For his practice, Adam Llewellyn Morse, CFP, a nine-year MDRT member from Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, hired a new staff member to serve as an office manager and free up Morse to focus on his role as an advisor. These are some of the attributes he sees as most important in hiring a manager in an advice-driven business:
- Passion for process improvement. “Question the status quo and look for new ways to do things.”
- Project management skills. “This ensures they can run their workflow and business improvement projects in a timely, efficient manner while assisting other team members.”
- The ability to be great with the team. “Others need to want to work with/for that person. We asked the person to come into the office and have lunch with the team and join a social event before we offered the role. This gave the team a good feel for the person.”
- Experience in the advice process. “We made this mistake once, and it was very evident. It is very hard for a manager to run an advice team and improve the advice processes and business if they do not have a very good understanding of what happens with clients. My suggestion is to find someone who has been in an advisor support role but wants their career to progress to management rather than delivering advice to clients.”
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Great article. Very useful tips