Advice That Sticks. Moira Somers

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СКАЧАТЬ It seems that money, even more than food, activates our survival instinct and makes wise, otherwise rational people behave like starving dogs. Any distorted or frozen patterns in our psyches will inevitably show up in our relationship with money, which makes it the ultimate repository for shadowy behavior.

      Geneen Roth, Lost and Found

      Craziness. Starving dogs. Shadowy behaviour. So … are you sure you want to work with people and their money?

      If your work involves giving people financial counsel, then their crazy, conflicted relationship to money is only one of the challenges you will face. Frankly, it’s not even the most formidable one. Factors such as the quality of your relationship with clients, their level of energy and insight, and a host of other social and environmental influences all contribute mightily to what the client will do with the recommendations you provide.

      Unfortunately, the odds are high that you have not received much guidance on what to actually do about any of these other influences. As a financial professional, the bulk of your training and expertise lies in highly technical domains. You know the ins and outs of taxation, pensions, investment vehicles and insurance options. You are savvy about key market indicators and the interpretation of financial data. You know a great deal about the ethics and laws governing your professional activities. You know all about the best products and services to help people reach their goals.

      But most financial professionals^* receive very little training in client psychology, and in the related art and science of giving advice. Advice that is timely, palatable, and easy for clients to understand. Advice that is custom-designed not only to be technically sound, but also to be ‘just right’ in terms of the client’s ability to receive and act upon it.

      This book fills the gap in that training. I want you to be able to give financial advice in such a way that three things happen:

      1. your great recommendations are followed by your clients,

      2. your clients’ well-being is maximized as a result, and

      3. you experience a massive boost in your career success and satisfaction.

      Throughout this book, I will be sharing evidence-based, practical tips with you. These are strategies that have emerged from decades of research into two intriguing questions. The first: What makes it so hard for people to do the right things for their well-being? The second: What can be done to help them make lasting, meaningful changes in their behaviour?

      Most of the earliest studies in this regard were targeted at health-related behaviours (things like quitting smoking or taking medication properly). The scope of the studies has expanded greatly since then. Broader applications of research findings have had a transformative impact on fields as varied as environmental protection and elite-level sports performance. It is high time for such a transformation to take place within the financial professions.

      For the past decade, I have been adapting these strategies to help bring about lasting, meaningful change in the lives of the clients I see in my own work as a financial psychologist and executive coach. The approaches have been further field-tested and tweaked by the financial professionals I consult with around the globe. I am confident that you, like them, will find that these easy-to-implement strategies make a world of difference in your clients’ willingness and ability to follow your advice.

      By the end of this book, you will know how to give advice that sticks. And perhaps – just perhaps – you might also find that you have been able to address some of your own areas of stubborn resistance to change. So read on to find out what an agitated professor and a wounded lumberjack have in common; how empathy, confidence, and blueberries can all be dangerous; and what my mother being branded a tart has to do with anything at all.

      Two kinds of expertise are needed

      Throughout this book, I will be making a distinction between the technical and the personal sides of advising. The technical side has to do with the domain-specific financial knowledge that you are examined upon throughout your education and credentialing journey (e.g. taxation, investment strategies, cash flow projections). The personal side has to do with client psychology and life situation (e.g. goals, abilities, energy level, outlook, family dynamics). ‘Both sides are equally complex and equally important,’ maintains Susan Bradley, founder of the Sudden Money® Institute and a thought leader in the financial advising profession. Regrettably, most credentialing programmes in the financial professions seem to operate on the assumption that, once the technical stuff is mastered, the so-called ‘soft skills’ will take care of themselves.

      When it comes to clients not following through with recommendations, it’s rarely because the advisor is technically unskilled or incorrect. Instead, it’s usually because the personal side of things has been neglected or misread. If you’ve been working with people and their money for any length of time, you will likely have come to the conclusion that the technical side of advising is comparatively easy. It’s the ‘soft’ side that’s the hard side!

      Many financial service professionals have realized they need a different kind of training, one that addresses human psychology. Organizations such as the Kinder Institute, Money Quotient, Sudden Money® Institute, and Financial Recovery Institute have spearheaded the delivery of excellent specialized training in this regard. Interdisciplinary collaboratives and think tanks such as the Purposeful Planning Institute and the Nazrudin Project have offered further opportunities for a broad range of professionals to come together, reflect on money’s meaning and effects, and influence the evolution of their respective disciplines. Advice that Sticks merges the teachings of these pioneering financial deep thinkers with the scientific literature on non-adherence and behaviour change.

      Need, opportunity and gift

      This book is for any advisor who understands the NEED, the OPPORTUNITY, and the GIFT that exist with respect to delivering advice more skilfully.

      Level 1: Need

      You know the irony of this situation as well as I do. In an era when financial guidance has never been easier to obtain, the citizenry of the developed world has dismal savings levels and record amounts of indebtedness. Yet none of the branches of the financial services industry seem to be taking into account the fundamental complexity of human psychology. They just keep on telling people the same old messages about what they should be doing, as though more telling will result in more uptake.

      The evidence by now is pretty clear that this is not a knowledge problem; it’s an implementation problem. It’s not unlike knowing that apples are better for us than chips, even as we reach into the bag for more salty, fatty yumminess. What we need instead of more information is more help in bridging the gap between correct knowledge and effective action.

      This need exists, not just for the betterment of our clients’ lives, but also for the future of the various financial professions. Huge shake-ups are taking place industry-wide, but especially within the specific domain of financial planning. Faceless, interchangeable robo-advisors are taking on a bigger share of the market, and mature advisory firms are seeing slowing rates of client acquisition. The financial advising profession is having trouble attracting new recruits.

      Across the broader financial services industry (which includes banks, insurance companies, brokerages, investment funds, and credit card companies), unsavoury and hidden practices are coming to the attention of the public. Legislative changes are being enacted worldwide that will increase transparency with respect to such things as disclosure of fees and debt servicing costs. These numbers are now staring consumers in the face with every credit card bill or investment statement that arrives СКАЧАТЬ