Kurt Dupuis:
Welcome to the Whole Truth, where two wholesalers help financial professionals build great practices and thrive in a rapidly changing industry. We'll bring you the stories and voices from those on the front lines of this change. And we'll have some fun along the way.
Steve Seid:
This is more than a podcast. We're building a community of financial professionals who are growing, forward thinking and want to get better. Thanks for listening and contributing to the discussion.
Disclosure:
The views expressed herein are those of the participants and not those of Touchstone Investments.
Steve Seid:
And welcome everybody to the whole truth, from the Bay Area, California. I am Steve Seid.
Kurt Dupuis:
And from Atlanta, Georgia, I'm Kurt Dupuis. We're going to have to set this one up. There's a lot going on here. So first, let's talk about our guest, who I have been trying to get him on this show since we started it, because he's so innovative, he's so curious and I couldn’t find, I never found just a natural fit. But I think Steve and I both said, after talking to him, that he'll be a recurring guest because-
Steve Seid:
He was great.
Kurt Dupuis:
... he's just doing so many cool things that it's actually tough to keep track of. But his name is Brian Doe and he is probably ... I think he's the first client I ever talked to when I came over to Touchstone almost five years ago. And he's had numerous wholesalers at Touchstone and he's stuck around for all these years. Just a great, thoughtful guy. But some of that came to a head several weeks ago was this Kolbe test. Kolbe Assessment that we had been introduced to through Dax, who's been on the show a couple of times, and he spoke so highly of it. It was like, well, we got to look into this thing more. And I mentioned it to Brian over lunch and he was like, oh, I've been using Kolbe for 20 years. So he's a great guy, lives over on Lake Oconee, has a very robust history with this.
And he uses this with prospective hires, current team members, he even uses it with his wife and clients. So he really likes this assessment and the insight it provides him. So before we jump into the chat with him, I thought it might be appropriate to talk about what this Kolbe assessment is. And so if you think of the brain, there's kind of three parts to the mind and how we work as humans. One is the Cognitive, that's how we think. The second is the Affective or how we feel about things. But the third, which Kolbe measures and I'm not sure there's any other assessment out there that measures this, is the Conative part of our brain, which is how we do things. So there's four modes that Kolbe measures, and I'll try to briefly describe each of them so the audience isn't completely lost. But the first is Fact Finder, and this is pretty straightforward. I am a “middle of the road” Fact Finder, I'm a five. Seid, what were you?
Steve Seid:
Oh, like an eight. Actually not like an eight, I was an eight.
Kurt Dupuis:
You were an eight, which means Seid wants all the facts, all the information, all the time, which as a CFA charter holder may not surprise you. I'm a five, which means I might be able to be a good translator between an eight and a two, but I'm somewhere in the middle. I like having enough information to be dangerous, but don't need to know everything. The second mode is Follow Through, or maybe better described as, it's how you would organize or design something. This surprised me. I thought, Seid, you would have a bit higher score. What were you on that one?
Steve Seid:
Three.
Kurt Dupuis:
And I'm a two. So I'm not the guy, I guess we are not the guys you would hire to build out some elaborate system. It's not my forte. The third mode is Quick Start, which is just how you deal with risk and uncertainty. Do you need to eliminate all risk about something before you jump feet first? Or are you okay taking some risk and being dropped in the middle of a cocktail party and then just making it up as you go? I scored very, very high on that one, which also might not surprise you. I scored a nine. What was yours on that one, Seid?
Steve Seid:
Six. So I was also on the high.
Kurt Dupuis:
You were six?
Steve Seid:
Yeah.
Kurt Dupuis:
That's on the high end. Which says as salespeople who are put into situations that we don't control, we just have to adapt, makes a lot of sense. High adaptability for Quick Starters. And the last ... Don't get caught up in the terminology, but I'll explain it. But this is called Implement. This is just how you deal with space and tangible objects. Like if you were a mechanic or an engineer that likes to construct and deconstruct things, you would have a high score on the Implementor. Seid, what were you on this one?
Steve Seid:
8363, so three.
