 65s that had built their books there for years. And I would've not been able to do any planning in that office ever unless 1 of those 3 advisors died, retired, or left for some other firm.

Michael: Well, which is particularly challenging because I know, like Northwestern Mutual in particular, for people who make it past the initial years when a lot of folks struggle, their retention rate is ludicrously high at that point. Most people who stay for 5 years at Northwestern Mutual stay for 25 or more years at Northwestern Mutual, which means if you're waiting for 1 of the 3 who has the Series 65 in the office to get out of the way, you could be waiting a long time.

Christa: Exactly. Exactly. So, to make a long story short, I didn't meet my production requirements to keep my contract and they let me go. So, there was not much I could do at that point.

Michael: And just in this context, you had clients and activity.

Christa: Oh, I did.

Michael: It wasn't as though you couldn't get in front of clients and activity. It's just that the client's and activity weren't generating enough insurance revenue or just enough revenue overall because at the end of the day, $100 a month into a whole-life policy gives significantly more production commissions than $100 a month into a Roth IRA. So, you need a lot more assets and flows and business if you're putting it into investments and not insurance because you get less dollars per client. So, now you need way more clients to get to the production numbers.

Christa: Correct. Or clients with bigger pockets. And let's face it, as a 20-year-old out of college, I wasn't meeting with clients that had millions and millions of dollars to invest.

Michael: As you said, "We're opening Roth IRAs for people in their 20s because that's my peer network at the time that I know and I can go to."

Christa: Right. So, that was it. And then talking about building and rebuilding and going somewhere else and building again, the other thing that I was unaware of, because I didn't have family in the industry and I just fell into it, was the fact that when you build a book at an insurance organization, you don't really own it. It's not yours. So, I left with a 2-year non-compete, and I didn't have any super large clients. So, I think if I made a few phone calls here and there, I don't think they would've enforced the non-compete. But it's not like I could've taken my book with me.

Michael: So, that becomes an even more painful. You had some client volume activity, but you didn't have enough to meet the production requirements to validate and renew your contract, but then failing to renew your contract and getting terminated means you don't even get to keep the ones that you had, you have to basically start over?

Christa: Yeah. Which is why I still have friends, very good friends that work in the insurance community, and there's definitely some players out there that give the insurance community a bad reputation. But I can't blame them 100% for doing what they're doing to make their own lives successful. But it was probably a blessing that that relationship with me and them came to an end.

Building A New Book (In A New, More Lucrative Market) At MassMarket [21:10]

Michael: So, then, what came next? You've been doing it, but you don't have a firm anymore.

Christa: Right. So, I definitely took about a month off to decide what I was going to do next. The other thing that is very prevalent in that industry is the recruiting is massively prevalent. They hire 20 people, and 2 people will stay. 2 people will be there after 3 years. So, the hiring for that industry in general has to be so voluminous in order to be able to keep people that are successful. So, I was always getting recruited to go to other firms.

Michael: Even while you were at Northwestern?

Christa: Oh, yeah, every week. Every week, I was getting calls, especially once they found out that I had survived past that 2 or 3-year time period, which meant I actually had the skills to prospect and business develop. So, I got approached by a bunch of people, and again, still didn't know at this point that there was a planning community and that I actually could do planning work, but I still loved working with clients and the work that I was doing. So, I said, "Okay, I know this industry is for me, I want to stay in it. I want to be able to go somewhere that will allow me to continue to work with clients in the capacity that I like."

I thought that being with an insurance broker-dealer was the only option I had, going to a broker-dealer or going to an insurance company with a broker-dealer. So, my options were to go work for someone like Charles Schwab or Fidelity, where the production requirements were based solely on assets generating or bringing in assets. So, I could either go work for them and annually bring in however many millions of dollars of assets they wanted me to bring in, or I could go to another insurance company and place 20 insurance policies and keep my job.

So, I said, "Okay, well, I'd rather go back to the insurance world and build client relationships and then book there because no matter what the dollar count, I know that I can place the certain number of policies that they want based on need and the amount of people that I was seeing every single year. But what I didn't want was the requirement to bring in so many assets, because at that point, my history at Northwestern Mutual, I wasn't meeting with people that had millions and millions of dollars.

Michael: So, you're still meeting with clients that are more moderate means, because, again, you're in your 20s. So, we tend to talk to people in their 20s and 30s. You talk to enough of them, inevitably, some of them are going to need insurance because they're just literally young people starting families and building careers, and at the stage where they will likely need some just bona fide needs, some life insurance. So, if I have enough volume of clients, which I've got, and they're of the age that's insurance-buying, it's going to be more straightforward for me to validate an insurance contract than an asset flows-based investment contract.

Christa: Right. So that allowed me to work with clients in the capacity that I wanted to. So, I started...

Michael: Glad you worked with who you wanted to work with.

Christa: Yeah. In the capacity that I felt was important. So, I started reviewing contracts, reviewing minimum production requirements, what would be a good fit for me. And someone had approached me for MassMutual and said, "Hey, why don't you come over here, come check us out." And I told the recruiting director what I was looking for, and they introduced me to a couple of advisors in the office that were already operating in that capacity. And they had the lowest production requirements on the insurance side out of many of the other contracts that I had read. So I thought that was a good fit. So, I went there and built my practice, started building it again.

So, this is the second build. So, now we're on the second build, because I couldn't take with me clients from before, so now I'm building again. But I will say, it was hard to lose the client base when I left Northwestern Mutual, but on the other hand, it allowed me to approach a whole different market. So, I was operating within a particular market at Northwestern out of college. So, it was mainly people getting started in their careers. Well, after 3 years, I had gained... One thing I will say about Northwestern Mutual, and I don't totally mean to knock them all the time, but they have the most incredible training program that I have ever experienced anywhere that I've ever been.

If you want to go through the ringer and become the best prospector that you will ever be in your life... I jokingly tell people out of school to go work for Northwestern Mutual for 3 months, go through the training program, and then quit. It's fantastic. And a lot of my business development skills and my network-building skills came initially from that.

Michael: What did they teach you? What did you learn that was so breakthrough and impactful for you?

