Here Are The Three Master Steps:
1. Delegate ALL client meeting preparation. This might be the most important decision you’ll ever make in your career. I assure you that if you make the choice, you will look back on it as the turning point of your life, not just your career. You may feel that if you delegate all client meeting preparation, that there will be nothing left for you to do, but when you learn more about the richly rewarding, exciting and fun tasks we have in store for you, you will be thrilled that you jettisoned the client meeting preparation tasks. (Yes, we are serious!)
2. Document every process and define a primary and a backup person to be responsible for every process. What is your process for documenting processes? Do you have one? Is it simple to use and easy to follow? Does everyone in your office know how to use it? How many processes do you currently have documented? How many of those processes are critical to your client experience? Who is responsible for each process and who is the backup for them when they are unavailable? Documenting processes isn’t glamorous or fun, but it is critical to your sense of control. We recommend documenting every process on a single page with both a hard and soft copy available to everyone in the office, and/or in the process. Our “Best Way” process limits every process to 12 steps or less, making every process simple to create and simple to follow. Any processes can be documented in 20 minutes or less. Then we match it with the “Go To Grid” ensuring that everyone knows who is responsible for what and who will backstop them, when necessary. We recommend that you ask your team to document a certain number of processes each week, regardless of what else is on their plate. Before you know it, you’ll have most of your processes
documented and you’ll know precisely who is responsible for what.
3. Implement The Three Meeting Process. The Three Meeting Process is an organized approach to your entire year. Our research
shows that clients want as few meetings with their advisor as possible while still accomplishing all of their financial and advisory objectives. At the risk of sounding a bit like Goldilocks, we have found that four meetings is too many for clients and two meetings is too few to accomplish the clients’ objectives and for the advisor to stay close enough to the clients’ situation and life. We have also found that having three different agendas (one for each meeting) is really valued by clients. In a single meeting they can focus on key areas of their financial life and goals, while still organizing, orchestrating and updating all of their financial issues each year.
Once all of your Ideal Clients are scheduled one year in advance for their three meetings, your life gets much, much simpler. Your next upcoming client meeting will drive your team’s primary task list. They and you can plan a year ahead if needed, because you know who is coming in, when they are coming, what documents are needed for the pre-planned agenda and what your team needs to do to prepare. By taking these three master steps, you’ll quickly see that you and your team can relax, knowing that all tasks and all client deliverables are planned, organized and under control.