Kurt Dupuis:
Three. So a low Implementor like me, I think I was exactly a three as well. Which means, okay with the big picture ideas, we don't need to physically see an example of what you're talking about. So those are the four modes that Kolbe measures. And again, it measures your Conative abilities. So when you think of the application about this, there's numerous. One is just introspection. There's going to be so many things, and Seid and I did this at the same time, just a few days ago. And we were like, wow, this fits us to a T, or at least that's what I was thinking. But when we talk to Brian, you'll hear, he has used this with prospective hires, he has used this with clients. So he is a low Fact Finder. So people that would just completely zap his energy wanting to know all the facts like you Seid, might not be the best client for someone like him.
He uses it with his wife and he's used it in multiple instances in his life. So we have had a lot of fun with this, and I think we're going to be hearing a lot more about Kolbe and what it can do for you and your team. But it's all about understanding how people work and reducing friction and maximizing productivity.
Steve Seid:
Yeah. And so we're starting with this conversation and as Kurt alluded to, we had that initial training. But then we're going to actually do a three-day certification program in January. And our goal is to be able to come and help you guys with your teams to do these types of assessments. There's really some amazing applications here for individuals, small teams working with clients as you'll hear from Brian NextGen. So all kinds of great applications here. So we're going to transition to our interview with Brian. But before we do, I want to highly encourage everyone, please, wherever you're listening to this, please subscribe to the show. Please rate the show. It helps us get our numbers up. Everything is better when we get more subscribers. So go ahead and please do that for us. And right now we're going to transition to our interview with Brian Doe. This is the Whole Truth, stick with us.
Kurt Dupuis:
All right. Well, we are excited to welcome my good friend and fellow Kolbe guy, Mr. Brian Doe. Welcome to the show, Brian.
Brian Doe:
Oh, great to be here. Thanks for having me.
Kurt Dupuis:
So this episode is the confluence of so many different conversations. We had a couple of conversations with a guy named Dax who was big into Kolbe, and then Seid and I started going down this path of researching that more and seeing if it's something we wanted to pursue. And I brought it up at lunch with you a few weeks ago and you were like, "Oh yeah, I've been using Kolbe for 20 years."
Brian Doe:
Yeah.
Kurt Dupuis:
So we thought what would be fun is to use us as kind of as guinea pigs, but lean into your experience using it and just decode this a bit. And so we want to tell people what it is, how it works, but most importantly, how you use it with your team to navigate their personalities and how people work within your team.
Brian Doe:
Yeah, sure. So I've been using Kolbe for almost 20 years. I think it's 18 or 19 years. Found it in a coaching program I was a participant in, Dan Sullivan's Strategic Coach Program. Great program if you're serious about growing your business and improving your quality of life. But the first thing they had us do was the Kolbe. So that was my introduction to it. They didn't really tell us what it was or how to interpret it. We just arrived with our score, we all had our name tag on with our Kolbe score across the bottom. And very quickly, we learned how to tell a lot about a person just by their Kolbe score. So while today I've been using it for a long time, I am not an expert on Kolbe. So I do not have “The Whole Truth”. But I am here as a testament to how easy this tool is to use for your personal life, for your team life, for your clients. And we can talk about all these different applications.
Kurt Dupuis:
And peeling back the onion a little bit, Seid and I are not going to be ... I mean, experts I feel like is a lofty goal. But we're going to get trained on the Kolbe process and the certification.
Brian Doe:
Perfect.
Kurt Dupuis:
So that we can help empower our clients and prospects with this, because it's such a powerful tool. We just did our Kolbe tests. So Kolbe A assessment, it's 36 questions maybe, where at each question there's four options and you rate the option you feel most like and least like is the best answer for you. And so that's how this comes about. So let's start with your score, Brian. What's your score? And let's use this as a way to introduce the four different criteria.
Brian Doe:
Okay. So I am a 3368. And if you look at the four different categories; Fact Finder, Follow Through, Quick Start and Implementor, this automatically tells me right off the bat I'm a low Fact Finder. Which means, my strength is not in gathering information, getting lots of detail. I'm an “executive summary” guy. I need the bottom line. I don't need a ton of information to move ahead, but I do need to find people that can keep me out of trouble. Make sure I don't break any rules or laws compliance-wise. And so I may want to pair with a higher Fact Finder. So if we have some research to be done or background to be found, that's where Kolbe very quickly tells me more about myself. And it kind of liberated me in a way because I had done an MBA, I'd done the Certified Financial Planner designation. I had done all these academic pursuits, but they were quite difficult for me. I didn't have the mental energy necessarily to really enjoy doing those.
