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:
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. Steve here.
Kurt Dupuis:
And I am Kurt Dupuis.
Steve Seid:
First episode of the year, new year 2024. Typically, we would have this be our clip show. That's coming next, but we actually wanted to have an interview come out first episode of the year that we thought was particularly good. Our guest today was Michael Futterman. Michael was head of practice management at a very large asset manager. He has his own consulting firm right now, which is Type Two Consulting. He's a coach. He's a speaker. And man, he was just...
Kurt Dupuis:
Dynamite.
Steve Seid:
... in my mind a heck of an interview.
Kurt Dupuis:
He's so polished. He has kind of been in this practice consulting game for a while. You can tell. His name first came up when we got certified for Kolbe a couple years ago because something that his prior firm was utilizing and he was very well known in the Kolbe circles. And I just love his concept of Type Two Fun, I think that's the name of his consultancy, because it's all about doing the hard things, the hard work that you appreciate and kind of get self-gratification through in the long run, like running a marathon. Anything that's hard, anything that takes time, effort, training and is kind of framing it that way I think is a unique perspective.
Steve Seid:
How do you get people to act? And that's what we're always trying to do as consultants to financial advisors is, "Hey, you want to do these things? We know you want to do these things. Now we actually have to help you to take action. Now we have to help you to move to take those steps. And I think it's a really creative and thoughtful way to coach people to focus on change.
Kurt Dupuis:
Well, Type Two Fun is the enemy of a problem that we run into often, which is just complacency.
Steve Seid:
Yes.
Kurt Dupuis:
And so it's the antithesis of a complacency, something that we battle all the time. And we know management that listens to the show as well, that's a common problem. We should not be striving for comfort. It should be the opposite.
Steve Seid:
Yeah. And there's a vision around it too. When you run a marathon, you're like, "Okay, I want to complete this." And sometimes we focus just on the little tasks we have to do. And then you could easily say, "Well, I don't want to do that." But if you have a vision, "Okay, this is where I want this business to be." If you have that vision, then the steps become, even if they're challenging, you're like, "No, no, no, I'm going to do this today. I better."
Kurt Dupuis:
Did you know that I ran a marathon?
Steve Seid:
I did not know that. I ran a half and I thought to myself, "How in the world do people do two times this amount of running?" That was my half... And I did it pretty well. I didn't walk at all during the entire thing. If you've done a whole, I give you great credit because that's no joke.
Kurt Dupuis:
I made the mistake of making friends with some runners when I had moved to Pittsburgh. So I moved to Pittsburgh in '08 and I ran the Pittsburgh Marathon in 2010 and met a group of runners and just started training. I'm an extrovert, so you give me people and I'm pretty much down for anything. But bringing it back to this Type Two Fun, I had for some reason really attached the training of this marathon to a brother that I had lost. So when I finished the marathon, I was physically exhausted, but all of these emotions also just rushed over. I just completely lost it. I completely just collapsed…
Steve Seid:
Wow.
Kurt Dupuis:
…right there at the end. So a flood of sensations and emotions, but that was my Type Two Fun. The work was hard but enjoyable. But I did it. Something I never thought I would do just to prove to myself that I could. This Type Two Fun thing really makes sense to me because I associate it with that moment.
Steve Seid:
That's an awesome story and a nice lead in to Mr. Futterman. So we're going to jump into that interview with Michael Futterman.
Kurt Dupuis:
And welcome back. We're going to have a conversation with Michael Futterman today. Michael, we always feel like people do a better job of telling their story and their background better than us just reading some CV somewhere. So could you start by telling us a little bit about your background?
Michael Futterman:
Yeah, absolutely. And first of all, let me start by just saying thanks to both of you for having me on. It's been exciting to get to know both of you as we've started this process. I'm a coach. I'm a EQ enthusiast. I'm a Type Two Fun addict. And I'm sure that we'll get into some of those things as we go along. I've spent 20-plus years in financial services. I started with UBS Financial Services as one of the practice management leads. I then later went to Allianz Global Investors and I originated their learning and development function. And then I left Allianz Global Investors to join Janus Henderson. At the time, they were Janus and I headed up their Janus Labs team for a few years. And now I've started my own coaching and consulting practice doing that independently. Before being involved in financial services, I was an Outward Bound instructor. And I really have a passion for human change and development and that kind of guides a lot of the stuff that I do on a day-to-day basis.
