The role of a financial advisor is, in large part, to help your clients solve problems. They come to you because they want to solve some pieces of their financial puzzle, and they believe you can help. This is an excellent example of “who, not how.” You cannot be all things to all people, and there are going to be times when you have problems to solve, or you’ll encounter other people’s issues that you cannot solve. And so often, the question is not, “How do I solve this problem?” The question is really, “Who do I leverage to solve this problem?”
This is the crux of Who Not How, a book by Dan Sullivan and Ben Hardy.
The Basics of “Who Not How”
The point of “Who Not How” is to stop spinning your wheels and expending time and energy to solve problems that aren’t within your wheelhouse. It’s WHY your clients come to you for help with life insurance and other products. They know they have problems to solve, and they probably HAVE tried to solve those problems alone, only to waste valuable time and energy. So instead of continuing to seek a specific solution, they find a person with a specialty.
No one is exempt from having problems to solve. We all have our own areas of expertise—or “zones of genius,” if you will—even within a field. It’s why joint work exists—cases with unique clients require cases with unique advisors.
The advantage of finding people instead of solutions is that you free up your calendar so you can stay in your lane. If you have to spend five meetings with a client convincing them of the value of whole life insurance, that’s a problem. Instead, if you can identify the right advisor to help with the case, you’ve closed the deal, freed up your schedule, and further solidified a working relationship. By seeking “who” instead of “how,” you make your life and your business so much more efficient.
How Do You Find Your “Who”?
The secret is simple—network and build community. You don’t know when you’ll need to call on someone for their expertise, so it’s a good idea to cast a wide net and build good relationships with many people. Going to events can be great for networking, or joining a community like the Prosperity Economics Advisors. You’ll get to meet a range of people with unique experiences.
You may think it’s all the same job, yet consider how many people there are in the world. You won’t be a right fit for every single one, however, you can be a good referral or candidate for joint work just by having connections.
Areas of expertise may include:
- High-net-worth clients
- College planning
- Clients of a specific field (firefighters, police officers, real estate investors, etc)
- Securities and equities
- Long-term care, disability insurance, or health insurance
- P/C or Liability insurance
- Estate planning
- Conceptual strategies
- Analytical strategies
- And more…
Where Do You Get Your Information?
It’s also good to identify a “who” for where you get your information. Many advisors in the industry are conceptual people, or are good salespeople, and have to work harder to get the “numbers” side of the business. The good news is, with Sullivan and Hardy’s method, you don’t have to be the numbers expert.
Truth Concepts, or Todd Langford, can be your “who” from an educational standpoint so that you can be confident in the information you’re getting. This can help you develop the basic skills needed and have a baseline to return to so you’re not trying to absorb too much, too often. That way, you can spend the majority of your time doing what you’re good at, and enjoy doing.
Still feel you need support with the numbers, the calculators, or something else? Hire an analytical thinker to learn the calculators and learn them well. Partner with advisors on cases who can do more calculator work. There are a lot of options when you consider who can help you with the problem, rather than trying to solve it yourself.
Come to a Training
Are you ready to implement the “who not how” method in your business? Let Todd, and Truth Training, be your “who” for numbers and analysis and attend Truth Training. Better yet, come to Truth Training to connect with other advisors who might be a resource for you in the future. You never know who you’ll meet, or how they could help you.
To learn how to advance your practice by leveraging technology to connect with your clients, read our article about AI in life insurance.