And so I was thinking about doing a CFA or do I go back and do advanced degrees. Well, right off the bat, that liberated me from saying, that's not my strength. That's not where I need to be spending my time, I can be more productive in other things. Follow Through is the other one that ... And especially in our business, you need good systems, good follow up, keep good records, obviously compliance. But I'm very inclined to not create and maintain systems. So I go hire all eight, nine Follow Throughs because I need people to run those kinds of things in my business and keep me on track.
Kurt Dupuis:
I guess I just assumed, because you tend to have ... you approach things very methodically, like a CFP, right?
Brian Doe:
Sure.
Kurt Dupuis:
Very methodically. So I guess I just assumed that you were a systems guy. But not so much a systems guy.
Brian Doe:
No. And I'm very curious, if I'm genuinely interested in it, then I can spend more time. I do have more energy finding out the details, but I'm also ready to go. I'm ready to launch tomorrow, yesterday kind of thing. And so yeah, the Quick Start ... and I'll make a comment, once I got your score ... Steve, I've not seen your Kolbe score yet, so we'll get to that, I'm sure.
Steve Seid:
Yeah.
Brian Doe:
But when I saw Kurt's, I'm like, oh, this is why we get along. You're an off the chart Quick Start and we love new ideas and changing things up. Status quo can go out the window. And that's, in large part, why you've got this podcast. I don't know many other wholesalers that would've championed actually starting a podcast like this. And I've been doing the same thing with my business for a couple of years and we just launched it, did it, tried it and learned how to make it better and more engaging over time. Let me just make one last point about the Quick Start score. So being a high Quick Start, you're going to take action, you're going to start new things and try new things.
And those people have a lower risk aversion to experimenting and trying things. But your low Quick Start scores, those people are your stabilizers. They're the ones that keep things intact and keep things as maybe they should be in some cases. And so I have a couple of very low Quick Start team members, but I said, we have a gap here. You've got very low Quick Start scores, I have not a super high one, but a relatively high one. Here's where I'm going to drive you crazy. I'm going to constantly be changing things up, I'm going to be adding stuff to the to-do list and we're going to have some to-dos that never get done.
Kurt Dupuis:
With no process associated with it.
Brian Doe:
No process associated with it. But it's okay to let some of these ideas die. Don't feel like they have to be done. And so we're able to avoid some conflict by being very upfront and knowing what our different Conative strengths are and how we're wired to approach things. So good for you and then very good for adding to or improving communication with your team. And then the-
Steve Seid:
Brian, I'm going to jump in here with a couple of questions. I know we're interrupting you as you're going through this-
Brian Doe:
That's fine.
Steve Seid:
... but there's things on the tip of my tongue I want to ask you, so let me do these three questions. The first question is, did your score surprise you? It doesn't sound like it did. It sounds like you took your score and you go, yeah, that's me. Was that the experience with you or did anything surprise you?
Brian Doe:
I think overwhelmingly, when you complete those questions, if you overthink it, you can spend a lot more time on it. But if you buzz through them, go with your first instinct, when you get that report back, it's incredibly validating. And you read the report and you're like, oh my gosh, that's me. But it also shed light on why I had trouble with organized systems, status quo type of thinking. It just always, I was trying to fit myself into some systems or programs that I just wasn't really wired well for. And you can't avoid those altogether, obviously. You still have to do compliance, you have to do continuing education, you have to follow all the laws and rules, get all the paperwork correct. But you can be far more productive if you can find a good team member that you divide and focus on these strengths.
Steve Seid:
Excellent.
Brian Doe:
Does that answer your question?
Steve Seid:
Yeah, absolutely. And the one other point where it sounds like a practical application of this is you've proactively searched out a team that balances you, is what I'm hearing. Is that a fair statement?
Brian Doe:
That's the first thing, I don't do an interview until they've done the Kolbe.
Steve Seid:
Oh, no kidding.
Brian Doe:
So if somebody is interested in working with me, I send them a link to the Kolbe test. And until they complete it, we don't even really talk.
Steve Seid:
Wow. That is really interesting.