Christa: Oh man, that's a big question. So, they have...people who are listening to this, that are used to this program are going to start laughing. They have this thing called the One Card program. And there was studies done on captive agents back in the, I don't know, I think it was like in the '50s. They followed around the top 20 agents at Northwestern Mutual and had them write down every single piece of activity they ever did. Every single phone call, every single lunch, every single talk, every single time they asked for business, every single time they asked for someone to become a client. And they went through all the numbers to get down to a ratio of how many interested parties that you need to approach in order to get someone to say "yes".

Because I don't care, and this has become so true because now I work in a space with wealthy people. We work with households between 5–$250 million. And the thing that has shocked me so much is that the numbers are true no matter what space you're in, no matter what industry you work in, no matter who you're targeting, the numbers are true.

Michael: What's the breakdown? What's the ratio that you found?

Christa: I will say, if you're good, your ratio gets better. So, this is like entry-level, you're just getting started. So, for every 10 people that you go up to and say, "This is what I do, are you interested? 3 people will say, "Yeah, tell me more," and 1 person will become a client. And that's all I had to remember.

Michael: 10-3-1.

Christa: Yeah. And it's funny that you say that because we would go to internship parties and there'd be the numbers 10-3-1 on the walls everywhere.

Michael: Well, which is fascinating, I've not been through the Northwestern Mutual system, but part of my early career, I was at a firm that was very heavy into seminar marketing. So, you do direct mailers to the local area, invite people out to a seminar. It was on retirement planning and estate planning, and revocable living trusts. And then you try to get them to engage with a comprehensive plan, and then help them implement whatever they needed. It was a brokerage firm at the time. And the magic formula for us in that world was for every 10 people who show up at the seminar, 3 of them will schedule an appointment with you, and 1 of those will become a client. We literally talked about the same 10-3-1 ratio.

Christa: Wow. That's wild because I've only experienced it in our industry, but it makes sense. And rebuilding for me the second time did 2 things. One, it allowed me to approach a completely different market, a more sophisticated market with higher dollar volume, because I had experience now and I had confidence – I did it once, I could do it again. And I also had all of the knowledge and background on how to build centers of influence and communities and track my numbers. And I knew if I wanted 20 clients that year, 30 clients that year, I could back into that number very easily because I knew what the numbers were.

Michael: So, you just start working backwards: if I want 20 clients, I need 60 prospect meetings. If I need 60 prospect meetings, I've got to approach 200 people. If I got to approach 200 people, 50 weeks in the year, okay, I need 4 or 5 people every week. If I'm talking to 1 new person every day, this should math by the end of the year.

Christa: You got it. And it's just as simple as that. Now, if you have experience and you really know your systems and your processes, your numbers could get better. So, I would say, "Your numbers could be 10-5-2." But typically, when you first start, you've got nothing. When you first start, you have nothing to go on, so you've got to use numbers from other people. And that's our starting numbers. So, when I started at Mass, building again to me gave me a chance to approach a whole different market. And that was exciting to me because I was looking for larger dollar volume, I was looking for more sophisticated clients. I was looking for the ability to make a bigger impact in the advice that I was giving.

Michael: So, I am fascinated by this dynamic of, "Because I had to start over, it was easier to go after a new or a different market." Because I find for a lot of advisors, there is a pattern. We build somewhere initially, and we get good at that, but then we also get known for that. Those are the circles we move in, we start getting more referrals of that. And on the one end, if that's a good enough market for you to grow in, then you can grow in it. But it's really hard to change, to change our identities, to change who we're going after to intentionally pursue a new market while not atrophy or while not losing who we've got already.

So, I'm fascinated by this, "While I was forced to rebuild because of the circumstances, so I had to start over from scratch, and that just made it more straightforward to not do what I was doing before and just go after a different market segment that worked better for me."

Christa: Yeah. I think a lot of that had to do with confidence. I mean, I was hired right out of school. What did I know? I didn't know very much. So, I set my sights within a range that meeting with people like myself... I was going to mention a statistic that I thought was extremely interesting, which I'm not quite sure where this came from. Clients will work with you within 10 years of your perceived age. So, if you're 30, then you'll work the best with clients who are 20 to 40. Now, that's not to say that there aren't outliers, but that's the people's comfort level of where they like working.

Michael: I've seen that a lot in the advisor community as well, that a lot of us have a client base that are us plus or minus 10 years

Christa: Right. You can make a better connection. So, the ability to jump into a whole different market, I think a lot had to do with confidence because I had been doing it for 3 years now, so in my mind, I could handle more sophisticated planning items. And I didn't have a planning "department." So, it was just me. It was me and my assistant. And losing my book initially did give me that ability to be like, "Okay, I'm going to go and approach this whole different set of people."

Michael: So, how did you define the new market that you were going after? Who was your ideal client that you were targeting when you got to do this fresh and new?

Christa: My ultimate goal, when I first started, I was meeting with a lot of single people who just graduated college because that's what I was, I was a single person, just graduated college. So, my new market, I really tried to focus on people who were 5 to 10 years into their career. I didn't really have a specific niche as far as industry or role. And married couples, 5 to 10 years into their career. I didn't really do too much, like privately-owned stuff, I did more larger firms. And also keep in mind, I'm from Chicago and my office was downtown. So, I think I may be set up a lawn chair outside the Accenture building and just met with as many people who left the building as I possibly could.

And that was my goal, because those people, they had good benefits, they had good job security, they were making good money. They needed advice. Nobody else was working with them because they weren't the top of the top. And it was a good market for me. And they had needs. So, one of the big things that is prevalent that I don't think will come to a surprise to anyone is that the best clients are the clients who care about things more than just generating wealth. When they care about themselves, their families, their spouses, their children, those are the best clients because their motivations are not solely transactional.

How Christa Actually Builds Her Client Networks [35:21]

Michael: So, how are you actually just prospecting and getting in front of all these folks in general, I guess, Accenture folks in particular? How are you actually getting out there and getting in front of them to do the 10-3-1 formula?