Kurt Dupuis:
Well, I think one of the first recollections I have of your name is when Steve and I got certified at Kolbe a few years ago, and I think that's one of the things that just working out in the field, your name and Janus Labs and the quality of the work you were doing there were coming up. So reputation precedes you there. So why did you decide, what went into the thinking of breaking out and starting your own firm?
Michael Futterman:
Yeah, it's a good question. And I appreciate that. I'm flattered to hear that the association with what we were doing at Janus Labs and the work that we did with Kolbe people thought highly of it. I think that the work that all of these firms are doing around practice management and coaching is great. So none of what I'm about to say is a dig at them.
Starting my own firm seemed like the best way to work with my clients in a progressive way that wasn't confined by some of the things that asset managers are focused on and within a wirehouse model. So when I was at UBS, you're often seen as an agent of the firm. And so there's a certain level of cautious trust. I'll put that in the best possible light. And at an asset manager, it's always in the interest of a sale of the product. And that totally makes sense. We have to find a way to differentiate in the asset management world to sell the products. But as an independent, the work really speaks for itself. So I am the product and the work that I do with the client. So it eliminates that cloudiness around whether or not a client wants to work with me directly. And that's really what kind of drove my decision-making around starting my own company.
Steve Seid:
Boy, does that resonate with us. It's been amazing how, I don't want to say easy because it sounds like we're pumping our chest out, but how easy it's been to differentiate what we call business consulting offering by not being product-focused. It's just if you just don't do that, the way that you come across is entirely different than everybody else, which it should seem like something that's obvious, but in the world of sales it's not.
So I want to spend a minute here on your time at Janus. When you look at Janus Labs relative to what other asset managers were doing, was it very similar or did you find that you guys really were doing some differentiated next-level type things?
Michael Futterman:
What we did at Janus Labs, it's always in the interest of developing a relationship. What I focused on at Janus was on two main fronts. The first front was helping our sales team with the relationships that they develop with clients and prospects by providing them with content and training on that content. And that may be a little bit of what was different there. I can't speak with other asset managers about what they're doing with their sales team, but I know that one of the things that my partners and I tried to do at Janus Henderson was develop that sales expertise around using the content and approach that I use as what I describe as a coachultant, and I'll get into that in a minute.
The second area of what we focused on was really working directly with the clients of the firm to bring these ideas and material to support them in growing their business or managing their team more effectively. So it was either around client acquisition or it was around what we would describe as practice management, team development, or health and wellness of an individual.
So I'll go back to this idea of coachulting. So if we break that down, it's coaching and consulting. Consulting is providing expertise in a specific area. So that could be, like I said, client acquisition or team development or client service, marketing, leadership. These are ways for us to say, "Here are the best practices. You should segment your book of business. If you use Rob Knapp's model of Supernova, you have 13 touchpoints a year." Whatever it is, here's the research and this is what you should be doing.
Another way to think about that is what are you trying to do? By comparison, the coaching piece is really around helping people think through how and why they are doing the thing. So it's the nuances of your particular culture, the background of your firm, the focus that you have. And really the coachulting is blending those things together. So I might start by asking more coaching questions. So things like what's not happening that you want to see happening in your business? What have you done to create that outcome so far? What do you feel is getting in your way of achieving that thing? And then as we learn more about their answers to that question, I'll ask questions that are more consulting questions. I'll say, "Here's how you can approach segmentation. Have you thought about doing it that way?" Or, "I've seen other advisors use these marketing tools or these approaches. Have you done that?"
So the blend of these two things together, it's the helping the advisor think about why am I doing this thing? Does it make sense for me? But then also how do we get this done and what are we trying to get done, that's the consulting part.