Brian Doe:
Like if I was trying to hire somebody for maybe the paperwork, Steady Eddie, keep everything in order kind of a role and I saw Kurt's Kolbe ...
Kurt Dupuis:
You wouldn't even take the call.
Brian Doe:
I love you Kurt, but we're not even going to have the first interview on that one.
Kurt Dupuis:
Steady Eddie is not my MO.
Brian Doe:
Right. But if I need somebody that's going to shake it up, innovate, reimagine, create something new, go experiment, try, then that's the kind of person you're looking for. You don't want somebody that's going to spend forever researching and making sure they have all the information they need before they can move ahead. What I see are people who are a lot alike on the Kolbe tend to think, hey, we'd make great team members. You love this and I love this, let's go. And then you're Quick Starting all over the place and nobody is getting anything done.
Kurt Dupuis:
Right.
Brian Doe:
Nothing ever gets finished. Likewise, if you have a lot of high Fact Finder, high Follow Throughs working with you or working on a team, they can never get enough information to satisfy themselves to actually then launch this new initiative, try this new program, and then nothing gets done. This is something that would typically cause tension, but you can actually use it to move things forward better and faster. I've been able to use the Kolbe to engineer this so that I'm really optimized to enjoy what I'm doing day to day. I'm doing the things that I'm best at and I've gotten all the stuff I don't like... or to the extent that I can, I've gotten things that I don't like out of my life and somebody else is handling them.
Steve Seid:
So I derailed you a little bit as you were going through your score. So again, we've got the four pieces here, Fact Finder, Follow Through, Quick Start. And refresh your numbers on those.
Brian Doe:
336.
Steve Seid:
So 33 would say this is something that is not a strong point for me.
Brian Doe:
Low Fact Finder.
Steve Seid:
Right?
Brian Doe:
No, no, no. Okay, so let me just stop you right there. And to Kurt's point, it's not that this is a strong or a weak point, it just is. Is it good that I can make a decision based on a small amount of information or is that bad? It's neither.
Steve Seid:
Yeah, good point.
Brian Doe:
It depends on the situation. And is it good that I'm prone to changing things or that somebody is a stabilizer? It's neither good nor bad, it just is. And in different circumstances, those Conative strengths can work to your advantage. But this is not a personality test, this is not an IQ test, let's make that distinction. Because, am I an introvert or an extrovert? Am I likable or am I not likable? Am I an agreeable person or-
Kurt Dupuis:
It has nothing to do with any of that.
Brian Doe:
It has nothing to do with all that stuff. But I've interacted with the DiSC assessment, I've done the Myers Briggs, I've done all those. Those just seemed so complicated. I could never make sense of them and I felt like I'd have to have a PhD in psychology to really figure out what to do with them. Whereas Kolbe, as soon as I did it, I read my report, it was very validating. I was like, oh, this is really cool. And then you do a couple of sessions of, what did the scores mean and how do you pair them together? And all of a sudden, man, you're up and running with this thing in no time. And so I'll close the loop for you here, Steve, the final score is the Implementor. And it's a bit of a misnomer, because I think people think of it as-
Kurt Dupuis:
It is.
Brian Doe:
... implementing.
Steve Seid:
Yeah.
Brian Doe:
And it really has to do with tangible implements. Are you a conceptual person or are you a tangible tools kind of person?
Steve Seid:
Ahhhh
Brian Doe:
And so Kurt, we could probably give him an idea of something. He could imagine it and he could make a decision on buying a new car or taking a trip somewhere. Whereas me, I've got to get my hands on it. I could never buy a car over the internet. When I sit in it though, I'm like, this is it. This is the right one. And so this plays out in my hobbies. I like making pizzas and cooking, I like gardening, I like photography and travel. All very tangible. Do jujitsu with my girls in the spare time. So these are all very physical activity, tangible in the world kind of things.
And so I have to do something with that energy because a lot of that does not get used in financial services. Now, I do love doing presentations, I do love teaching and getting a group together. And not so much lecturing, but just imparting knowledge, being the subject matter expert. If you looked at personality, I tend a little more towards introvert than extrovert. If you dropped me into the cocktail party and made me network, I don't like that. But I can get up and draw you pictures and charts, diagrams, and different models. So you can learn how to use these strengths anywhere in personal life or business.
