Kerri Sullivan-Kreiss, CFP®, AIF®, with Commonwealth since 2004
Kerri Sullivan-Kreiss, CFP®, AIF®, based her impartial advisory agency, SullivanKreiss Monetary, in 2004. Having spent the earlier 13 years as an advisor on workers with a publicly traded firm, she needed to go away huge company agendas and proprietary funding merchandise behind. As president of her personal enterprise, Sullivan-Kreiss was desperate to develop a concierge service mannequin constructed round a powerful tradition of fiduciary duty to shoppers.
As Sullivan-Kreiss says, “I’ve all the time primarily based my enterprise on the basic principal of treating others as I want to be handled. My goal is admittedly quite simple: to place our shoppers’ pursuits first, act with integrity, and embrace the distinctiveness that every consumer brings to our apply.”
Throughout our conversations, the power of Sullivan-Kreiss’s dedication to this imaginative and prescient all the time shined by. The profitable progress of her agency could possibly be seen as emblematic of the depth with which Sullivan-Kreiss engages with shoppers. It additionally highlights her extremely environment friendly use of time. To supply the personalised concierge service that Sullivan-Kreiss believes makes her agency particular, she has develop into a grasp of time administration. She has realized learn how to function effectively and collect the mandatory assets to maintain progress and construct economies of scale.
When you’re seeking to go impartial or develop a longtime advisory enterprise, understanding the ability of Sullivan-Kreiss’s enterprise selections may allow you to chart the way in which towards optimizing your time and setting your agency up for long-term progress.
Constructing One thing Particular
For Sullivan-Kreiss, constructing consumer relationships is all about specializing in the journey with every particular person you serve. In an effort to develop a top quality apply, it’s a must to make every consumer really feel particular. That will sound elementary, however it’s essential to maintain high of thoughts. As she says, “It’s being there for shoppers by on a regular basis moments, celebrating life’s main milestones, and serving to to supply assist, encouragement, and, hopefully, consolation throughout troublesome instances.”
A proactive service mannequin. Ideally, SullivanKreiss Monetary shoppers shouldn’t get voicemail after they name, and follow-up to requests and issues should be speedy and correct. However concierge service is greater than that: it’s being proactive versus responsive, going above and past what’s anticipated. Sullivan-Kreiss focuses on long-term, complete monetary planning; she isn’t fascinated by “merely being a cash supervisor.” This implies setting common evaluations to maintain abreast of modifications in shoppers’ lives and assembly each two weeks when creating a plan for a brand new consumer.
The end result? Sullivan-Kreiss has constructed one thing particular: a extremely engaged neighborhood of long-term shoppers. For her, that’s what makes the advisory enterprise rewarding and enjoyable. And there’s icing on the cake: in response to Sullivan-Kreiss, “The vast majority of my agency’s new shoppers come from referrals from present shoppers.”
Spending Extra Time with Shoppers
As you possibly can see, Sullivan-Kreiss’s enterprise mannequin is instantly tied to her spending as a lot time as attainable with shoppers. Notably, like lots of her Commonwealth friends, Sullivan-Kreiss spends considerably extra time in consumer conferences than different business advisors. That’s in response to a 2020–2021 examine performed by Commonwealth in partnership with Cerulli Associates, which discovered that, on common, Commonwealth advisors spend 33 % extra time in consumer conferences than different advisors from each wirehouse and impartial companies.
The truth is, primarily based on additional evaluation of the information, Commonwealth’s Follow Administration workforce decided that Sullivan-Kreiss ranked within the high decile of productiveness amongst Commonwealth advisors, primarily based on gross income, progress price, and period of time spent with shoppers. This statistic speaks to the essential work Sullivan-Kreiss undertakes day in and day trip with the people she serves.
Reaching Scale and Effectivity
So, how is Sullivan-Kreiss in a position to spend a lot time with shoppers? There are inherent difficulties in scaling a concierge mannequin. Nonetheless, as she labored by fixing them, Sullivan-Kreiss realized that having the proper workers and agency companion may also help facilitate enterprise scale and effectivity.
The ability of your individuals. Sullivan-Kreiss delegates administrative, operational, and sure planning duties so she will be able to deal with client-facing work. With three full-time workers members (a director of consumer relations, a monetary analyst, and an operations supervisor), she is evident on their significance to her enterprise mannequin: “My workforce is phenomenal. What they do behind the scenes allows me to be good at my job and spend as a lot time as I can with my shoppers. Their strengths enable the agency to ship top-tier concierge-level assist—the personal touch we dedicate to each consumer.”
In accordance with Sullivan-Kreiss, her regular progress has been pushed by her workforce’s steadiness of competencies. And that progress has introduced the agency to an inflection level, the place extra workers is critical. To deal with the amount of labor and maintain her productiveness excessive, Sullivan-Kreiss plans so as to add an funding supervisor and an extra advisor to the workforce.
When requested about recommendation for advisors seeking to develop, she states, “One of the productive issues you are able to do is empower your individuals and provides them room to develop. It’s completely key to have the proper individuals on workers, notably those that have complementary abilities units to yours.”
The impression of your agency companion. Sullivan-Kreiss remembers her agency’s early years flying by in a blur, however she has all the time acknowledged the significance of a supportive agency companion. She explains, “Along with actually busting your derriere . . . it’s a must to domesticate the proper relationships with the proper individuals. You want to have a companion behind you that’s proactive and responsive.”
Like different impartial advisors, Sullivan-Kreiss seems to her agency companion for a big selection of back-office assets and assist. As a result of her work is grounded in monetary planning, she appreciates having specialists, corresponding to Commonwealth’s Superior Planning workforce, available to speak by a posh planning or retirement downside.
As for funding administration, Sullivan-Kreiss acknowledges that this function is an ongoing problem for any impartial agency. She prefers customized portfolio administration and, with the help of her monetary analyst, does quite a lot of her personal funding analysis. Nonetheless, if a consumer is searching for a particular funding technique, she needs to have the ability to depend on her agency companion for specialised data. She receives that assist from Commonwealth’s Funding Administration and Analysis workforce.
In the end, Sullivan-Kreiss says that your agency companion should be capable of present a “phenomenal degree of assist” that’s tailor-made to your wants.
Cementing the Cornerstones of Success
Being an impartial advisor has allowed Sullivan-Kreiss to utterly align her agency along with her values and shoppers’ greatest pursuits. She’s been in a position to construct the agency she’s all the time dreamed
of, one primarily based on placing her shoppers’ wants first and powered by environment friendly time administration. Proper now, she’s centered on the thrill of the current and accelerating much more progress sooner or later. Something is feasible along with her imaginative and prescient, a powerful workforce, and Commonwealth’s partnership at her again.
When you’re an advisor eager to go impartial, Sullivan-Kreiss’s recommendation is to do it as quickly as you possibly can. As for contemplating a agency companion, be thorough about due diligence and align with a agency whose values mirror yours. Final, however definitely not least, all the time needless to say you wish to go the place you possibly can develop, even when it’s one step at a time.
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