January 25, 2024
I once bumped into an ex-colleague in the queue for Jason Donervan (Google him) in Clifton.
I didn’t know the bloke that well, hadn’t seen him for a few years. But that didn’t stop him launching into a drunken but incredibly detailed breakdown of the remuneration package he’d just secured himself at a commercial bank — right down to job car specs and holiday buy-back arrangements, checking them off on his garlic mayo slathered fingers as I tried not to cringe to death.
"We need more firms that are openly happy to ‘smash’ supposedly boring things such as customer satisfaction and work/life balance."
Advisers are obsessed with talking about their successes. We are well suited to the whole LinkedIn hustle porn hellscape.
Not that we’re alone, in fairness. There probably isn’t an industry around that doesn’t have to suffer high-profile nitwits bragging about their personal brand-building journey on there.
But I do think we might be conspicuously good at it.
Sometimes we do it in ways we think are subtle. For instance, ‘Wow! Look how high my FCA/PI bill is,’ is an invitation to work out turnover by dividing it by the relevant percentage.
I worry that some of that self-aggrandising nonsense confirms unhelpful stereotypes around advice as a crass, salesy, not-quite-a-profession.
"If any start-up advisers are feeling like I did back then and want to speak to someone who never gets calls from minor royals and showbiz legends, my DMs are open."
But I think it could matter in more important ways. The potential for a performative hustle culture to present a threat to mental health is well documented. LinkedIn is an image-filtering service for people who aren’t good looking enough for Instagram. With the same ability to create warped, impossible-to-meet expectations.
Kick in the teeth
I remember, very early in my start-up phase, feeling miserable about the fact every other firm owner I spoke to was — they would have me believe — busy fielding enquiries from minor royals and showbiz legends.
As with all social media, that tendency to exaggerate and distort the truth can be a kick in the teeth if it catches you at a low ebb. It creates a pressure to maintain not just success but the constant outward appearance of success.
I wonder what the point of it is. I seriously doubt if clients, or even prospective clients, respond well to this kind of braggadocious content.
"If growth is at the cost of one degree of service standards for existing clients, I don’t want it."
I think I’m mostly quite good at finding all this funnier than it is insidious. But I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel the potential for it to nibble away at my core beliefs about what I want for my business.
When I set up almost four years ago, I was crystal clear about what I wanted, and it hasn’t changed. I wanted to build the best — not the biggest — practice I’d ever worked at. I wanted all the best-of-breed tech and investment processes, cherry picked from my 20 years’ experience as an employee, allied with much more time for my clients, leading to much better service. Ideally without compromising my ability to feed and clothe my kids.
That’s it. That’s the business plan.
I don’t need or want a lucrative exit (because I know it would require me to make unacceptable trade-offs on my clients’ behalf). I’ve been lucky enough to grow a bit, exclusively through referrals, but rapid growth isn’t essential. In fact, it has the potential to derail my core goal of quality over quantity.
"I worry that some of that self-aggrandising nonsense confirms unhelpful stereotypes around advice as a crass, salesy, not-quite-a-profession."
If that growth is at the cost of one degree of service standards for existing clients, I don’t want it. Same goes for anything that means I can’t drop off my kids at school.
Client outcomes
Before I set up on my own, I worked at outwardly successful, high-growth firms with horrible cashflow and desperately under-resourced client teams. I was once told, “We don’t recruit until team members are screaming for it.” This doesn’t imply good client outcomes.
As an employed adviser I was recruited for my client following, only to find there was no plan to provide sufficient resources to onboard and look after them. These aren’t mistakes I’m going to make in pursuit of growth. I’d rather grow slowly, or not at all, than grow like that. Boring, hey? Not remotely LinkedIn-able.
"Advisers are obsessed with talking about their successes. We are well suited to the whole LinkedIn hustle porn hellscape."
I’d like to make the case for less BS bravado in advice. More acceptance of running your own race. More honesty. More rejection of toxic hustle culture. More firms that are openly happy to ‘smash’ supposedly boring things such as customer satisfaction, stability and work/life balance.
And, if any start-up advisers are feeling like I did back then and want to speak to someone who never gets calls from minor royals and showbiz legends, my DMs are open.
This article featured in the Dec 2023/Jan 2024 edition of Money Marketing:
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