Steve Seid:
Thank you for answering that question. Because when I asked you if it felt like you, I saw this and I go, I'm not sure that is me because when I looked at Implementor, I only scored a three on that and I feel like I am an Implementor.
Brian Doe:
Yeah.
Steve Seid:
But it was focused on
Brian Poe:
You’re a Follow Through
Steve Seid:
But you were focused on tangible things, which I'm not. I'm not building anything, that's not who I am. So that's interesting. Thank you for clarifying that.
Brian Doe:
So while we're on the subject of you, what is your Kolbe score on those four categories?
Steve Seid:
8363. So even follow Follow Through, I didn't score where I thought-
Kurt Dupuis:
That surprised me the most on you. I thought you would have a way higher follow Follow Through score.
Brian Doe:
So that Kolbe is what they would call a strategic planner. You go gather a good amount of information, you've got this itch to go innovate and do new things, but you probably have good people around you that keep the systems going. And generally, you don't have to expend a lot of this tangibles hobbies kind of energy, you're more of a conceptual person.
Steve Seid:
Yeah. That's about right. I'll tell you, I was surprised. Kurt, we can get into your score. I thought Kurt and I were going to score completely different.
Kurt Dupuis:
I thought we would be the inverse of each other. But that's effective. Our emotive, the way we communicate, our personalities, I think are a yin and a yang. We've talked about that numerous times. But that's why this is so different. That has nothing to do with this. This is how we work. So if you have a problem and you're tackling that problem, for you it's research, you're a high Fact Finder. You're going to go find out everything. I'm in the middle with fact finding, so I want to know enough to be dangerous. But I have a super high Quick Start, so I want to learn the basics. And then I just want to jump in both feet first.
Brian Doe:
And Kurt, when I listen to some of your previous podcasts, you refer to your half-baked ideas, you started-
Kurt Dupuis:
The object syndrome.
Brian Doe:
You started a garage band off of a listserv in your neighborhood. I mean, you just come up with an idea and you want to do it.
Kurt Dupuis:
True story.
Brian Doe:
And there are a lot of people that would just hesitate, overthink it, overanalyze it, and not want to make that change. So you can definitely see, once you know someone's Kolbe, you can actually just watch it play out.
Kurt Dupuis:
So the Implementor, that fourth category, I'm with you, Steve, that's the hardest to wrap your head around because ... And I think a word that I heard used that was different than Implementor was just “Demonstrate”. Do you like demonstrating? Do you not like demonstrating with your hand? And Brian, I can remember probably the last lunch when we were talking about this, I started noticing when you do explain things, you move your napkin, you'll get a pen. And you live on Lake Oconee and we were talking about the lake, but you had to pull out your phone-
Brian Doe:
I had to pull out the map.
Kurt Dupuis:
... and show me physically where we were talking about, different spots on the lake. So that high demonstrating or that high Implementor made so much more sense after going through the Kolbe and seeing the numbers on a page.
Brian Doe:
Yeah. And when you look at numbers on a page or you're dealing with portfolios and client concepts, I'm always drawing pictures. I cannot talk without ... I mean, look right here, I've got-
Kurt Dupuis:
Yeah, there's the notepad.
Brian Doe:
... my notepad and I'm jotting down all these things and drawing diagrams, and I like to convey things in a demonstrable way that's interactive. Some people are more conceptual, they don't need to see the pictures, charts, graphs, models, and things. And a model could be a spreadsheet. You could build a spreadsheet. That's-
Kurt Dupuis:
Another one.
Brian Doe:
... Implementor in action. But yeah, that's where you see it.
Kurt Dupuis:
So the practical application in your personal life, has your wife done the Kolbe A and have you all talked about it?
Brian Doe:
Absolutely. So I am a higher Quick Start and Implementor as we discussed and my wife is a moderate Fact Finder higher Follow Through. She's a higher Follow Through. So for everybody looking for peace in the valley and harmony in their relationships, this was a great tool. It was early in our marriage, second or third year into being married and I was like, oh, that's why she's always griping because I'm not on time, I'm five minutes late to everything, I don't care what the schedule is, I'm going to do what I want to do when I want to do it. And so we've met in the middle. And she runs the kids' calendars and the social calendar and she tells me when and where to be there. She's learned to lie to me and tell me to be there 30 minutes ahead of when something is going to happen.
