PLANADVISER - November/December 2022 - 18

practice management / cover story
1 Align cultures and missions.
" I think the younger generation is very driven by mission
and purpose, " says Jeff Cullen, managing partner of Strategic
Retirement Partners in Chicago. With the tighter job
market and Baby Boomer advisers starting to retire, he says,
younger advisers can be pickier about where they work and
what they do. " Fortunately for this new generation, they do
have more ability to say, 'What do I want my mission and my
purpose to be?' " Cullen says.
" I think the firms that are going to be able to attract and
retain younger people, " he continues, " will have to have a
good mission, be really good at conveying that story to their
employees, and provide them with a career path that aligns
with that mission and holds their interest. "
Retaining advisory team members all comes back to
alignment of their personal values and the organization's
values and culture, says Rick Shoff, managing director,
adviser group at CAPTRUST in Doylestown, Pennsylvania.
" At some advisory firms, there's a lot of turnover, " he says.
" When I talk to advisers who want to leave their firm, they
don't say it's because of 'alignment': They say the firm
they're with doesn't really understand the retirement business.
They tell me, 'I would grow a lot more if I were offered
" Some of the biggest
aggregators are really
not a team: They're a
bunch of individual
practices. If you're not
one team, there is no
alignment; so that's when
you see many teams
moving around. They're
hired guns. "
more support.' Retirement plan advisory work isn't the main
event where they are. They're working in a firm that doesn't
understand their business, and they're looking for a firm
that does. "
If advisers do not feel aligned with their organization's
culture and values, " it's easy to leave and go somewhere else,
because they're really not part of a team, " Shoff adds. " Some
of the biggest aggregators are really not a team: They're a
bunch of individual practices. If you're not one team, there
is no alignment; so that's when you see many teams moving
around. They're hired guns. "
2 Illuminate a development path.
The D'Aiutolo Malcolm & Associates Investment Consulting
Group at UBS has eight core staff members. With one exception,
they have all been developed internally, rather than
coming to the Rochester, New York-based practice as experienced
advisers. " Our team has always been built from
the ground up, " says Paul D'Aiutolo, senior vice president -
investments.
The process is gradual. New employees joining the team
initially do nonspecialized tasks that require little retirement
plan expertise, such as entering plan-health data
from recordkeepers into the team's quarterly deliverables,
pulling research reports and inputting investment data in
spreadsheets. As a second step, they join regular administrative
calls the team has with larger clients, usually weekly
or biweekly, to talk about whatever plan operational issues
need to be addressed. A newer team member will just listen,
but, over time, that person usually takes the lead representing
the team.
As a third step, a newer staff member starts attending
client meetings led by a more experienced adviser. The
junior staffer helps prepare meeting materials, observes the
meetings and takes notes.
After two or three years, most team members go in
one of two directions, D'Aiutolo says. They either focus
on external work that includes leading clients' committee
meetings and/or doing participant education, or they take
on an internal consulting role. In the internal role, an officebased
staffer works closely with plan sponsors on tasks
such as committee meeting follow-up work and helping to
resolve issues with the plan's recordkeeper.
It is usually extroverts who are fine with traveling who
gravitate to an external role. Rather than the path being
something the team's leadership determines, D'Aiutolo says,
" it's more of an alignment of their personality and skills
with their job. Somebody who goes on the internal track
probably is making a career choice of, 'I don't want to travel
for work, and I need my work schedule to be more manageable
and predictable,' " he says.
" The biggest thing is, there is no one-size-fits-all for how
to develop people, " D'Aiutolo continues. " On our team, we
start with the culture we have of, 'we serve working Americans.'
If people believe in that mission, then we've been
open-minded and flexible in how we structure their work. "
18 | planadviser.com November-December 2022
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PLANADVISER - November/December 2022

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