Steve Seid:
So let's get into some of these concepts. One that seems awfully important to you is this concept of Type Two Fun. I think your firm actually is called Type Two Consulting. Do I have that right?
Michael Futterman:
Yeah, it's Type Two Fun Consulting. And you spell it all out, and there's two questions people ask is is it fund with a D or fun with an N? And the answer is it's fun with an N, right? I'm talking about things that are fun to do. And then the other question they ask about is does this have anything to do with diabetes? And the answer is no. It has nothing to do with diabetes.
So what is Type Two Fun? Really put as simply as possible, it's the hard stuff that we do intentionally. And we do it because we know it's going to be worth it. So what goes into that category? It's running marathons. It's climbing mountains. It's going backcountry skiing. For advisors, it might be changing firms or forming a team. For parents, it might be taking your kids to Disney. Those are things that we do. They're challenging while we do it. We might look back while we're doing it or look at ourselves while we're doing it and say, "Why did I ever agree to do this thing?" But when we get to the other side, we're able to look back and say, "Yeah, that was worth it. It was important for me to do that."
So Type Two Fun's important for a number of different reasons. So first is biologically. There's a push and pull for humans to both conserve energy and also exert control over our environment. So Type Two Fun, when we engage in things that are challenging, there's no bear that looks at another bear and says, "You know what we should do? We should go climb that mountain. We should see who can do it faster and we can do it better." This is a uniquely human thing. We want to achieve, but at the same time we also want to conserve energy, and that'll come up a little bit later in the description. So first is there's this biological pull.
The second thing about Type Two Fun, why it's important is because business changes. Whether it's compressed fees or client expectations of a team or generational wealth transfer, there's always going to be change in whatever business we're in. And being able to muster the motivation to respond to it is going to be really important. And so in coachulting, what I do, this is related to what do we need to do in order to achieve the objectives that we have or the goals that we have for ourselves. So there's biological push, there's always going to be change.
The third piece is related back to our need to exert control over the environment. Most advisors that get into the business want to feel a sense of personal accomplishment. And whether that's a wellness component of doing hard things, like it is good for my brain to learn new stuff, or if it's just outcomes for your business.
And I'll do a little thought experiment with you guys in the audience. I want you to think about the things that you did in the last month that were easy but pleasurable. So these are things that you might've purchased or the cocktails you drank or the golf you played. And I just want you to think about those things. Think about how often. You don't have to tell me what they are, but just think about them and how they made you feel.
And now in contrast, I want you to think about the hardest thing that you did intentionally. Maybe it was something as simple as just making sure that the laundry got folded. For me, I'm good at getting the laundry into the laundry machine and into the dryer, but then once it needs to be folded, this is where I really need to exert myself. So maybe it was something like that. Maybe it was pushing yourself to go to the gym.There was an advisor that I talked to the other week and he was saying that going to the office when they could easily work from home was something that was Type Two Fun for them. That was sort of that exertion piece.
So now when you think about those two things, the things that were really easy but pleasurable and the things that you did that were hard, which one gives you more pride? And I'll ask you was it the hard stuff or was it the easy stuff?
Steve Seid:
The hard stuff easily.
Kurt Dupuis:
Absolutely.
Steve Seid:
Yeah.
Michael Futterman:
Of course, right? It's the hard stuff. We want to be proud. We don't want to be arrogant. There are lots of us who are arrogant. But we want to be proud of what we accomplish. And we've done that since we were kids. Think about the time, if you have kids where they say, "Hey, look at me dad," or, "Look at me mom." People wouldn't run triathlons if they didn't get to brag about it. If you weren't allowed to talk about it afterwards, nobody would do it.
So why this becomes important is by doing hard things, why this becomes important for every business owner, for every human on the planet is we build up resilience because we learn about trying hard and straining ourselves to do something. We develop deeper reservoirs of dopamine, which is directly related to motivation and actions that we take, and we ultimately improve our mental health when we compare it to always doing the easy thing. There are so many things in our environment that are easy to do. You can order food with a press of a button. You have a thousand shows that you can watch on Netflix, and we find ourselves saying there's nothing to watch on television.
