Hit the Ground Running: A Survival Guide for New Financial Advisors

Being a successful financial advisor is one of the greatest jobs you could ever imagine. You are your own boss. You can tailor the job to your interests. You can make a lot of money. You can see the results of your work almost immediately. If you structure your business correctly, you can control your work schedule to achieve a balanced lifestyle. And the financial marketplace is constantly changing, so no matter how long you work as a financial advisor, the job is never boring. 


However, becoming a successful financial advisor is tough. Most new financial advisors will either give up or be terminated within their first two or three years in business. Some will find a way to survive but always seem to struggle. However, some will succeed beyond their wildest dreams. Luck has something to do with success, but less than we want to admit. I will never forget the words of my first branch manager. He said, "Lucky things will happen, but you have to be around long enough for them to happen to you." To build a successful financial advisory practice, you have to travel along a well-worn learning curve. The sooner you can get further along that curve, the better. That is the goal of this book - to cram one advisor's first few years' worth of travel along the learning curve into an honest and enlightening resource for new financial advisors. 


Much of this text is opinion - but it is honest opinion based on experience and uncorrupted by any corporate or personal agendas. I have compiled (i.e., stolen) ideas from numerous successful advisors, rookies who have survived and built successful practices, rookies who have either been terminated or chosen to resign, brokerage firm managers, financial product reps, and corporate trainers. The questions that new financial advisors have are not new, but are often not addressed by any formal training program. I hope this book provides you with the perspective required to be a better decision maker and to avoid some of the most common pitfalls of financial advising. Armed with this knowledge, you can hit the ground running, fortified with the survival techniques necessary to enhance your chances of building a successful career as a financial advisor. 


Michael S. Nichols is a principal partner of Cutter Advisors Group, an independent financial advisory firm with offices in Missouri and Illinois. Dr. Nichols received his PhD in finance from Saint Louis University in 1993. He began his career as a financial advisor at Merrill Lynch in 1998. During his three and a half years at Merrill, Dr. Nichols also served as a mentor and trainer for new financial advisors. At the end of 2001, he left Merrill to create a partnership at Morgan Stanley, culminating in the creation of Cutter Advisors in 2004. Dr. Nichols has also served on the national Certified Financial Planner Board of Professional Review. Academically, he has accumulated more than 20 years of university-level teaching experience in finance and investments as both a full-time and adjunct professor and has served as a master's in business administration program director. He currently serves as an adjunct professor of finance at Saint Louis University and Maryville University.