Today on Financial Advisor Success, I’m excited to host Dr. Carolyn McClanahan of Life Planning Partners. Carolyn is a physician and financial planner based out of Jacksonville, Florida, where her truly holistic ensemble practice works with 80 clients and maintains more than $1 million a year of stable recurring income.

In this episode, Carolyn lays out the infrastructure & beliefs of her firm and shares the client standards document that ensures she only works with considerate, responsive, all-around awesome clients.

Carolyn also talks about how she adjusts her complexity-based fee for each client, why she doesn’t want to grow beyond 100 client families, the hard lessons she learned about hiring, and the parallels she sees between medicine and financial planning. We wrap up with a discussion of her new company that plans to make it easier for financial planners to navigate working with aging clients to ensure their long term financial stability.

Get the full show notes and transcript for this episode at: https://www.kitces.com/9

David Grau Sr. talks about how he helped start a business at the wholly unique intersection of financial services, technology, and consulting that is FP Transitions’ bread and butter. 

We also discuss the four sectors that David and his team break the industry into - books, practices, businesses, and firms - and the critical differences between them. David also shares his potentially controversial (or at least counterintuitive) perspective on compensation, which by now is an industry standard. (We’d love to hear your thoughts on this!)

Get the full show notes and transcript for this episode at: https://www.kitces.com/8 

In this episode, Matt talks about how he transformed a stagnant firm into a profitable lifestyle practice with the help of his father Nathaniel (the founder of Jarvis) and his two excellent office staff. He outlines the business’ metrics, service model, and the infrastructure he’s built to ensure his clients get excellent service even if he’s not in the office.

We also talk about industry criticism of lifestyle practices and the heavy investment Matt and his team have made in the technology that keeps the business running. He discusses the future of the practice and the factors he weighs when considering new clients, including potentially spending less time with his family.

Get the full show notes and transcript for this episode at: https://www.kitces.com/7

Eleanor Blayney talks about the challenges of growing an independent RIA in a male dominated industry. She was one of the founding partners of Sullivan, Bruyette, Speros & Blayney. The firm grew to a billion dollars in AUM before it was sold to Harris Bank in 2003. She focuses on serving the needs of women - both as clients and as advisors in the profession.

Get the full show notes and transcript for this episode at: https://www.kitces.com/6