|
The Story of Three Clients |
|
The first advisor we'll call David. David worked for a very large investment bank providing financial advice and services to high net worth individuals, and he had access to some of the most complex financial products available. He, like many other advisors, was a casualty of his firm disappearing. He was faced with a dilemma: What to do? In effect, he has to reinvent himself. The question, as always, is: What advice would you give David?
#2
Our second advisor wants to improve her practice. Mary is worried about the current market conditions and wonders if she will even have a career in the future. She is good at what she does and has many loyal clients, but frankly she just doesn't know how to deal with the uncertainty in our economy. What advice would you give Mary?
#3
Our third financial professional is Ted. Ted is a veteran insurance broker, sells life insurance, and has a substantial block of health insurance business. He wonders how to deal with changing market conditions, especially if some form of national or universal health care coverage were to be enacted.
Ted, like our other advisors, is still young enough to want, and need, to continue working. He's not happy about the prospect of universal coverage because it may put him out of business. But he's a realistic person and wants to be proactive about his career. What would your advice be for Ted?
Our General Recommendations
Whenever advisors are confronted with troubling symptoms our first step is to always ask: what's the basic problem, or, what's important? In each of the three cases described, the root problem is fear: fear of uncertainty regarding economic prospects or fear of losing business due to market or regulatory changes.
It's very helpful to be able to address these issues head on. In all three of these examples we had to initially deal with the fear factor. As FDR said when inaugurated in 1933: "We have nothing to fear but fear itself." He didn't say there was nothing to fear; he was suggesting that we face our fear and not be immobilized by it. That advice is appropriate today.
Our Suggestions
For David: After David settled down, he realized that now - right now - is a perfect time for him to reinvent himself. Several suggestions for improving his practice, which he had previously ignored, will now be implemented.
For example, he'll be refocusing on defining his Target Market by using our Invisible Market Matrix program. He realized that now is the time to build a truly solid foundation for his practice. He also agreed to refine his service standards and put his procedures into writing. David will be using this economic crisis as motivation to create his ideal practice.
For Mary: We recommended that she develop a concise and usable business plan. Because she had never had a comprehensive approach to her practice, she didn't realize her strengths and weaknesses.
By examining all the important parts of her practice (marketing, selling, closing, delivering goods/services, having excellent administrative procedures and evaluating her short and long term financial goals), Mary was able to put together a One Page Business Plan which will help her weather the ups and downs which affect all businesses. For Ted: The problem was that his market may either shrink or disappear altogether. Hardly a promising outlook; we worked with Ted to develop a new business plan. His new One Page Business Plan allowed him to develop other parts of his practice, should his health insurance practice eventually disappear.
In Conclusion
By facing problems head-on, each of our three advisors is in the process of creating a new business model which will help them maintain business income, in spite of difficult economic conditions or a change in regulatory guidelines. Dealing with their fears allowed creativity to flow and new plans to emerge.
Having lived through many personal and business crises, I'm prepared to help you survive and thrive during this crisis as well. A complimentary coaching session is available, and you may also wish to investigate the One Page Business Plan or the Target Market System. |
Nick is available to answer any of your coaching concerns, and as always, will provide a complimentary coaching session to anyone interested in pursuing a coaching program. Please call Nick at (510) 898-3245 or
email him to set up a session.
Return to Newsletter Archives |
|
Newsletter
Issue No. 11
October 2008 |
|
"Curiouser and curiouser!" cried Alice (she was so much surprised for the moment she quite forgot how to speak good English).
Just as Alice was surprised when she looked down the rabbit hole, many of us must feel as Alice did. What are we seeing? It's actually quite amazing when we reflect on what's happened in the last few weeks:
* Wall Street - as we knew it - has virtually disappeared.
* Our credit system has almost ground to a halt.
* Uncertainty about our economic future is at an all-time high.
* World financial markets are uncertain.
* Major banks have been acquired (Washington Mutual and Wachovia) and the bail-out situation is murky.
To state the obvious: life goes on. We will learn from our mistakes and work ourselves out of this mess.
This month I'll be sharing stories about the proactive stance taken by our fictional cast of characters.
Please be of good cheer - we will survive!
|
|