By challenging ourselves to push the limit, we become proud, we become more resilient, we learn new things, and generally that's better for our mental health, and ultimately it leads to better business outcomes.
Steve Seid:
Boy, does this resonate with me on so many different levels. And I'm now going to ask you a question. Okay, so this concept, how do you use it when working with financial professionals?
Michael Futterman:
I mentioned that I used to be an Outward Bound instructor. And one of the things that I would do, and for those of you who don't know what Outward Bound is, it's an organization that's been around for more than 50 years and they basically take people out into the wilderness to help them challenge themselves and learn more about themselves. And I was an instructor for them. And one of the things that we would do is we would go rock climbing. And for some people, rock climbing, just putting the harness on is going to be super frightening for them. And for other people, nothing less than reaching the top of the climb is going to be conceived as success.
So what I had to do and what I do with my clients today is kind of examine what is going to push you out of your comfort zone, but not so far out of your comfort zone that you're going to be panicked? We would get people, they would get harnessed up and climb five feet off the ground or even three feet off the ground. They could literally almost step down off of where they were and they would be frozen. They would be panicked.
So one of the key things in Type Two Fun is that we have to understand what is a meaningful amount of change that you are willing to engage in that is not going to send you into panic. That's the first step in starting to understand that. So talking with my clients, helping them to understand what would be a meaningful amount of change, what is going to get in the way of your success? I don't see the problem sets being tremendously different. You've got business objectives that people want to meet, and that may change from firm to firm. So some firms might be dealing with a succession plan, or some firms might be dealing with creating a team. In this industry, you're going to find that those kind of problem sets show up over and over.
What is different each time is the skill and the capability of the team that I'm working with. So there are some advisors and some people in this business that are much more self-aware and willing to change. And then I'm sure as you guys have seen, there are ones that are a bit more stubborn…
Kurt Dupuis:
Yep.
Michael Futterman:
…I think is probably the most PC way to say it. So this is where coachulting becomes important. I can share what I do, segment this, differentiate this way, be a better team leader, but how you do that is going to be designed around the client and where they are. So we want to push hard enough, but not too hard. Another way to think about it is the batting cage. I haven't swung a bat since Little League. You put me in a batting cage, I'm looking for the slowest pitch. But there are other people that they've been swinging a bat for a long time. They're going to be able to withstand the pressure of that Major League sort of speed in the batting cage. We want to find that right area.
Kurt Dupuis:
I'm totally stealing coachulting because we've asked people, "What is coaching? What is consulting? What's the difference?" You describe it very beautifully, but also...
Michael Futterman:
Thank you.
Kurt Dupuis:
... combining them as a concept.
Michael Futterman:
Well, what I find, let me break in on that.
Kurt Dupuis:
Yeah.
Michael Futterman:
If I just sit there and... Pure coaching is just asking questions.
Kurt Dupuis:
Right.
Michael Futterman:
Right? If you go and look up coaching or you look at the ICF model or these other models, they say, "Don't ever tell your client what to do. Don't ever offer a solution." And I think that dogmatically, that doesn't work. If I sit, and I've had this experience where I sit with an advisor and I keep asking them. I learned this earlier in my career, fortunately. If you just keep asking questions and you don't provide them with any options or solutions, they're going to get tired of you pretty quickly.
Kurt Dupuis:
Yeah. And without the tactical ideas to round that out, then you're just a psychologist, right?
Michael Futterman:
Right.
Kurt Dupuis:
You talk about using discomfort as a powerful motivator. So back to asking questions, I'm just imagining you asking a question and then just pausing in awkward discomfortable silence for half an hour before they respond. Is that what we're talking about here or something else?
Michael Futterman:
So I got a quick story about that. I had an advisor that I was working with out in California. And we were talking about client experience events. They said, "Well, I do a lot of client experience events. Let me tell you what I'm doing and do you think it's a good idea?" So we went through and he described a couple of them. And I said, "So are you able to work with clients and get introductions? Are you using these as prospecting events? Are you using these as just appreciation events? How are you using them?" They said, "Well, I'd love to get more prospects, but the events are too big, so I'm unable to." I said, "Well, do you have any smaller events? Do you ever do anything smaller?" And they said, "Oh, yeah. Well, I do this thing where I bring in our chief economist of the firm."
