If you’re comfy and doing well with your business, why expand?
The answers are plentiful. You might be looking for larger profit margins, and at your current capacity, you’re unable to reach your goals. You might be looking to expand your service area, and the cost of moving beyond your current boundaries could offset any additional profits.
Perhaps you’re looking to ramp up your client-service game, but your current list of team members stretches too thin to focus on building relationships. Maybe you’re looking to add new services or are increasing your strategic alliances.
No matter what your “why” is, if recruiting financial advisors is in your line of sight, then it’s time for due diligence.
Consider if your business is facing enough sustainable growth to legitimize expansion right now:
- You’re seeing increased demand across all or most of your services
- Your profits are strong, and your expenses are under control
Determine the advantages and disadvantages of hiring new financial advisors:
- New advisors enable you to reach your “why” that you answered earlier
- New advisors could negatively impact your business in unexpected ways
Create a strategy to bring in the types of financial advisors that’ll mirror your company culture and help you reach your expansion goals:
- Set goals and a system for measuring your success
- Encourage positive culture and intentions for each new team member
- Know your financials—current and long-term
- Identify potential risks and be prepared to address them
Recruiting Strategies for Financial Advisors at Different Career Stages
Are you part of the nearly 37% of financial advisors projected to retire over the next decade?
As the age of current financial professionals rises, a younger generation is moving in with ideas that’ll change how businesses run. For many in the industry, it’s essential to start succession planning early to meet that changing landscape.
“In evaluating potential successors, advisors place 88% importance on the personality of the acquiring advisor, 85% on the likelihood to put the client’s interests first, and 85% on regulatory/compliance records.”
Commonwealth.com
Can you picture the future financial office as a modern, innovative, and fluid-culture space?
Imagine handling clients via seamless digital portals where they can log in, manage their accounts, and communicate needs without the facetime from the old days. There’s significant progress around installing robo-advisors to take on the responsibility of sophisticated strategy management, thereby reducing the costs of financial planning and asset management. The integration of this type of fintech could evaluate risk tolerances, time horizons, and investment strategies.
If you’re wondering why the younger generation is vital to your firm’s future, consider that more than $18 trillion will pass from baby boomers to their descendants shortly. Having a younger team that can relate to this demographic means your firm is “keeping the family business.”
Related: Is it Time to Hire Another Advisor? [Infographic]
Create an Ideal Advisor Profile to Hire Right the First Time
The profile you create when recruiting financial advisors should reflect your “why” and the long-term strategy you have for your firm’s growth.
Much like the Myers-Briggs test that provides insights into personalities when building a team, aligning your growth plan with prospective candidates can keep your company culture moving in a positive direction.
Consider the following attributes:
- Years of experience or point in the career
- Production and business mix
- Knowledge, skills, and designations
- Client service standards and service model
- Investment philosophy
- Growth trajectory and business goals
- Client niche
- Personality and personal values
How much do you have in common with millennials and Gen Z? The more you understand this demographic, the easier it’ll be to attract them to your firm. Consider that they’ll account for 30% of the workforce by 2030.
Innovation and technology will attract them to your financial landscape. Younger generations come equipped with equal parts book knowledge and career drive to successfully and quickly launch their career. They’re not willing to wait years to feel appreciated, which is why you need to provide opportunities enabling them to move quickly:
- Clear fast-track career path
- Strong mentorship
- Roles that include collaboration
- Healthy internal competition
- Have a socially conscious platform and values
Finding and attracting successful, established advisors to your firm takes significant resources—if you’re looking at them, there’s a good chance other firms are as well. Spend time creating your list of benefits. Unique offerings beyond finances could boost your bottom line if the advisor can bring their book of business with them.
Experienced professionals are looking beyond the salary to additional benefits you can offer:
- Schedule and location flexibility
- A high level of job freedom and control
- Unlimited income potential plus bonus and equity
- Firms with robust fintech solutions
- Career growth mirroring that of the firm
- Affordable healthcare coverage
Think Outside the Box with These Recruiting Strategies for Financial Advisors
According to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, there were more than 330,000 financial advisors in 2021, and that number is expected to grow 15% by 2031. If you’re looking to build your firm from this pool of advisors, you’re going to need to tap into all available resources:
Company culture can be your number one recruiting tool: Start with communication among every office member so they know the team is growing. Provide a basic understanding of what you’re looking for so that when they come across a potential candidate, they’ll seize the opportunity to pitch the position. It’s also worth offering referral bonuses to keep your team members engaged in the recruiting process.
