The adventure continues...

"I believe that hiring the right retirement plan advisor is the SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT decision a company will make for itself and its people in terms of driving outcomes over the next 20-30 years. The impact of this decision compounds over time."?- Josh Itzoe

Nearly a year ago I announced that I was leaving Greenspring Advisors, the RIA that I co-founded and where I launched and led the retirement practice for nearly 16 years.? It was a great run and I’m proud of the legacy and relationships I left behind. It's a wonderful firm.

I had a number of reasons for leaving, from burnout to boredom.? But the most important was legacy and impact. I wanted to spend the second half of my career pursuing significance over success.? And for me, the pursuit of significance was supporting the fiduciary-focused, retirement plan advisor community.? My goal was to impact 1 million+ Americans by helping advisors succeed.? I wanted to build a “tribe” that I could serve, care for, support and give everything I had to them.? I wanted to “open source” the experiences, expertise and know-how I’d cultivated in building a highly successful, award-winning, multi-billion dollar retirement practice.? And I wanted to build fintech empowers advisors to courageously lead their clients to govern and run their plans better, drive superior outcomes and achieve aspirational goals.??

I am, and always have been, passionate about fiduciary practices and principles.? I’ve written two books about the topic and host the Fiduciary U? Podcast to make ERISA fiduciaries smarter.? I believe in fiduciary-focused advisors that push their clients to make the hard, right decisions for their employees.? I believe these advisors are the best hope to help American workers retire in dignity, not despair.??

And I believe that hiring the right retirement plan advisor is the SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT decision a company will make for itself and its people in terms of driving outcomes over the next 20-30 years. The impact of this decision compounds over time.?

So now, some honesty and transparency. It's been a long 12 months. It’s been messy. Things didn’t start as quickly as I hoped.? Maybe I was overconfident.? Maybe I was naive.? I was definitely too optimistic. I forgot how hard it was to build a company from scratch and the grind of the early years.? I had a lot of sleepless nights. In fact, I spent 5 days in the hospital which is a whole different story. That’s what happens when you go 3 weeks straight without sleeping more than 90 minutes in a 24-hour period.? And I pivoted a couple of times.? The tech platform I initially created to benchmark retirement fees didn’t have product market fit and basically failed.? I lost confidence in myself and my abilities.? I regretted and second-guessed my decision to leave.? I had to come face-to-face with the leadership mistakes I made and own my failures.? I thought I had destroyed my career and lost everything I spent 16 years building.? I experienced deep depression and anxiety for the first time in my life.? It was rough sledding.??

But I didn’t give up and slowly some beautiful things emerged.? My faith, which had grown stagnant, grew stronger. As I struggled, fought and willed myself to keep going I learned a lot about who I was and what I was made of.? I realized I was a lot more resilient than I ever imagined.? I realized the importance of marrying well, being engaged with my kids and having a small circle of people who I trusted and who cared for me in the dark times.??

I came up with a new idea for a different platform, one that I had originally designed and built in 2013 and that was a big contributor to my prior success.? I pitched the idea of this alternative platform during lukewarm demos of my fee benchmarking tool.? Advisors showed interest. On numerous occasions I heard “Is that available now?? I’ll license that if it is.”? “It’s under development, just be patient” I’d tell them. And so 8 months ago I pivoted, hired a development team and got to work.

On Monday, I officially announced the launch of FiduciaryRx?, a modern tech platform that empowers advisors to diagnose, prescribe and improve Fiduciary Wellness? for companies and employees.? It uses a simple, but powerful concept of the Fiduciary Wellness Score? to diagnose, quantify and improve overall plan health and success, all in under 10 minutes.? Advisors can use up to 50 best practices to motivate, inspire and lead their clients from meeting basic standards to achieving aspirational outcomes. As Fred Reish has commented, “Plan sponsors have an option of going beyond looking at what benefits the participants or employer. Meeting minimal objectives of the law is not the goal.”

The Fiduciary Wellness Score? leads to conversations with clients and prospects that are deeper, more meaningful and more engaging. It re-defines, re-imagines, and re-energizes the whole conversation around “fiduciary”.? Once they know their score, the next question clients typically ask is "What do I need to do to improve?" Conversations automatically shift to actions and outcomes.? And the goal transforms from simply being a fiduciary to being an effective one.? It enables advisors to be heroes to their clients and inspires confidence and loyalty.? And that’s part of the magic.?

In addition to FiduciaryRx?, I’ve created the Fiduciary U? fiduciary training platform, with insights and expertise from Fred Reish, to both teach and train advisors and for them to use to train their clients.? An educated client is an engaged client.? And an engaged client is a retained client. Lastly, I’ve created a private community to support advisors, deliver them insights and advice at scale, and to facilitate peer-to-peer networking.

FiduciaryRx?, Fiduciary U? and the FiduciaryWor(k)s Community are part of an annual membership for advisors.? And a small investment leads to major ROI - winning a single, small plan covers the membership cost.?

If you’re an advisor that works with retirement plans, whether you’re a rookie or a seasoned pro, I hope you’ll consider joining the FiduciaryWor(k)s “tribe”.? And let’s learn together, serve together, inspire together, and lead together.?

My promise to advisors - to give generously of all that I’ve learned and all that I’ve built to serve you. I am a champion for you. And I want to help you win more plans, help more people, and build a career that makes a difference and that you can be proud of.??I promise you’ll get the very best I have to offer, both now and in the future.? Are you in?? I am.?

Head over to www.fiduciaryworks.com and sign up for a demo to check out FiduciaryRx? and consider joining my tribe.