Why repeat the mistakes other advisors have suffered through with their broker/dealer? If you can read one story every other month and learn how to avoid a developing situation in your own back yard…and it's a fun read…why would you not bookmark the site where you can do this and visit it six times a year?
Marine on St Croix, MN (PRWEB) July 17, 2008
Sometimes frustration just gets the better of a financial advisor. A smaller broker/dealer is absorbed by a larger one and previously great personal relationships that formed the basis of good business become suddenly impersonal and seem to fester irretrievably in the larger bureaucracy. BD management overreacts to new regulations and changes the rules, again, before thinking through the real issues. Decisions are made by the BD without letting anyone in on them beforehand, and losses are absorbed by advisors who make sensible business decisions that turn out to be not ill-informed but uninformed.
As the economy continues to suffer, every aspect of financial services from the very top on down also suffers to some degree. But when pressure forces change, the smallest unit changes first. In retail financial services, the smallest unit is the advisor. Their success depends largely on working well with one broker/dealer that processes the advisor's business on behalf of the buyer/client. When the perfect storm hits, bureaucracy takes hold, people become rigid, relationships suffer and clients are lost. Who gets the blame? The advisor, the face that explains things to the client, gets the complaint and the blame when things don't work out right…for any reason.
It is not easy--in fact, it is difficult--for a financial advisor to change broker/dealers, but often the case to do so is so compelling that it must be done. Yet Jon Henschen, owner of Henschen & Associates, who advises advisors on when, how and to what broker/dealer to move, strongly believes that forewarned is forearmed. This is why he says he is collecting broker/dealer horror stories and selecting a bi-monthly 'winner' for advisors to learn from. Says Mr. Henschen, "Why repeat the mistakes other advisors have suffered through with their broker/dealer? If you can read one story every other month and learn how to avoid a developing situation in your own back yard…and it's a fun read…why would you not bookmark the site where you can do this and visit it six times a year?"
You can see the first winning broker/dealer horror story at http://www.bdhorrorstories.com/ . It is not a blog, but a growing collection of "situations to avoid" stories of current broker/dealer antics.
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