Kurt Dupuis:
You're that person in the relationship
Brian Doe:
Yeah. And so where you would have this potential point of conflict. And I think I started to say this earlier about the Quick Start, if you're more than about four points apart with someone else, that can be a source of conflict. So identifying that early and saying, hey, here's where I'm going to drive you crazy. Here's where we're going to get sideways. Or, I'm going to give you your space to do this and I'll come to these events on time, but on vacation we're throwing the calendar out the window and all that kind of stuff. So yeah, I've used it in personal life as well.
Steve Seid:
I can't wait when Becky comes home tonight to go, I have these series of questions that you're going to answer.
Kurt Dupuis:
So that dynamic that you describe is very helpful for two-person relationships. But when you think of teams, I think there's also value in those people in the middle. So across all these modes. So think of a Fact Finder, so I'm a middle of the road Fact Finder. So what that could potentially mean is I could be a good translator between a high Fact Finder and low Finder. High Fact Finder, slow down, we've got plenty of information. “Executive Summary”, maybe I can give you a little bit more than that and meet in the middle. So again, you're likely not going to be a high or a low number with any of these categories. There's value with being in the middle. Same thing with Quick Start. Maybe you're the person that says, well, maybe we don't just jump on every idea that we ever have ever.
Brian Doe:
Right.
Kurt Dupuis:
And use some information to put a little bit of a process, but not a full process. So there's value with being in the middle. So don't expect your scores to be high or low in any category, there's value with being in the middle.
Brian Doe:
And high or low is a bit of a, again, of a missed ... Like if you want to score high on an exam, it's because you need ... There's not really a high or low here, but it just is an indicator of where you naturally have strengths in these four areas. And then to the high Fact Finder, we created what I call a rabbit cage. And every crazy idea I have, we just drop it in the rabbit cage. And one day when I get all my other projects caught up and we're looking for something new, we can go pull something out of the rabbit cage.
Kurt Dupuis:
The Repository.
Steve Seid:
Can you clarify one thing to me with regards to the team? So I thought that was a really great point you made about how you hire and having people on the team that balance you. What Kurt and I can envision doing when we get certified is going to teams and giving this assessment. What happens if you find that teammates are alike and there isn't balance, how do you handle that situation?
Brian Doe:
Well, I've only ever really had bad experiences that ended up not working out when there was a mismatch on the Kolbe.
Steve Seid:
Interesting.
Brian Doe:
I was at Merrill Lynch for nine years and you got all these producers that we’re all gung ho. Like I said, with Kurt, we feed off of each other's energy and we want to go do these things. And so, hey, let's partner up. And then you find out, like I said, you don't have people to come in and finish things or make repeatable systems. Or you want to go this way and I want to go this way, and there becomes conflict and it just ends up breaking apart, was overwhelmingly what happened. I would bet you, if you went into most functional teams, you would find there's, maybe by accident, there's probably a good match of these different skill sets or somebody is tolerating a lot of suffering. One or the other.
Kurt Dupuis:
Well, I think part of this is it's a tool to measure friction so you can get in front of it, or give you the tools to deal with that friction. Because it's okay to have different strengths, but maybe using different language or maybe the division of labor has to change a little bit. I think you can hopefully what we'll eventually get to is being able to give tools for people that are already locked into the team, they already have very divergent scores. But I'm sure there's tools for sorting out people that have different scores.
Brian Doe:
No doubt. But I think if most people are in growth mode, obviously over time there's turnover. I think having a handle on Kolbe gives you an indication of, maybe this part of the business isn't working as well, so maybe that's our next hire. Maybe we bring in a consultant that is a high follow Follow Through to help us create some systems. There's a lot of different ways to apply it. If you're a two-person team and you've got similar Kolbes, it doesn't automatically mean it's a bad thing. I tend to see ones that are ... like, if you have a lot of high Fact Finder or high Follow Throughs, they tend to get along better than two Quick Starts that want to go in dramatically different directions all the time.
So there's probably combos that work just fine. And if anything, I think it gives you an indicator of, hey, maybe a part-time person, a virtual assistant, a consultant. We can bring the skill set in where we need it and not have to go out and hire whole new people. I can give you a couple of examples of how you could use this with clients.
