Mindy Diamond on Living Your Best Business Life, Building a Successful Firm, and Deciding Should I Stay or Should I Go?

Guest: Mindy Diamond, the founder and CEO of Diamond Consultants and the author of a fantastic new book called Should I Stay or Should I Go?

In a Nutshell: Between the competition for top talent at large firms and the proliferation of smaller lifestyle RIAs, many advisors feel like they need to be constantly evaluating their career options. But the grass is not always greener, and FOMO should never be the lead driver of a major career decision. Instead, advisors should follow their internal compass towards opportunities that will help them accomplish what matters the most to them in their lives and work.

On today’s show, Mindy Diamond shares the process she uses to help advisors clarify their goals and make the right decision for their careers. We also explore the concept of living your best business life and how aligning your personal values with your professional environment is a key to long-term success. Mindy offers practical advice for advisors at any stage of their careers on assessing your options, asking the right questions, and understanding when it’s time to stay put or make a move.

Mindy Diamond: “Until you’re exceedingly crystal clear on what ‘perfection’ looks like, unless you’re really clear about what your goals are, and what ‘ideal’ would look like, and what are your nonnegotiables, and what are the things that would be nice to have but you could live without, you’re never going to know it when you see it.”

Mindy Diamond and I discuss:

The seductiveness of complacency and why never being satisfied can be a good thing.
The characteristics of people who are most likely to contemplate major career changes.
Mindy’s step-by-step process for helping advisors plot their next career move.
Common advisor nonnegotiables that drive major career decisions.
How the best RIAs have closed the gap between themselves and larger firms in terms of freedom, flexibility, and control.
How advisors — and in some circumstances, their clients — handle transitions between firms.
Competition for talent, “garden leave,” and the potential for lawsuits if you jump to a new firm.
Mindy’s advice for an advisor just starting out today and trying to find their ideal firm.

Quotes:

Mindy Diamond on advisor nonnegotiables:

“A move should never compromise on the most important things you do for clients. The products, the services, the technologies, the infrastructure, whatever it is you rely on most. A move should do no harm, and hopefully it should be needle-moving enough. It should be more than marginally ‘better enough.’ I could talk to every advisor on the street and 100% of the time find a list of firms that will undoubtedly be better than their current firm in at least one or more categories. But that definitely doesn’t mean that the advisor should move. What it does mean is that if you’re clear on the non negotiables, then you will know that as long as a move to another firm could be needle moving enough or better enough in the most important things to you, those might be reasons to consider a move. So examples of some of those nonnegotiables are things like being able to take whatever are the most essential support staff with you. It’s things like I need to be able to monetize my business for the maximum transition amount up front. Well that eliminates going independent, right? Because if I need maximum transition money up front, that speaks to going to the biggest firms. So the clearer you are on the nonnegotiables, the more it begins to define the short list. Everybody’s list of nonnegotiables is different. That’s the beauty of being an advisor because there’s so many choices.”

Mindy Diamond on the power of mentorship:

“The most important thing, whether you start out at an independent or you start out at a wire house, is to make sure that you have someone really smart, really capable, that you respect, with good values, that is going to be vested in your success, that’s going to teach you what they know and help to make you better. Sometimes in the independent space, that’s an uncle or an aunt or a parent. I think it’s rare to find that in the independent space unless it’s with a family member. While the wire house training programs have had a zillion iterations, they’re still really good training grounds. By the nature of how they’re structured, you start out in the program and they force you onto a team and you’re forced to have a mentor who’s going to teach you the business. And that’s the most important thing. So there isn’t only one path to success, but I think it’s harder to find that dedicated mentor in the independent space.”

(Steve: Unless you work with a coach!)

Mindy Diamond on how advisors can define success for themselves:

“I think if you’re working for a big firm, they’re measuring your success. It’s a whole carrot and stick thing. Your compensation is driven by net new assets. So that forces organic growth. You have to grow by adding new clients, not sitting on your laurels and waiting for the markets to rise. So I think advisors in general are pretty focused on that as a metric, bringing in new clients. Now, are there advisors that are late in their career, or not all that motivated, or not all that focused on it, and are there models or places where they can get away with just coasting and relying on market growth? Absolutely, but that’s what makes a horse race. I think that advisor today, maybe they’ll choose to leave the hard-charging environment of the big firms that says you have to grow, if you want to keep up your income you have to add X amount of net new assets. Maybe that advisor would choose to leave the big firms and either go to a smaller boutique firm or an independent firm or build their own firm. So they get away from the metrics and the bars and the incentives and all that sort of stuff because it’s not important to them. And I think that’s really the message of it all is that unlike 30 years ago, there is a place for everyone and it starts with that ‘inside’ job. What’s important to you? How do you want to live your business life? How important is organic growth? How important is it to have all that freedom and control? And use those answers to drive where you go, as opposed to the other way around.”