Christa: So, I'm systematic about building my networks, and I will say, and I don't think this is a statistic anywhere. I think this is just from my experience. And I'm sure we'll get to this too, but I've rebuilt 3 times. So, 3 times I've built networks, and usually, your network will start producing benefits for you – organically. I'm not talking about acquisitions because that's something completely different and much faster. But organically, if you build your network properly and you work really hard at it, it'll start producing and reaping lots of rewards in your third year. And I knew that from being at Northwestern Mutual.

Michael: It takes 3 years. It takes 3 years.

Christa: 2 years to build trust, 2 years to build connections, 2 years to build your network and your name out there. And then on the third year, you start seeing returns. And then the other thing that I always knew is that you need at least 3 different ways to get introduced to potential clients.

So for me, since I didn't have a massive budget because it was just me, my first thing I did is I went to 3 networking events downtown in the city of Chicago every single week for the first 2 years. Every week, I was going to 3 things.

Michael: What kinds of things?

Christa: Everything. Being in Chicago, I had lots of opportunities. But maybe some listeners are not in large metropolitan areas, but every metropolitan area has a chamber of commerce. Every metropolitan area usually has maybe a lunch group or a group that gets together once a month to discuss business practices or whatever. The interesting thing is, people who are good at networking know other places to network. And if you build a network of people who are good at networking and get to know them really well, then you go to events, and they go, "Oh my gosh, you got to check this event out. It's really great." "Okay, great. I'll be there." Then you go to that event, and you meet someone there, and then they go, "Oh man, you like this one, you're going to like this one. You should check that out."

Michael: So, you became the active networker who found your networking buddies because they were at many of the same networking meetings that you were at, and then you get to share notes about other networking meetings that some of you don't know about?

Christa: Yeah. And it was great because in the beginning, I went to everything, everything I could think of I went to. I was looking up events on Eventbrite. You can go into Eventbrite and type in business meetups, and go there. There's other networking calendars. If you just go and Google "networking calendar" in your area, your geographical area, there's something bound to come up. And you just go there, and you build this community of people who are also good networkers themselves, and then you learn which ones work well for you. So, that's where the work comes in. You have to go to everything first, experience some that don't really fit well until you find ones that you're like, "Wow, this is good. This is a good community, good people come here, it's worth it." I also did free and paid ones. I can tell you the paid ones are always better. The free ones are tough because...

Michael: What makes the paid ones better?

Christa: You get a higher caliber of professionals that show up. So, I think it's probably pretty well known in our community and in all communities that finding someone who's really great at building networks and introducing other people to relationships and relationship building, it's a skill that not everybody has. When you go to paid events, serious people are there because they're paying to be there. They're there to make connections, build relationships, find out how there's some way we can help each other, get an idea of how we can share the abundance. It's the abundance mindset.

Leveraging Personal Branding To Make An Impact In Networking And Prospecting [39:39]

Michael: And so just curious, as you go through these networking meetings, I feel like the challenge for a lot of advisors is just literally, like, how do you introduce yourself and explain what you do? So, did you have the 30-second elevator speech thing that you created to tell your story? Did you do it a different way? How are you actually introducing yourself and trying to get 10 intros down to 3 meetings, 10-3-1 model?

Christa: This is an interesting question. Let me think of the best way to say this. When you're at a networking event, I know this is going to be mind-blowing, nobody really cares what you do. Nobody cares. A lot of people there are there to have fun, they're there to meet people. Yes, there is a component of like, "This is what I do," but the best connections that you make when you're networking are getting to know them as a person. So, some of the best networking meetings I've been to where the best centers of influence that I've built relationships with, we'll talk at the network meeting... I won't talk to anybody else, I'll just talk to them for an hour about all their passions and their background and where they're from, and what they're interested in.

And we get to know each other on a personal level. And then I get their card, and then I leave, and I look at their card and go, "Oh, that's what they do." So, I did have like a canned, "Hey, I'm a financial advisor/wealth manager. We work with clients with this particular area." But I would usually then say, "But tell me about you," because everybody wants to talk about themselves.

Michael: And then, do you follow up with them on the card? Is there more of an ask in the follow-up? How do you actually turn this into a business opportunity?

Christa: In my opinion, this is where people really struggle... and I do this now in a slightly different medium, but I've been doing it my whole career. There aren't very many women in our business. I think it's getting better, which makes me very happy. I think it's getting better, and more women are coming into the industry. But I used to love to do things that separated myself from the crowd of advisors by using my fact that I'm a woman to my advantage, I guess – and as a positive. And so, I used to...so silly, I would get the most sparkly pink thank-you cards. And for listeners who aren't in this demographic, you can use anything you want, but every single person, whether they were a good connection, a bad connection, if I met you and we talked and I have your information, you are getting a handwritten thank-you card from me in the mail 2 days later.

Michael: And it's going to be a memorable card because it's a sparkly pink thank-you card, which you are probably not getting from any other advisor you met at the networking meeting. It stands out, it's the thing.

Christa: That was my process. I don't know if it's flawed, but that was my process. So, I sent out handwritten notes. And I will say this, which is surprising, to date, and I've been in this industry for 18 years, I have yet to receive a thank-you card from someone that I have met at a networking event, which I think is hilarious. So, because I send out, at least... now that I'm in business development a lot, I send out at least 15 to 20 a week, at least. It takes a lot of time and effort to actually write them out, but man...

Michael: Is there a standard script of what you write?

Christa: No. I write what we talk about. So, when I meet with someone at an event, I'll put notes on their cards saying, "Loves horses, has 2 kids, lives on the North Shore." And then, when I send them their card, I might say, "It was really nice to meet you. I really enjoyed talking to you about your family and your horses. I look forward to seeing you again soon." Just like a short little...

Michael: And how do you capture those notes? Because to me, that's an interesting thing. You're in a networking meeting, you're talking to people left and right, sometimes it actually gets hard to keep everyone straight. So, where do you keep the notes?

Christa: When you're done talking to someone, you got to write on the back of their card just like 2 or 3 words.

Michael: Or you would scribble it on the business because you're exchanging business cards.

Christa: Yeah. It's made it slightly more challenging now that when I meet with people and they're like, "I have an e-business card." And I go, "Oh no."

Michael: I was just going to ask, what happens as we shift to more digital business cards? Is that actually kind of problem?

