Advisers share key to profitability, emphasise importance of collaboration

Speaking at the Adviser Innovation Summit in Melbourne last week, Find Group of Companies founder and managing director, Warren Strybosch, said morals first and foremost underpin a profitable advice business.

“Probably the first one that I would first want to discuss is morals. I know it sounds a bit weird, but obviously the introduction of the FASEA Code of Conduct, I thought it was really interesting when I was lecturing financial planning and they brought out best interest duty as a regulatory requirement and I was probably not surprised but disappointed that that had to be the case,” Mr Strybosch said.

“I think as an industry it’s great that we’ve moved more towards understanding ethics and trying to encourage people to be more moral in their practices and I think that’s helping us as a profession get to where we’re going now.”

Joining Mr Strybosch on a panel, director of Endurance Financial, Amanda Thompson, suggested practices need to establish a strong identity and pinpoint their “own why”.

“As a practice you need to understand your own ‘why’ and that can move with the times as well, because if we’re not understanding our own why then we’re not going to move with the intergenerational shift that’s about to come. So you’ve got to align yourself to your values and understand what it is that you want to achieve as a practice,” she said.

As such, Ms Thompson urged businesses to stand their ground and remain confident in their own value.

This, she noted, also extends to pricing models.

“Over 20 plus years, I’ve learnt not to discount,” Ms Thompson said.

“If that person doesn’t want my advice, then they’re not the client for me. Because I do not charge excessive fees and I back myself. I think that you’ve got to value yourself and the advice you give first, and then we’re setting a standard in our own businesses”.

Over the course of her career, Ms Thompson explained she has transitioned to offering packages as opposed to specific advice fees.

“These packages include mentoring without specific advice. I offer insurance only advice now and price that accordingly so that it’s very black and white. And in terms of how you do your ongoing service offering, I do it at an hourly rate so that it’s very justifiable,” she said.

“I’m a very small practice, so I have to be able to control what comes in and out of my office.”

Meanwhile, while Mr Strybosch leads a larger team of advisers, he argued profitable pricing models should not only reflect the value of a business but should also be justifiable for the client.

“I think that we need to always be focusing on making sure that our fees are fair and reasonable and that what we are charging the client it’s justifiable,” Mr Strybosch said.

“You know we’re always seeing in the media every week that someone else has ripped off someone else. We want that to stop.”

Both Mr Strybosch and Ms Thompson emphasised the value of forging strong industry relationships as well as investing in ongoing formal and informal education.

“It’s important that we all continue to educate and continue to learn,” Mr Strybosch said.

“I’ve got seven qualifications myself and I’m about to do another certification. And so I think it’s important, and I always encourage people who are younger, especially even if they’ve done their bachelor, to say what’s the next thing that you’re gonna be doing?”

Moreover, Ms Thompson urged smaller practices to embrace collaboration beyond their own business as a tool to grow their profitability.

“I’m a romantic and not in the whole knight in shining armour concept, as in that good things happen to good people and good people align with good people. And I think the best way that we can, and again I’m coming from a soul practitioner concept, is to align yourself and share information, and join events like this or have your own little group of advisers that you can share new things that you didn’t know or things that I’m doing differently,” Ms Thompson said.

“Instead of competing with each other, we should be uplifting each other as best we can.”

Ms Thompson also emphasised the need for advisers to leave their egos at the door and to embrace feedback.

“If you don’t have the relationship with other advisers, you don’t have the relationship with the fund managers or you don’t listen to your clients, you’re not going to get the experience that then transpires into a different education.”