Kurt Dupuis:
Sure.
Brian Doe:
So let me give you a couple of other examples. We've talked about using this personally and on your own team and understanding how your team members think. But I've actually Kolbed clients before.
Kurt Dupuis:
Oh, wow.
Brian Doe:
And this is a very helpful ... Once you've done a few of them, again, you'll start to spot what different characteristics there are, so you may not have to Kolbe everyone. You may want to though, it could be a great client building activity that you could shed light on them, their relationship with their spouse, all those things that we talked about. But if I have a client or a prospective client who is a super high Fact Finder, I'm never going to be able to give that person enough information. They're going to come in and they're going to want more and more. I had one guy who was an engineer, retired, had $5 million. I think he just wanted to go around and brag about how much money he had.
But he came in and he had read and studied and he basically had his financial planner background. And I asked him, I said, "Well, how exactly can I help you?" I said, "Look, it sounds like you already know all this stuff." Oh no, no. He downplayed it. But then he wanted me to read this 40-page Morningstar white paper on Gamma. And I was just like, I'm out. Best of luck to you, enjoy your search, but I am not your guy.
Kurt Dupuis:
Tap out. I'm done.
Brian Doe:
Yeah. Here's a 40-page research paper, let me know your thoughts on this. I'm like, yeah, you're not even a client yet. We're going to part ways right here. So then if you have somebody who is a high Implementor or gifts, handwritten cards, all these tangible things, and how you communicate makes the difference.
Steve Seid:
Oh, that's a good one. That's really, really good. Yeah.
Brian Doe:
So conceptual versus tangible, who wants a electronic birthday card versus who would appreciate a good hand crafted ... one of these nice cards that all the scrapbookers do. So you can do different things based on people's Kolbe scores. But the Fact Finder is a big one for me, because if somebody is a super high Fact Finder, they're just going to wear me out. And I've learned to tap out of those before they actually become clients.
Steve Seid:
Wow.
Brian Doe:
And then I use my Kolbe. I love rock crawling in Jeeps out in Utah. And so I've figured out who my clients are that do that and so I do events where I'm taking clients out and we rent Jeeps and go out west and do stuff. And one of my clients called up and he said, "I'm looking at the Sprinter vans conversion to make it for a travel and camping, exploring type of vehicle." He says, "Can I afford it?" I said, "I'll identify my conflict of interest here up front. The answer, first of all, is yes, you can definitely afford it. And two, once you get it macced up and usable, you have to share it and let me use it as well." You can lean towards the people that you connect with, resonate with. I have a lot of clients who are radiologists. And so, I love going to the hospitals and going to the reading rooms and they're showing me the scans and they're talking about the surgeries, they're innovating and all this stuff.
Kurt Dupuis:
High Implementor.
Brian Doe:
They are high Implementors. Yeah. Engineers versus radiologists. I'm going to get along with the radiologists most all day long. And the engineers, I can't ever provide them enough in information. I get tired before they do.
Kurt Dupuis:
That is a great contrast.
Brian Doe:
Yeah.
Steve Seid:
I am absolutely blown away. I knew you used it, Kurt was telling me about, with your team and stuff. But the way you do it with your clients, that is just incredible. Do you do it for all your clients? Is it just a certain tier of the book? How many of your clients have taken Kolbe?
Kurt Dupuis:
That's your structural question, Seid? So you're assuming he's got a process for that?
Steve Seid:
I want to know. Is it half the book? Is it-
Kurt Dupuis:
There was one month that he read it for 20 people and then he hasn't done it again in two years.
Brian Doe:
Nailed it.
Kurt Dupuis:
Right? Yeah.
Brian Doe:
You nailed it. But-
Kurt Dupuis:
I speak that language.
Brian Doe:
But having done it, you see and can tell what people tend to be. And here's another practical application, I've used it with ... And I got this idea from Maria Forbes, she's up there in Atlanta. She works with putting together ... she does some Medicare planning and team building type stuff. I paired her up with a Medicare specialist, but she creates family care teams and she'll Kolbe the whole family. And so when mom has slips and falls or something happens, who is going to be the first person to hop in their car and show up and get them to the hospital and take them to the doctor's appointments? That's me. I'm the high Implementor, I'll be there. You need me, I'll show up. But I am not going to go through the insurance policy and figure out what all the details are about, what's covered and what's not covered and keeping up with receipts and submitting payments.