This guy was working at a wirehouse. I'm not going to tell you which one, but it was a big chief economist, you know the name of the person. And they said, "Do you think it's a good idea? Do you think that's a good prospecting event for me to have the chief economist come in?" And I said, "I don't know, do your clients want to hear from a chief economist?" And then I shut up. And they kind of looked at me, you know the RCA? The dog that cocks its head when it hears a high-pitch noise.
Kurt Dupuis:
Yeah.
Michael Futterman:
That was the look on the guy's face. He had never considered. And that's part of the coaching job is to ask questions that provoke thinking that's lateral.
Kurt Dupuis:
Thought. Yeah.
Michael Futterman:
So I love those coaching moments where I can ask the question and the client either says, "That's a great question." Because that means to me they haven't thought about it, or they've only been thinking about it in one way. And then waiting for them to come up with a solution or saying, "Okay, so let's brainstorm what are some solutions?" And letting them brainstorm and then letting them sit with that. Discomfort is very, very important. And there's powerful things with discomfort and there's also really powerful things with positive motivation. So I love both of them.
Steve Seid:
Do you coach financial professionals to do that with their team? Because I could imagine saying applying discomfort to make my team motivated to change in certain ways would be beneficial. I could also see that ended up being where they hate you.
Michael Futterman:
So I think very often that the person who's providing that discomfort, they can be inexpert in that. We've got these, this is a business that has big egos in it. And so the advisor who started as an entrepreneur and built their business and they feel a real sense of ownership, and I did it this way, so why can't you do it that way? And they feel that it's their way to do things. And we can get into some details about that. That often can be seen as being difficult or being kind of a jerk in the way that they do it. So my job as the coach is to help both the immediate client, if that's an individual, see that there's another way to think about things through that intentional discomfort, but also to help them bring that learning to the way that they manage their team. And there's varying levels of success with that.
So I want to go back to the negative motivation. So the science behind this, and I'm taking this from research that Andrew Huberman and some of the people that he's had on his podcast have talked about, is positive motivation. So praise and accolades and working towards things that are great that we want to do, positive motivation is great. So when we're excited to do something, do the thing, then we don't need to be hyped up as much. There's still benefit in doing it. So you don't need to get me excited about going out and going skiing or going for a bike ride or anything like that. What science says is that for things that you're motivated to do, five minutes of visualizing the outcome and the feeling of doing the thing is very helpful in getting started in motivation for that activity.
The challenge in terms of Type Two Fun is when you're not motivated to do the thing. So this is where negative or discomfort can be a very powerful motivator. So let's say it's doing the laundry, or prospecting calls is a great one. Even though I know I need to do it in my business, it's really challenging sometimes to get motivated to pick up the phone or write 10 more emails and try and get out to people and introduce myself.
So in those cases, visualizing the outcome is not going to be as helpful as visualizing failure. So when you're not motivated, really spending one to five minutes concentrating hard on the consequences of not doing the thing. How are you going to feel? What will not happen if you fail to do this thing? So I won't grow my business. I won't reach more clients. Maybe what will happen. Maybe you will start losing clients. You won't have as much revenue. There's a lot of evidence to show that by thinking about that thing, it can get you motivated to actually start to take action.
Steve Seid:
I heard you on a podcast and you mentioned something along the lines of it's really good for financial professionals to examine their beliefs because often they're focusing on things that in the grand scheme of things don't matter that much. Is that something that you see happen a lot in the industry?
Michael Futterman:
Absolutely. And it relates right back to that whole ego thing. That we all have. I don't want a single financial professionals out as any different than other human beings on the planet.
One of the things that comes up, and in particular for financial professionals is that time comes up as a consistent challenge. So this idea about beliefs relates back to how am I going to be able to spend the time on things that matter? And that becomes really important. So when we see something happening, we create meaning out of that thing. And it's almost always from incomplete data. And I'll give you a quick example.