Don’t forget opportunities for advertising and promotion: Start with a pop-up or dedicated page on your website that informs clients, prospects, and, if optimized properly, Google that you’re accepting resumes. Further your reach across all your company’s social sites.
Not all events need to be educational: Social time amongst colleagues can be worth their weight in gold (or in names) of potential new hires. Create events that are open to influential people across correlated industries. While they’re making connections, you’re tapping into centers of influence and potential candidates.
Related: How to Be Brilliant On Your Next Hire [Talent Acquisition Tips]
Learn to use Google Alerts to reach out and start a conversation: When these posts filter into your email, you’ll find that authors and articles from industry leaders are connected with names, and reaching out is an easy way to recruit financial advisors in your region.
Take advantage of memberships to business organizations: Chambers of commerce, Business Network International, Rotary Club, and even your local country club typically provide plenty of ways to get the word out. Mention it in your introductions and follow-up emails, and even consider advertising in any of the publications offered.
Talk to centers of influence (COI): An online job board like ZipRecruiter is effective, but it’s worth tapping into the people who have helped you build your business. Reaching out to your most trusted business alliances can often provide quicker and more targeted results than a recruiter. Give COIs a copy of the persona and a clear description of what you’re looking for, and wait for the referrals to drop in.
Take note that the world of job searching and recruiting has changed. Modern methods are quick and accessible from anywhere, and the younger generation is ready to find their career spot using multiple platforms.
Use various social media platforms: There’s a lot of power on sites such as LinkedIn Jobs, Google for Jobs, and job posting sites like Indeed to reach your targeted audience. There are even job sites specific to finance that may be worth considering. Listings on these sites move quickly, so you’ll need to use targeted keywords and job descriptions to appear at the right time to the right candidate.
Move your interns to full hire: Consider this recruiting tactic as cherry-picking the best of the best. These prospective hires already know your business, fit in with your company culture, and are eager to take the role and make it their own.
Texting for a better candidate experience: In one research study, candidates who received text messages during their interview process rated the overall experience 50% higher than those who didn’t. Companies using text messaging can appear more transparent, approachable, and positive from the receiver’s perspective.
What It Takes to Succeed Moving from Recruiting to Hiring Financial Advisors
Preliminary interviews are your chance to screen out the initial round of candidates that don’t fit your persona or company culture.
Explain the role clearly and get a handle on what they believe the position will look like—including salary and growth opportunities. You’ll want to ask why they want to be a financial advisor with your firm and listen for common ideas regarding the role as well as red flags.
If you’re doing in-person (or Zoom) interviews, now’s the opportunity to dig deeper into the role and how the candidate will respond. You can uncover their decision-making skills, ability to think quickly, and comfort level in challenging situations. Conversely, they’ll have a chance to see if they believe they’ll fit in well with your firm.
Finally, but perhaps one of the most important, is to plan proper onboarding. Onboarding is the process of integrating new employees with the rest of the team and the organizational culture, while training is the process of educating them on the tasks, duties, and responsibilities of the job.
Nothing breeds success better than integrating your team with the necessary knowledge and skills they need to perform at their best.
Related: Incentivize to Secure Top Talent for Your Business [Infographic]
A Resource to Recruit Financial Advisors & Other Team Members
FIG Talent Solutions is a corporate talent acquisition team available to our partnered financial advisors.
The expert recruiters at FIG Talent Solutions provide specialized talent recruiting, consultation, and employee placement programs within the financial services community. With over 20 years of recruiting experience, the Talent Solutions team blends business process management and consultation with talent acquisition to provide a customized solution.
If you’re looking to reduce your time-to-hire period and retain more high-end talent drastically, FIG Talent Solutions can educate, engage, and recruit new employees by identifying your unique needs to create a detailed and productive recruiting campaign.
Click below to learn more about FIG Talent Solutions and to find your next all-star team member today.
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