Occupy Planning

We clearly live in a world of uprisings. We’ve seen them around the globe and with increasing frequency in recent years. They come in all forms: peaceful, aggressive, violent, and disgusting. We’ve seen people occupy governments, city squares, countries, and even Wall Street.

Underpinning all conflict – whether it is thoughtful, carefully debated, empathetic or violent – is a single truth: they are all a call for change. All conflict is a call for change. And there are changes that need to happen at the Planning Table.

There has never been a time in human history where wealth holders have needed better advice, guidance and discernment than now. It has never been as complicated, nor has there ever been as much opportunity to develop approaches and financial plans that can echo into the future. Those echoes, however, will reverberate with planning genius, or with the shrill tones of shortsightedness. The determining factor will be the decisions of the client, but the critical influence is the advisor.

That's why there’s an opportunity to Occupy Planning.

What do we mean? Let’s break it down…

First, there is an uprising that’s been building pressure and momentum for about the last 20 years. It’s a shift from providing wealth holders with answers, to guiding them toward thoughtful discovery of what actually matters to them (and why) and then stewarding that into the future. It’s bigger, it’s denser, it’s more powerful, and frankly, it’s more productive. It also requires you to slow down, exercise some impulse control, and counteract some of your original training to find a problem and solve it as quickly as you can. The results, however, will be worth it.

What does this have to do with “occupying” anything? Simple: people (that’s you) are statistically unlikely to change. The odds of you making a material change in your life or business are about 1 in 9 (we’ll rant about that one another time). Which means that the only way change will happen is if you have a powerful reason Why. If you’re not connected with that, you’ll flirt with change, experiment a little, and then revert to old behavio(u)rs when you’re tired or under pressure.

But, when people become invested in something that matters to them, a cause, a movement, where they can become part of something that will have a lasting impact, and where their failure to act may mean that the cause could falter, people start making a bigger difference than ever before.

Now, let us be clear; you undoubtedly make a difference. Great guidance makes a difference. And what we want to call you to is making a bigger difference than perhaps you ever thought possible. It’s time to Occupy Planning.

How can you do it? Three things:

First, you absolutely embody the fiduciary mindset. The needs of the client must come first. That sounds obvious, but there’s more to it than you might think. It means that you have to start by helping the client understand what they want. Most wealth holders cannot clearly articulate their goals or their vision for the future with any clarity. They often provide the “right answers” to your questions, rather than the “real answers.” Traditional fact finding won’t give the client clarity. It will give you clarity about their numbers, but it won’t help the wealth holder, and it’s typically a painful experience for them. That means the attention must move toward true Discovery. Can you help the wealth holder discover for themselves what their desired future looks like, and what goals will move them toward that future?

When you put those needs first, when the client’s vision is the superseding priority in all discussions, you transcend great “customer service” and move into a rarified space that is invariably unoccupied. Occupy it.

Second, understand your role at the planning table. Your role is determined by the client, not by you. You may think otherwise, but what we think in this regard is relatively irrelevant. The client decides who you are to them. So, they may see you as their absolutely most trusted advisor, or as a source of advice, or as a source of product. When you try to occupy a role that the client doesn’t perceive you to have, it creates negative tension. To address this, occupy your role well. If you’re the most trusted advisor, then steward their vision. If you provide advice or product, support the most trusted advisor and stay connected to serving the client’s vision. Keep in mind that you can occupy more than one seat at the table, but only if the client can see you that way. Know who you are in their eyes, and fill the role superbly.

Finally, bring a process to the table. It’s one thing to bring “smarts” and another to bring answers. But when you can show up with a step-by-step process, two things happen. First, it keeps you on track. It’s easy to be pulled around by opportunities, and that can completely undermine your credibility, or your ability to discern what the client actually wants. The other is that it communicates confidence to the wealth holder. When they know that you have this solved, that you have a process and method to identifying and addressing their vision, you are lifted out of the commodity mass and are seen in a new light.

Wealth holders need more from their advisors. They need more from you, and they deserve it. So do you. The side effect of powerful planning that gets to the heart of a client’s vision for the future is that the scope of the solutions typically becomes much larger. By slowing down a bit at the beginning of the planning process, the results become markedly larger and more meaningful. 

Occupy planning, and see your business transform.