I was speaking with an advisor who had over time increased the income of one of his partners. And this partner was not bringing in business. They were not a rainmaker. And they were really concerned about I've set this precedent, this person has increased their income because I've shared more production with them, and I don't know that I'm going to be able to keep doing this, they haven't brought in any clients. And I said, "That's interesting. Tell me about your business overall." And they said, "Well, my business has grown. We've brought in $150 million over the last two and a half years, but I haven't really seen a lot of that income."
And I said, "Let's break this down for a minute. You've brought in $150 million in AUM, but you're telling me that you haven't seen a lot of the increase in production from that." I said, "Tell me what else is going on in your business?" And they have somebody who's retiring, they're paying out a retiring FA. They might've had some other expenses. I said, "So let's step back from this for a moment. You're basing this belief in sort of an unsustainable business model with your partner because their income has increased and yours has not to the degree that you would expect it to with 150 million coming in the door." I said, "How are you able to go out and bring in 150 million in revenue?"
And what it really boiled down to is this other partner was the catalyst in allowing them to grow their business. They would've never been able to be spending the time on the street sourcing and prospecting that $150 million without the back office support from this other advisor.
And so when we went through this thought experiment, they very quickly realized that. They're like, "You know what? I'm so close to the business on a day-to-day basis that this perspective is super valuable." Is being able to step back is often really challenging when it comes to examining your beliefs is that day-to-day. It's almost like you come in and you expect certain things to be a certain way, but if your furniture is rearranged when you come into the office, it's going to make a huge impact on you. You can probably walk into your office with your eyes closed almost and sit down in the chair without having to look for anything. But that's because you become accustomed, it becomes part of the wallpaper, so to speak. And so helping clients to step back is important.
So the point is not whether the activity that is going on is valid or not. You have to examine, is it worth my time and energy to spend on this thing? And am I operating from a full set of data in order to make those decisions? The bottom line I think is that people need to step back and say, "Even though I believe this, I want to examine do I have the data to support that or is it my feelings that are driving that?"
And so a great book that I recommend to people is What Got You Here Won't Get You There. And that's by Marshall Goldsmith, who I hope I can achieve a fraction of his achievements. He doesn't work with anybody for less than a million dollars. The guy is just a monster in terms of the coaching world. And in that book, there are 20 habits, which we all do, which get in the way of our success, which might've been helpful before, but examining our beliefs about a certain situation is sort of at the core of that concept.
Kurt Dupuis:
One of my favorite mottos in life is strong opinions loosely held, right? There's no sacred cows, no view that can't be uprooted given new data.
Michael Futterman:
Yeah. Yeah.
Kurt Dupuis:
So you've got to educate us on something. We talked about this in the pre-call, and I already forgot what the definition was, but I remembered I had never heard of it before. But you talk about the concept of Wealth 3.0. I wasn't aware we were past 2.0 and I don't even know what 2.0 is. So can you explain that concept to us?
Michael Futterman:
Yeah, yeah. So I didn't know what it was, at least as a term to describe what I've been talking about with financial advisory businesses for more than 15 years. And to be very clear, the term is not mine. I didn't come up with this terminology. It's based on doctors James Grubman and Dennis Jaffe, and then they worked with a coach named Kristin Keffeler.
So my interest in this idea of Wealth 3.0 is that it's in the alignment of the idea that financial services has evolved from stockbroker to asset allocator to wealth manager to whatever we want to call what we do today what we do. And the progression is from more transactional work to more transformational work. Wealth 3.0 is really the shift from helping clients understand that money is a means to an end, not an end in itself. And what does money mean to your family? What are your guiding principles, the purpose and the choices?
So an example of this is the guy that inherits $50 million from the sale of a family business. And this is actually an anecdote from one of my clients who asked me, "Hey, I have this client, what do I do with them?" The client came to them and said, "My family business got sold. I don't have to ever work again. What do I do? I'm concerned about, I have young kids. I don't want my kids to see me lounging by the pool on a Tuesday morning. But now that I can do whatever I want, what do I want to do? And then furthermore, what are the values and purpose that I want to provide to my family?"