Christa: You adapt. It's all about adaption. So, I have a very wonderful assistant right now, and my assistant, when I was at MassMutual would do the same. Although I didn't have to worry about it too much back then because everyone still had paper cards, but now that I'm running into some e-cards, I will very quickly pull out my phone when I'm done with that conversation before I get into the next conversation, we use Microsoft Teams, so I'll Teams notes to my assistant so that she has it. And then when I come in, she'll give me the notes so that I know who it was and what we talked about. My poor assistant, she's used to it now, but I'll be at an event, and she'll get a note that says, "John, 3 kids, horses, North Shore." Now, before, I had to prep cards on my own, but now she preps cards for me. When I come in, she gives me my notes, and then I'll say, "Oh yeah, that was so and so," and then I will give her all the information. So, that's how I'm handling it from an e-card perspective. But if we're talking about follow-up, they would get a handwritten card from me, a week later, I would call them to set up either a coffee or a lunch

Michael: And so, consciously here, they get the card within 2 business days of the meeting, the call then comes a week later. So, they've received the card, they remember the pink thank-you note, you're still relatively top of mind when then you say, "I'd love to set lunch." And what's the call like? "I just want set lunch to get to know you more and more better"? "I want to talk to you about how I help people with their finances"?

Christa: That depends on the conversation that we have at the event. So, if I meet with someone at an event, and they are an awesome networker, let's say they're an attorney, an estate planning attorney, and they're a great networker, they're easy to talk to, they have lots of clients they work with. Estate planning attorneys are power partners for us because our clients need estate planning, we tell them we don't do estate planning, and then we send them to an attorney. So, our 2 power partners, power COI partners are estate planning attorneys and CPAs. That's who we send the most clients to. So, if it's an attorney or an estate planning attorney, my goal for lunch with that estate planning attorney is just to get to know more about their practice, not necessarily for business per se, their own personal business.

So, I want to get to know their practice, I want to know what clients they work with. When you go to networking events, it's extremely apparent if you have intentions strictly just for business and not networking intentions. So, it's very important to me when I go to these events that I'm there to make good connections and make good relationships, and where those lead is where they lead. I'm not necessarily there saying, "Hi, you should work with me." "Hi, you should work with me." "Hi, you should work with me." Because you never know. And it's also not the time or place to talk about personal finances. But naturally, once I also get to talk about our firm and what we work on, a handful of those people usually say, "Oh, that's really interesting because I have blah, blah, blah, blah," and they go into their own stories.

If I meet with someone at an event who maybe indicates that they really do need help or they're struggling, well then yeah, that coffee or lunch might turn into like, "Tell me what you're struggling with. What can I do to help?" So, those lunches and coffees are introductory meetings for exploratory reasons, hence the reason why the 3-year are time mark. I want to have 3 good conversations with people and that's it. So, I want to make 3 good connections, and if I make 3 good connections, I will have considered it a success.

Michael: And so, if you get several of those a week, you might get 10 good connections in a week, which ironically gets you right back to like 10-3-1. So, then you're sending out thank-you notes to all of them. Then you're doing the follow-up calls to get the meetings. So, is this where 10-3-1 starts to kick in? If you send out 15 to 20 thank-you notes at the end of the week, you're going to get a third of those actually turn into meetings that people will take you up on?

Christa: So, no. You're not even at that point yet, you're setting that up. So, the 10 people are 10 people that you've said, "This is what I do. How can I help you? How can I help you in the capacity of what we do? So, the networking meetings, if I sit with an attorney and we just talk about the attorney's business and how we could share business, that's not part of the 10. But if the attorney says, "Hey, by the way, my existing person XYZ," and then I say, "Well, that's what we do. If you're interested in taking a step with us on your own personal concerns, then here's the process," and we have a process for that. So, then he turns into a 10 – 1 of the 10.

So, the 10 is you approaching someone saying, "Here's what I do, here's what we specialize in, would you like to go through the process?" And if I meet with those people that I met at events and that conversation doesn't materialize into that, then I can't count that as a person in that particular process.

Transitioning To Consulting To Learn All Ends Of Business [50:26]

Michael: Yeah. So, now keep us moving forward on this journey as it's evolving.

Christa: So, that's 2 years. First year, 3 networking events a week, 2nd year, 1 networking event a week, third year, maybe 3 networking events a month. Because once you have your network built, then all you've got to do is just stay in touch with them. So, it's a lot of effort in the beginning, but then once you build it, it's there for you. And then you start turning business in the third year. I mean, you'll turn business in those first 2 years, it just won't be as prolific and flowing as you will in that 3rd year.

Michael: I just find the first 2 years, the results come just literally directly from the activity, 1 meeting and conversation at a time, and if you talk to enough of them, then some of those turn into business. Somewhere around the 3rd year, basically, referrals start showing up. Some of your 10s start showing up and you didn't have to go out there and find them. You're away from someone and they're more qualified and they're already part of the 10, so you don't have to do the prior work to get them to be part of the 10. And so, the whole flywheel just starts to roll fast.

Christa: Yeah. And those are the best, the ones that come that you don't put too much effort into. It took me time to build that up again, and then clients came, the flow came, and the practice was successful. I enjoyed being there. I feel that I built a pretty good practice there. I was able to do a lot of planning. I still wasn't charging for it because I didn't know that that was a possibility. And I don't think my firm would've given me the option to do that. When I left MassMutual, they were just starting to be like, "Oh, no, now you can charge for planning advice." And until my time at MassMutual also came to an end.

Michael: So, what happened at Mass? Was this a similar phenomenon of, "I'm continuing to get clients and grow, but I'm still not getting enough insurance-related activity to qualify the insurance contract?"

Christa: Yes, that also happened. And I think this starts to get into some of the struggles that I have with the industry in general. I had my son. So, during the time that I was at MassMutual, I got married and my husband and I had a child. And when I had my son, I no longer wanted to do meetings on weekends and evenings. I wanted to spend time at home with my newborn. And my whole plan was to build a network and build a practice that would give me the chance to take it easy a little bit in the first couple of years of my son's life. And instead of actively building, just maintain, build a book, maintain it while my son was small, and then when he got older, I could jump back in and start to build it again. So, that was my plan, was to maintain. Well, if I wasn't actively building, I was not meeting my contract minimums, too, for production.

