{"id":6888,"date":"2021-11-04T09:00:43","date_gmt":"2021-11-04T09:00:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/emoneyadvisor.com\/?post_type=thought_leadership&p=6888"},"modified":"2021-11-19T14:56:40","modified_gmt":"2021-11-19T14:56:40","slug":"what-financial-professionals-can-learn-from-lifestyle-practices-in-the-covid-19-era","status":"publish","type":"thought_leadership","link":"https:\/\/emoneyadvisor.com\/blog\/what-financial-professionals-can-learn-from-lifestyle-practices-in-the-covid-19-era\/","title":{"rendered":"What Financial Professionals Can Learn from Lifestyle Practices in the COVID-19 Era"},"content":{"rendered":"

While the development of COVID-19 vaccines has restored some semblance of normalcy, the Delta variant has thrown a wrench into many firms’ back-to-office plans.<\/p>\n

The continuation of work from home has the financial advice industry questioning if there ever will be a true \u201creturn to the office” push.<\/p>\n

While change can throw us off balance, it also can provide a fresh perspective. This new, digital-first world provides a unique opportunity for financial professionals to build a practice that caters to their interests and desired lifestyle.<\/p>\n

Navigating Our Digital World<\/h2>\n

While daily life was already becoming increasingly virtual, COVID-19 accelerated this trend to new heights.<\/p>\n

A Pew Research Center survey shows that most workers whose job responsibilities can be fulfilled from home rarely or never teleworked before the pandemic.1<\/sup>\u00a0By October 2020, 71 percent of those workers worked from home all or most of the time, with over half saying they’d want to keep working from home after the pandemic.1<\/sup><\/p>\n

While teleworking rates have dropped in 2021, there are still significantly more people working from home than before the pandemic.2<\/sup><\/p>\n

It’s been challenging to adapt the high-touch financial advice industry to this digital-first world, but many practices have done so while seeing the same\u2014and sometimes even more\u2014success in client acquisition, client retention, and AUM.<\/p>\n

Long term, this fundamental shift in the way we work potentially frees financial professionals from the constraints of geography. Planners can now acquire new business from a variety of locations.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, this provides the potential to niche down and build a book of business that reflects their interests, all while complementing their desired lifestyle.<\/p>\n

In other words, more financial professionals can adopt or emulate a lifestyle practice model.<\/p>\n

Breaking the Lifestyle Practice Taboo<\/h2>\n

In the past, opening a lifestyle practice was thought of as a potential next step for financial professionals who were nearing retirement. For those earlier in their careers, building a lifestyle practice could come with a kind of stigma\u2014namely, the assumption that you don’t have a desire to \u201cbe successful” or \u201chustle.”<\/p>\n

This couldn’t be further from the truth.<\/p>\n

In the COVID-19 era\u2014when the importance of family and work-life balance has taken center stage\u2014it’s clear that the lifestyle practice taboo is outdated at best and damaging at worst.<\/p>\n

For some people, success looks like building a large enterprise firm. For others, it looks like cultivating a finely curated book of business that supports the kind of life they want to live.<\/p>\n

Even if you’re not interested in building a lifestyle practice, there’s still a lot to learn from this refreshed version of the lifestyle model.<\/p>\n

Discover Your \u201cWhy”<\/h2>\n

Understanding what motivates you as a financial planner is fundamental for creating any successful practice.<\/p>\n

To identify your “why,” ask yourself some basic questions.<\/p>\n

What’s the driving force behind the work you do? What keeps you engaged and passionate? What special skill set or perspective do you have? What kind of clients need your unique value the most?<\/p>\n

After you’ve done an honest examination of these questions, consider how the answers could all work together to support a specific audience. This exercise can help you\u00a0identify fruitful niches for your practice<\/a>\u00a0and begin to design a day-to-day practice that’s more meaningful to you.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, understanding your “why” translates to providing more value to your clients. When you know who you want to serve and why you want to serve them, you’re able to give the best and most meaningful financial planning services possible.<\/p>\n

Designing a Practice That Works for You<\/h2>\n

Here are a few key steps you can take to focus on the parts of your business that\u00a0only you\u00a0<\/em>can do:<\/p>\n