So the difference between Wealth 2.0 and Wealth 3.0 is that Wealth 2.0 was based on anxiety and fear. Fear that if we tell people about the wealth that we have and we don't hide it from them or keep it sort of locked up, then they're going to squander it. Wealth 3.0 is more about possibility. It's about understanding that we can do lots of amazing things with this. Let's look at what opportunities this provides to us. So education, family planning. And these are things, again, that have trickled down from those truly ultra wealthy families into what most advisors do today with financial planning and sort of trusts and estates and wills and education of the next generation and developing conversations with the next generation or even skip generations and teaching grandkids and young children about the value of money and how to invest. That's ultimately what Wealth 3.0 is about. It's about that positive outlook on what wealth can do for us and maybe for society as a whole.
Kurt Dupuis:
Another thing that we've talked about and around with several guests, and you have a unique take on it. It's referrals. Everyone's sort of solving for growth and everyone acquiesces that the easiest way to grow is get referrals from your existing client base. Okay, well, how do we go about doing that? So you talk about the need for, and I'm quoting, "a compelling catalyst."
Michael Futterman:
Yes.
Kurt Dupuis:
What are we talking about there?
Michael Futterman:
So let's get something out of the way first before we even talk about referrals. Some people say out there, don't do it. Don't ask for referrals. They should just come to you naturally.
Kurt Dupuis:
Yes. Two big camps.
Michael Futterman:
And there are others that are positive that is absolutely the best way to grow your business. And let me share with you my perspective is they both have well-reasoned positions on why they're right. And I'm not here to say to somebody you should absolutely ask for referrals.
Now, for those that do want to ask for referrals, I think one of the challenges here and relates back to this idea of compelling catalysts is that there is a sea of sameness in this industry. I think that that presents an enormous opportunity for businesses to differentiate themselves. So that's the start of compelling catalyst. Why should somebody choose to become a client of yours? Or if you're building a team, why should they become an employee of yours? I can work with anybody. So compelling catalyst has to answer that question, why would somebody choose to work with me? Or why should I go and partner up with this particular financial services firm?
And there's a lot of table stakes. We take care of our clients. We start with a integrated financial planning process. We serve the needs of divorcees. There are 50% of marriages end in divorce. That's not a niche, that's a tranche. That's a huge portion of the population. I work with women. That's 50% of the population. That's not differentiating. So it's important to start with that concept.
Now, moving onto the referrals piece. I think that advisors that choose to ask for referrals, they struggle with actually getting it done for two primary reasons. The first one is is they don't have a process that creates momentum for somebody to give you a referral. So let me talk about that a little bit.
The first step in creating a process for referrals is who do you ask? And so I talk a lot about segmentation. I really help people start to understand who do I want to replicate? If I want to replicate the divorced women that are entrepreneurial business owners with a business that has 10 million in revenue or less, that's more of a niche. If I want to work with, you've probably heard with DINKs, dual income, no kids. If I want to work with those people, how do I want to identify them in my book of business? Who are the people that I might want to replicate? Who have I currently helped? Who is currently giving me referrals? These are all areas of segmentation. So that's step one is understanding who do I really want to grow my business with and how do I want to start identifying those people?
The second step in creating a process is creating a moment of when you can ask. So building up that bucket of goodwill, building up that moment of when somebody feels really great about the work that you've done. Maybe that's after a review. Maybe it's when you've solved a problem for them. Maybe it's when they've just... Some people have said it's right after they onboard because right then they've made the decision. They feel good about making the decision. Why not start asking them right then, "Hey, what are some of the reasons why you made this decision? What made you choose us over other people?" And then how do you ask. So that's the third piece. So understanding who to ask, when do you do it, and having a process for that. And then how do you ask is the third piece.
So this is around scripting. And I often talk about Jerry Seinfeld here because he's been on record in a lot of different interviews where he says, "I write out all of my jokes.
Kurt Dupuis:
Yeah.