Michael: Right. Because recurring revenue fees are great for personal revenue, but that's not how insurance qualification contracts are built. It's all business. It's all new business.

Christa: First, one of the frustrating things about the insurance contracts is January 1 hits, and you're back at 0, you've start all over again. So, I very politely asked the powers that be in my office if I could transition my contract from a captive representative to what they would call a broker status, more like a broker. Brokers have no production requirements, they just have access to the products and vehicles that the company has. But it would've allowed me to maintain my relationships with my book. I kind of told them, "Hey, I'd like to transition to a broker temporarily while my son is small so that I could maintain my relationships. And then when the time comes and I feel comfortable, I'll jump back in and start building again." My request was denied, and my contract was canceled, and I lost my book for the second time.

Michael: So, they denied it, and then you couldn't get to the production requirements or they literally terminated you for asking because they didn't want to work with you if you weren't trying to grow anymore?

Christa: It was like halfway through the year after I had given birth and then I said, "I'm realizing that this is much tougher to meet my requirements now that I have this newborn at home." I knew I wasn't going to meet it. So, I hadn't yet failed to meet the requirements, I went in and said, "I will not meet them. I would like to transition."

Michael: You could see what's coming because you know how you were planning to change the way you were spending your time.

Christa: Correct. And at that point is when they terminated me.

Michael: Because you said you're not going to qualify your contract, so...

Christa: That was definitely a bigger blow that I was not prepared for.

Michael: So, what happens at that point to you and your clients?

Christa: So, I had a non-compete. I had a 2-year non-compete and I had a fair amount of clients that I would still occasionally keep in touch with. That transition was a tough one for me because I had built a pretty good book after 5 or 6 years, and I couldn't take it with me because that's not how the contracts work. And I really had to do some soul-searching because at that point, I feel like anyone would get to this point, I didn't know if I wanted to stay in the industry anymore.

Michael: Yeah. Most people don't stay after the first time. You have to start over if you lose your book of clients, much less having it happen more than once.

Christa: Yeah. So, I stayed in touch with a handful of clients that I was really good friends with, and I referred them to other advisors. They told me that they would follow me if I went somewhere else. But at that point, I didn't have it in me to go somewhere else and start again. Plus, I also had a newborn at home, so I didn't want to have to start again.

Michael: I was going to say, the whole point of this was dialing back new business activity while the newborn is home, ideally while you can continue to be in maintenance mode with existing clients and revenue. So, you still didn't want to be in building mode at the time. The bad news now is, and you don't get to continue the maintenance.

Christa: Right.

Michael: So, the maintenance revenue from the clients and assets you've got before you get terminated.

Christa: So, I did nothing for a while. I introduced a handful of clients that I really cared about to advisors within the firm that I was still really good friends with and trusted. And I just enjoyed being at home with my newborn for a little while, which was nice to have that opportunity. And then, at that point, since I'm a busybody, I needed to keep going, I said, "I have all this experience. I'm so good at running a practice and building communities and building networks that I know a lot of advisors struggle with that. Why don't I just go to advisors..." I knew a ton of advisors because I had been in the industry for so long at that point. I was like, "I'm just going to go to them and ask them what they need help with and work for them on a contract basis."

I like to say I started a consulting firm, but it was really just me going to advisors that I knew in the community saying, "What are you struggling with? If you had unlimited time and you didn't have to worry about all this other stuff that you're doing building this practice, what's one thing that we can help implement in your practice that would take you to the next level?" And they would let me know, and that's what we would work on. So, it was a little bit of a comfort to be not on the client side, working with advisors was a refreshing change at that point, and I didn't have to worry about building, creating, putting a new book together.

I did everything from, I did a lot of sales work, a lot of, "Are you unhappy with your current market. How do we get you in a new market? You need to increase your new prospecting flows. Maybe you're spending too much time on internal office work and you need more time out there to prospect so you can build to the point where you want to build on." One advisor came to me and said, "Christa, I'm still on paper and I need to implement a CRM." And I said, "No problem, we can do that." So, we hired interns over the summer. We scanned all of his clients' files. I taught his staff how to use it. I downloaded it on his phone, showed him how to access all the information.

And you do one project and then the project ends, and then usually the project goes so well, they're like, "Oh, stick around and do this too. Stick around and do this too." There was a decent amount of work that I could do just with advisors on any capacity. When you run your own book, you do it all. So, I pretty much could go in and say, "I can do it all. Just tell me what you need help with."

The Next Steps And Challenge Along Christa's Journey [59:59]

Michael: Then what comes next on this journey?

Christa: So, I got pregnant with my daughter. And when you're a consultant, I feel like a lot of people who are listening to this will understand the fact that you don't have benefits. So, you don't have health insurance, you don't have benefits. I had health insurance from my husband. My husband was still working full-time. He's in telecom. But it was 3-and-a-half years of consulting, and I said, "You know what, I'm tired of the jumping." I was jumping from place to place. So, I wasn't really building a track for myself. I was just making ends meet while my son was little. And I told myself, "Okay. I'd like to go somewhere now. I'm done jumping from place to place with no really knowledge of what my income would be like for the year. I have no benefits. I want to grow roots somewhere," I guess is an easier way to say it.

And I also missed working with clients. It had been 3-and-a-half years of working with advisors and no client interaction. So, I wasn't doing any planning, I wasn't working with clients. And at this point, I had finally discovered the fee-only RIA world. So, I said, "You know what, if I ever get back into planning or the client world, I really want to do it in the feel-only space."

Michael: How did you find it, or what had you not found originally that suddenly you found out at this stage?

Christa: Somehow, I don't remember how it was, but somehow, I got introduced to XYPN. It either was an ad or something I received because I still held onto my licensure, and that's how I discovered it. And then the world opened at that point because then I read what XYPN was, and it had all this language about fee-only. I don't remember when it happened, but definitely felt like a light clicked on in my head going, "This is what I want. I want to work with clients in this capacity." And that's how I found that whole fee-only RIA community.

Michael: So, did you want to go hang your own shingle with…?

