Owners of a financial advisory practice are leaders, managing and motivating staff to help them achieve their mission to serve clients and grow their businesses. But how often does an advisor take a step back to evaluate their leadership performance? Self-evaluation takes brutal honesty and much courage, but the process can be exceptionally rewarding in identifying ways individuals can improve leadership skills.
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New Year’s resolutions can be a bore; they are much discussed, widely created and largely ignored. Yet, they can serve as a catalyst to make important changes. As the financial services industry enters a new, post-pandemic year, there may not be a better time to get serious about resolving to make changes that position your practice for success.
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The Britney Spears saga to escape the conservatorship that controlled her finances, personal life and medical decisions educated a whole generation of Americans to a highly complex legal framework that, in reality, is applicable to a very small percentage of the population.
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On May Day, the 183-year-old Wall Street practice of charging fixed commissions came to an abrupt end. The industry profoundly and irreversibly changed that day. It gave rise to discount brokers—Charles Schwab being the pioneer and most successful offspring of May Day—and led to the disappearance of scores of old-line, white-shoe brokerage firms who found themselves unable to compete. Some historic inflection points come with black-and-white dates and blaring news headlines; others sneak up, quietly and gradually. Either way, they are not to be ignored.
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Perhaps it should come as no surprise that the digital revolution is now disrupting the monopoly power of central banks and nation-states. Bitcoin, in its short history, has been in the vanguard of this disruption.
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