Michael Futterman:
I write them out on this yellow legal...
Kurt Dupuis:
I've seen him with all the notepads. Yeah.
Michael Futterman:
Yeah, with all the notepads, right? And he writes them down and he battle tests them and goes back and forth about where to add a pause or whether it's and or but. He's very, very specific about it. Kurt, where do you live?
Kurt Dupuis:
I'm in Atlanta.
Michael Futterman:
You're in Atlanta. If I come to Atlanta and I say, "Where's a good restaurant to eat?" You're probably thinking of a lot of restaurants.
Kurt Dupuis:
Yeah.
Michael Futterman:
Right?
Kurt Dupuis:
What part of town? What time of day? Yep.
Michael Futterman:
Hey, I want to eat at a great red sauce Italian restaurant or a classic French white tablecloth restaurant, or I want the best burger in Atlanta. I've narrowed your focus. So this is the other piece of the puzzle is that when we ask generally for referrals, it doesn't land. I got to think. I know a lot of people that might help you out, but be more specific with me. So being specific. And the idea here is that how you ask comes down to that scripting and familiarity because it leads to the second point, which is anxiety. So this is the belief scenario that we were talking about before.
And some of the beliefs that I've heard from advisors are my clients won't like it if I ask them for a referral. They feel like I'm asking them for something. I might look weak like I need the business, and so that doesn't work. Or I don't like it, it feels icky to me. I don't care if it feels icky to you. It feels icky to you because you want predictability. So let's be predictable about the things that you can control.
So build that process, run the process, and evaluate the process. And it all comes back to who do I want to grow my business with? What makes me unique? And what is the reason why somebody would choose to come and work with me? Those all fit into that compelling catalyst as it relates to this idea of asking for referrals.
Steve Seid:
So we're going to have to do a part two with you. So can you commit to us that you could do part two?
Michael Futterman:
Yes.
Steve Seid:
Because I do want to come in front of the person that just says, "No, I didn't like this at all. This is terrible." But really I have so many follow-up questions and paths and we have questions we didn't get to and awesome insights. Let's sum up where people can find you.
Michael Futterman:
Yeah, and I appreciate that. The easiest way for people to get to my website is www.michaelfutterman.com. And I'm sure that'll be published on the link to this. My URL is way too long. I still love the idea of Type Two Fun Consulting, but the URL is too long for me to spell it out here. I would invite people to take a look at that on my website. There is a link there if somebody wanted to have a complimentary coaching session with me. That is one of my ways to show people what it's like to work with me and I encourage people to sign up for that. And that's something that I am happy to do for your audience. And I want to tell the two of you guys, I really appreciate this. It's great to talk with people like the two of you who are so passionate about what you're doing and to ask good questions. That's part of the reason why I think this went well is that you guys are good coaches. You asked good questions to get me thinking about how do I explain this to the audience.
Steve Seid:
Thank you, Michael. Absolutely fantastic. Speaking of Jerry Seinfeld, we're going to transition to our Costanza Corner. This is The Whole Truth. Stick with us.
And welcome back to our Costanza Corner where we want to leave on a high note. And Kurt as we sit here at the end of 2023 as you all listen in the beginning of 2024, I think you have a message for the folks that I agree with.
Kurt Dupuis:
Well, I'm looking at our calendar and this is going to be the 69th episode that we've done. This is two and a half years. So the Costanza Corner is just thank you for another year of listening, putting up with us, submitting ideas, participating. The show exists for you and it wouldn't exist without you. So thanks for your participation and being part of this community.
Steve Seid:
Yeah, totally agree. Love the notes you send. We see the stats and man, people are listening to this thing, and what a great joy it is for us to be a part of building that and building the community and just be involved. This is just such a cool ride we're on. So with that, let's kick some butt in 2024, what do you think? Anyone listening? It's time. Get motivated, set a goal. Let's take a big step forward. That's my message.
Kurt Dupuis:
Let's do it.
Steve Seid:
Thanks everyone for listening. We'll see you next time.
Kurt Dupuis:
See you all.
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