Christa: Oh, no. I was still recovering from losing my practice 4 years ago from Mass. So, I was at a point where I'm like, "Ah, I don't know if I could do that right now." I got a call from a recruiter. I was doing consulting and I got a call from a recruiter saying, "I have this planning operation or this planning company, and they are interested in hiring a planner, and your qualifications are great. Will you go talk to them?" And I said, "Yeah, sure. I'm looking to build roots in an organization somewhere. I'll go talk to them."

And they were a CPA firm where they were implementing planning into the CPA firm. So, the CPA firm had been around for a long time. So, they had a lot of CPA clients. And there was planning layered into that and they were doing planning for like 2 or 3 years. So, they were looking for a planner to help them build that out. And so, I met with them twice, and I thought the opportunity fit well. It seemed like a good place to be. So, I said yes, and I started there, but it didn't last long.

Michael: So, what happened?

Christa: I can't 100% confirm this, but I was pregnant with my daughter when I was interviewing with them and made it clear that that was the case, and I was let go very quickly. I think I was there for 3 weeks.

Michael: No.

Christa: Yes.

Michael: That very quickly turned around.

Christa: Yeah. So, it was so quick that it was like, "Okay, I didn't even do anything. I'm not quite sure exactly why I was let go other than the fact that I was in this condition." So, that was also not ideal.

Michael: They didn't give a reason, just, "We've decided not to move forward after all."

Christa: Correct. And I called the recruiter and said, "What just happened? I'm so surprised right now." And they wouldn't even give the recruiter a reason. So, that was also not ideal, and another reason why I try to advocate for those of us who are out there in this industry raising families and having children and have all these other things that I think some people look at as maybe a distraction. But that was rough. I will say now though, it was probably a blessing because I would not have found where I'm at now had I not gone through that. And where I am now, I have great opportunities, and my owner's been really great to me.

So, then at that point, I didn't have anything, and I said, "Oh man, I have to find something." So, that's when I made a list of fee-only planning operations, 20-mile radius of my house. And then I just went and started interviewing.

Michael: How did you find them?

Christa: There are publications that post the RIA firms in the Chicago land area, like investment news, investment news-wise comes out with, "Hey, here's the top 100 RIA firms in Chicago." I'm sure they do it in other cities too. So, that was easy to find, like, "Oh, hey here's this 100 fee-only planning, or RIA firms." Some hybrid, some fee-based, some fee-only. And I just looked at where their locations were and said, "Okay, well, here's a good list of them. I'm going to go talk to them and see who they're hiring and what they're looking for and where I could fit."

Michael: So, what was the outreach? Because I know just some advisors that have tried to network their way around this way and find advisory firms to get jobs with and just have struggled at the end of the day to get meetings and find opportunities. So, what was your actual approach on this?

Christa: Oh my goodness. I'm not going to condone this as a method because it may not work for everybody.

Michael: Okay, but...

Christa: I was pregnant with my daughter at the time, so I was on a very, very fast time crunch. Every day, I was getting bigger and bigger. So, I very much needed something very fast, So, I printed my resume and physically walked into all 20 offices and sat in their lobbies until someone talked to me.

Michael: Awesome. You just found their firm and what, brought your resume, and just said like, "I'd like to talk to the owner of someone in management about opportunities at your firm?"

Christa: I met with the person in the front and said, "This is my experience. I've been in this industry forever. This is all I've been doing. I'm extremely skilled and can do anything. If you put me anywhere in the firm, I can do it. You want to put me in marketing, great. You want to put me in a meeting with clients, excellent." You have to remember at that point, I was pregnant, so I was like, "Hey, you give me something to do, I'll take it."

Michael: And with the idea you wanted work while you were pregnant? Before, were you searching for something to say, "This is what I want to do after?" Like, "I'm pregnant now and then I'm going to have my daughter, and then after maternity time off with my newborn, then I want the job." What was your actual timing for work at this point?

Christa: I had no plan. My plan was to work with that firm that I get hired at and have my daughter and take my maternity leave, and go back and be an employee. That was my plan. So, when they let me go, my strategy at that point was very much like, "I just need something." Because I didn't know what else... I had no plan. So, if I found something that fit and they were a great firm, why would I not stick around afterwards and do other stuff with them? If I found something and it wasn't a great fit, okay, well, that will play itself out over time.

You learn pretty quickly at that point if it's a good fit for you. Ultimately, I would've loved to have worked in planning. My resume said planner. I had done everything at that point, but I said, "You know what, I'm just going to find a planning position. They'll put me in a planning department. I'll run plans, do Monte Carlo, put spreadsheets together if that's what they want, help support an advisor. I'll do that." So, I just went into those offices and talked to the person in the front, gave them my information, and I basically said, "I don't know who does the hiring here, and I'm not even sure if you're hiring at this point, but I feel like I have a lot of skills that can help the firm. And if there's a match, then great. And if the hiring manager has 5 to 10 minutes to come out and chat with me, I would appreciate it."

And some of them came out and talked to me right away, and some of them said, "Oh, well, thanks for stopping by, but they're really packed today, but they're open tomorrow. Why don't you come back tomorrow?" So, that's what I did.

Michael: So, did 10-3-1 work here?

Christa: On the recruiting side? I don't know. I have to tell you, if you're a statistics person, my statistical sample was not large enough for me to generate a 10-3-1.

Michael: Fair enough. But you got a job offer or 2 at the end?

Christa: I did. So, the firm that I'm at now actually was one of those firms that I walked into and spoke to the owner. It's a smaller firm. So, the owner was in the office when I came in and talked to him and gave him the same talk that I gave everybody else, just told him my background and what I was good at. And he said he would take a look and let me know. So, I left and he sent me a message through LinkedIn the next day to come in for an interview, and here I am.

Michael: So, what's the current firm and the role then? Bring it to present.

Christa: So, we're an independent fee-only RIA. My role that he hired me for was paraplanner. I was just a paraplanner, which given my experience, probably overqualified for, but at that point, again, I said, "Hey, it's in planning, I will take it. That sounds amazing. I get to work on clients, I get to support you. I love it. Let's do it."

Michael: I mean, that was compensated as a paraplanner as well?

Christa: Correct.

Michael: So, not necessarily at the dollars maybe that you were shooting for?