But there is somebody in the family who will. And so you can assign a family care responsibility based on people's Kolbe, so that there's better harmony in the family, mom and dad get taken care of better. And so it's a very powerful tool and it's super easy to use. It's 50 bucks to Kolbe somebody. It's a fairly nominal cost, in my opinion. I've done it with interns, I've done it with, like I said, clients, new hires, and even family members. So can't recommend it enough.
Kurt Dupuis:
That's so many more examples than I even expected to go with. So the practical applications, so first of all, introspection. It teaches you a lot about you.
Brian Doe:
Yep.
Kurt Dupuis:
Secondly, before you hire. Great part of a hiring process to Kolbe people before you even take a phone call to put them on the team. But then thirdly, the people that are on your team, run a Kolbe on them.
Brian Doe:
Yeah. It's never too late.
Kurt Dupuis:
Find ways to decrease the friction and increase the productivity. And heck, even do it with clients to find out who you might jibe with, who you don't, how to communicate to certain types of clients versus others. Some may want the diagrams and some might just wear you out with needing too much information. So many awesome applications for this. This is an awesome, awesome chat. I think this is just going to be the intro to Kolbe for our community, because I think Seid and I ... So, high Quick Start over here, we're jumping in feet first.
Brian Doe:
I think Seid wants to think about it and do some more research on it before he moves ahead.
Kurt Dupuis:
He's going to need that 40-page Morningstar report before he makes a decision.
Brian Doe:
Right. No, if you're going to offer this or help teams with this, I mean, by all means, develop your familiarity with this, check out Kolbe. If you guys become gurus in it and can help some people, I think that this is one of the cheapest, easiest, most valuable tools that you can use for building a team.
Kurt Dupuis:
Three of my favorite adjectives; cheap, easy, useful.
Brian Doe:
There you go.
Kurt Dupuis:
Well Brian, thanks for coming on today and helping educate us a little bit on Kolbe. And I'm sure this will help foster many conversations in the future.
Brian Doe:
I have no doubt. I hope so.
Kurt Dupuis:
Stick with us. When we come back, we'll have the Costanza Corner.
Steve Seid:
And we're back with our George Costanza Corner. Kurt, you have something for us today.
Kurt Dupuis:
I do. And I'm going to try not to get emotional on this one, but this stuff-
Steve Seid:
Wow.
Kurt Dupuis:
... kind of eats me up. So there was a boy, his name is Abraham, and he had a pretty rare blood disease. And you're familiar with the organization, Make-A-Wish-
Steve Seid:
Yeah, of course.
Kurt Dupuis:
... which comes in and gives terminally ill kids a last wish, really cool experience. Instead of doing something cool like going to a Super Bowl or something selfish, he decided to use that money to pay for the meals of homeless people for a year.
Steve Seid:
Wow. It's amazing.
Kurt Dupuis:
Which, this kid is 12 years old.
Steve Seid:
Oh my God.
Kurt Dupuis:
And so I'm trying to think of myself as a 12 year ... I mean, all I was doing was playing sports and thinking about myself. I can't imagine being so thoughtful and self aware to be thinking about others. To be given this gift that's so special and just being like, no, I'm going to give it to other people instead. So just think about someone like the worst time in their life, but still thinking about others, that gets me choked up. Having kids, I feel like those are the kind of kids you want to raise, even though I'm probably not that kind of person. But knowing that those kids actually exist in real life and not just a standard barer to be out there I think is really cool.
Steve Seid:
Well, you did something. I know this story is pretty profound because you left me speechless. I don't really know how to respond to that other than to say, what a wonderful individual. What else can you say than that?
Kurt Dupuis:
It costs nothing to be good, so be good.
Steve Seid:
Thanks everyone for listening. We'll see you next time.
Kurt Dupuis:
You can find the Whole Truth and subscribe for free on Apple Podcast, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. We'd love it if you took the time to rate and review the show on Apple Podcast, it helps others find the show. And for more episodes of the Whole Truth, go to www.touchstoneinvestments.com/thewholetruth. That's touchstoneinvestments.com/thewholetruth. All one word.
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