Christa: No. But at that point, this may sound like I'm underselling my capabilities, I was just happy to have the opportunity because let's just say that my interviewing experience being pregnant in this industry was not ideal. I very much interviewed with a particular person, and we went through everything and I gave him all my experience and he goes, "Oh my gosh, your experience is wonderful, you're very easy to talk to. I love everything that you're showing me." And then I informed him about my condition. I know you're not legally supposed to, but in my mind, if I was a business owner and I hired someone, I would want to know if that person was going to be out for 3 months fairly shortly...

Michael: Shortly after they get hired. Yeah.

Christa: Yeah, yeah. Because I don't know, and maybe this is my personality, but I feel like if you're a business owner and you're hiring someone with a lot of capability and anytime someone goes on maternity leave for that long, you need someone to cover them. So, I felt it was only fair to include that that was going on in my family life and it was very important to me. Family is number 1 to me, and it was very important to me to be with my daughter after she was born. So, I said, "Hey, this is my condition and I definitely want a maternity leave." I didn't ask for anything drastic, I just wanted regular FMLA, which is, unfortunately in our country only 12 weeks unpaid.

Michael: It's unpaid; it's not here comes like, I'd like to start with you and then get a couple months of paid leave as soon I start." You were willing to take unpaid, just, "I would like to have a job and then still have one when I come back afterwards."

Christa: Yeah. FMLA in the United States is 12 weeks unpaid. That's what we're entitled to. So, that's all I was asking. I felt like I was asking the minimum of what everybody gets. You're now seeing organizations that offer paid leave, which is fantastic. I'm glad that that's transitioning towards there, but at that time, it just wasn't an option. And you could just see the color drain from his face within a second. And then his face fell and he looked at me and went, "Oh man." And I said, "I will see myself out. Thank you very much for your time." So, at that point, when I got offered the opportunity as a paraplanner, I was just happy to have the chance to be doing something that I felt I was capable of doing and having the opportunity.

Michael: And so, what is the size and structure of the firm overall?

Christa: We manage right now 300 million of assets. And the number of families, it varies, but right now we're probably at 150 clients, maybe 100 households. But I started in the paraplanning department, and I like to think that very quickly, I proved my ability and my skillset was beyond what that role was responsible for. So, I grew into a planner, and then I started meeting with the clients in the book and built good relationships with them, and became director of the department and started hiring planners to train.

I think that happened about 2 years into my time here, or maybe a year. And then when my owner and I sat down, and he talked to me about his desire to grow, I think it's pretty obvious at this point that my most valuable skill is the ability to build networks and be out there. So, I said, "Okay, I'll do it. So, here comes the third round of building new networks and making connections."

Michael: So, now you're in a business development capacity again?

Christa: Correct. Actually, I was doing no business development for the first 2 years that I was here. This is my 4th year that I've been at this firm, and I only started doing business development my third year. So, this will be my second full year of business development activity.

Michael: So, what's it like building a client base for the third time?

Christa: It's the same. I have a little bit of a larger budget now, which is nice, that allows me to be involved with communities that maybe financially I wasn't allowed to before. Not allowed to, but financially, were more tough to get into.

Michael: Meaning networking groups you have to pay more for?

Christa: Like associations, like joining larger associations, going to charity events. Things where the ticket to be there isn't $35. The ticket to be there is $250. But I will say this, not only do I enjoy the business development side or am I good at it, but I also very much enjoy it. I love meeting new people. You throw me into a room with a whole bunch of people that I don't know, and it's definitely the area that I most thrive. I love getting to know people's stories. I love making connections with people – COVID was very hard for me if you can't tell – and helping people out. I get just as much enjoyment out of getting a referral from a trusted connection as I do giving a referral out, because to me, it's all about making everyone successful around you.

I think too many advisors in our industry have this scarcity mindset. I got that from the insurance industry. Too many advisors in our industry have what I call a scarcity mindset, "Oh, if I have this business, then it's not your business." Or, "If you get that business, then I don't get it." There's so much business out there for all of us, we need to start helping each other. Doing this combative back-and-forth scarcity mindset doesn't help anybody, and it doesn't help the reputation for the industry in general. So, it's fun to be around people and surround myself with people who are supportive, who are interested in my success just as much as I'm interested in their success. So, building it again in the capacity that I am in now has just been another journey, and I've enjoyed it. It's been fun on

What Surprised Christa The Most In Her 20-Year Advisor Career [01:18:26]

Michael: So, what surprised you the most about this journey of building your advisor career over nearly 20 years now?

Christa: I think the one thing that through my experience and working with advisors and being in the industry, it actually was slightly difficult for me to find a role in the RIA space coming from insurance. I will fully admit, there are definitely players in the insurance area who maybe don't have the most ethical motivations, but there are plenty of wonderful people as well. But the amount of opportunities that I think maybe I've been passed on because of my insurance background, it took an effort to get into RIA community.

Michael: Because they just assumed if you came from the insurance world, you weren't going to be aligned to the firm?

Christa: Or my skillset was geared more towards the transactional nature, where like, "Oh, they're coming from Northwestern Mutual, they're coming from MassMutual. All they're interested in, all they have the skillset to do is transactions and not relationship building." And that I will say, surprised me beyond no other. I was getting turned down for roles at RIAs because of my insurance background.

Michael: Which I only find amusing because for most advisory firms, the struggle in a lot of the RIA channel right now is organic growth because a lot of us don't have strong business development backgrounds. And so, you actually coming with a strong business development background and a track record of success were not appealing to them because you have the exact skillset most firms actually need.

Christa: I guess. I don't know. I still don't know. I don't know why. There is, and I'm not sure if this is totally true, there is this general sentiment in the RIA community that people who come from insurance or broker-dealers don't have the appropriate skill sets to work in an RIA capacity, or maybe that's how they feel. To me, it doesn't make sense because we're all meeting with clients, we're all building relationships, we're all trying to build a book. The amount of advisors that I used to consult for who would look at resumes because some of the advisors I consulted for said, "Hire people. I need people, go hire people." And I would bring them resumes, and on the resume, it would say New York Life or MassMutual or Northwestern Mutual, and they'll say no immediately, without even giving that person a second thought. And in my mind, I'm thinking, "What are you doing? If you want client-facing, those people have the most client-facing experience. You know why? Because if they did not sit with clients, they would not eat."

Michael: Yeah. At least have the conversation to find out, like, look, if you're concerned that it's someone who's too transactional because to be fair, there is a lot of that from the insurance because that's how the model gets built when you go to 0 every January. But not all of them, almost by definition, if they're coming from the insurance channel and talking to your RIA, they're looking for not that.

Christa: Agreed. Well, and if you think about it this way, how hard is it to teach someone the ability to connect, and I'm not talking about business development. Hiring for business development, that's tough. And to find someone who really has those skills, that's really hard. But if you're hiring someone to help you with your existing book, tag team with you on meetings, run plans, and build good relationships with your clients, would you rather take someone that has 0 client-facing experience and teach them how to run a good meeting, know what good meeting flow is, emotionally connect with those people in that meeting as well as competently describe what your planning concepts are?

That's a tall hill to climb for someone that has never sat in a client meeting ever. Or would you take someone with insurance background who has 4 years of client-facing experience, although they were selling product, and just teach them how to shift their mindset just minorly from a transactional nature to a planning relationship nature? To me, the shifting is easier, but I don't know. I don't have an answer for you on that one. I'm not quite sure why there's that hesitancy for people with that background.

And the other thing that is also shocking is the fact that if someone's trying to get involved in the industry and they do have a family, or they do have other things that are important to them, that people automatically think that they can't be successful. That's not cool either. It doesn't make sense to me either. So, I'm very much an advocate for talking to people at least initially and not just immediately dismissing them because of their backgrounds. If I'm not a good recruiter, it's definitely not my forte. But one thing I did learn in my recruiting work is that a resume is the most horrible predictor of whether or not someone's going to be able to do the job well. So, eliminating someone on that alone has always been a little tough for me. So, that's 1 thing that's shocking.

The other thing that's shocking is just in general, and I think this is getting better, is just the industry moving towards more open career paths and giving people the ability to participate in the industry in many different forms and functions. When I got out of school, you either produced or you were an assistant. There was no other path. And now you have research and trading and planning, which I love. It gives the ability for people who maybe don't have the skillset to produce and don't want to just be administration to participate in the industry and grow in a career that would be fruitful for them.

What Was The Low Point In Christa's Career? [01:25:12]

Michael: So, what was the low point for you on this career journey?

Christa: I think when I lost my book at MassMutual, that was the biggest blow. I didn't know if I wanted to stay in the industry anymore because that was really tough. But at that point, nothing else sounded attractive to me. I didn't want to go back to school and do something completely different, going to law school wasn't in the cards. And I always knew in the back of my mind that I was good at what this industry needed. I could do it well. And I think once I got done with the consulting and said, "There's got to be someone out there who is going to appreciate my skillset and want to utilize it to its full capacity," I think that's what kept me in the industry.

Christa's Advice For Her Past Self And Younger, Newer Advisors [01:26:17]

Michael: So, what else do you know now you wish you could go back and tell you 10, 15 years ago as you're going through these, like Northwestern then MassMutual dynamics in the early years of your career?

Christa: I think it would've been finding mentors that are outside of my space. So, when I first started at Northwestern Mutual and when I was at MassMutual, I had a lot of friends who were other producers who would give me advice. But I wish maybe I would've found someone outside of my immediate producer circle to give me more unbiased...because they're all with the firm that you're at, so of course, all their advice is going to be, "Stay and tough it out. Stay and tough it out." It would've been helpful to have found someone outside of my circle. In the planning industry, would've been fine, maybe at a completely different broker-dealer or at another planning firm to bounce ideas off of and someone who was experienced.

So, when I first started, first of all, there was not very many women in the industry, so I didn't really have anyone to reach out to. There were 0 women in my Northwestern Mutual office when I started. All the women were receptionists, and all the men were producers. So, that also was a little tough. But it would've been nice to have found someone with experience outside of my circle who could have given me advice on where a good path would lie and just for me to bounce ideas off of, that would've been helpful.

Michael: So, what advice would you give just younger, newer advisors coming into the profession today and trying to figure out their path going forward from here?

Christa: There's really no perfect position when you first start, you just need experience. I'm going to jokingly say, go to Northwestern Mutual and stay there for 3 months and go through their training program. And that's my main... Your career will take you in many different spaces, and I think your moves here and there are definitely important, but ultimately, especially in the first 5 to 10 years, all you're doing is just building experience until you get the idea of what's going to be your perfect rule and where your motivations are. Are you going to stick with research? Do you want to be client-facing? Do you want to run a planning department one day but you don't want to go business develop? Business development is really difficult and it's not for everybody. But that doesn't mean you can't have a successful career in this industry.

Christa's Definition Of Success Throughout Her Career [01:29:20]

Michael: So, as we wrap up, this is a podcast about success and one of the things I've long observed is the word success means very different things to different people. And so, you're on this wonderful track of building successful career now for the third time. The career success seems to be flowing well for you. How do you define success for yourself at this point?

Christa: My success hinges critically on my relationships. When I was at the insurance companies, we would go to these big meetings, these big annual meetings where they would invite all the producers, and they would parade producers across the stage who were multimillion dollar producers and give this air of, "Don't you want to be them?" And from the first meeting that I was at, all those people were having multiple health problems, the relationships within their families were not great. And it was funny because I had the opposite reaction. I said, "I don't really like being a multimillion-dollar producer at the expense of not having healthy relationships with people that I care about. I'm not willing to make that sacrifice."

So, for me, success is defined as, in my profession, being happy within the role that I'm in, being professionally challenged so that I'm growing as a person, but never at the expense of my relationships with the people that I care about most, which include my family and my friends. Because what is life all about except having healthy relationships with people? Working with the clients that we work with, no amount of money can fix broken relationships. It takes investment in yourself to make that happen. So, that's my definition of success. If I can thrive within the role that I'm in and continue to be challenged but also have the capability to have healthy relationships, I consider that a win.

Michael: I love it. I love it. Well, thank you so much, Christa, for joining us on the "Financial Advisor Success" Podcast.