I've heard the same concern from so many firm owners:
"Developing new advisors is hard."
How do you balance mentoring a new advisor and your already busy schedule? How much technical training should come first? When should they start working with clients?
They're important questions, and everyone approaches them differently. But after going through four different training programs, I've started wondering if we sometimes overcomplicate the answer.
The Baptism by Fire Method
During my first week as an associate advisor, I was handed a 70-page client file.
Insurance policies, trusts, estate planning documents, account statements, tax information, and everything else you'd expect to find in a comprehensive financial planning case.
I was only given one instruction.
"Build a plan. We want to see how you think."
No guide, training, or shadowing.
I had just passed the Series 65... and I was overwhelmed, to say the least. I knew the technical concepts, but putting all of the pieces together in a real case felt foreign when I'd only ever read about it in textbooks.
Over the next several days, I worked through every document, connected the pieces together, identified planning opportunities, and built my first comprehensive financial plan. I popped into the advisor's office from time to time with questions, but for the most part I researched, thought through the problems, and figured things out on my own.
Once my plan was ready, I presented it to the advisor and explained my thinking. Then, we walked through the plan together. Section by section, he helped me understand where I was wrong, and how I could improve it.
I wasn't "ready" to put it all together and build a financial plan, but he trusted me to try.
Instead of watching someone else form recommendations, I was forming my own. Every gap in my knowledge became obvious. And because the work mattered, I wanted to fill those gaps as quickly as I could.
There's a big difference between studying financial planning and practicing financial planning. I don't think I fully appreciated that until this experience.
Responsibility Accelerates Growth
I'd spent years learning concepts and theories. Reading textbooks, talking through case studies, and learning different planning strategies.
But there was something completely different about applying those concepts to a real family's situation. That's when everything started clicking for me.
The technical foundation is necessary, but it isn't enough to make a great advisor. At some point, you have to stop reading about financial planning and actually do financial planning.
You can have a new advisor shadow meetings for months. They will eventually pick things up.
But I don't think they'll learn nearly as much as they will by owning a piece of the work themselves.
When you're responsible for putting together recommendations, suddenly the case becomes real. You start thinking differently because the work matters in a real way. The concepts stop being words on a page, and become decisions that affect someone's life.
Trust Doesn't Mean Throwing Someone Into the Fire Alone
This experience also changed how I think about mentorship.
When I was trusted to work on a real case, it felt a bit like I was thrown into the fire. But the support and mentorship were always there if I needed them, they just weren't holding my hand through every step.
My plan wasn't accepted without feedback. It was reviewed, challenged, discussed, and improved by experienced advisors.
That's what made the process so valuable. I had the opportunity to succeed... and the opportunity to fail.
And either way, I had someone there to teach me.
The first step is to trust the person with real client work. The second step is to step in and mentor them when they get it wrong.
A Thought for Firm Leaders
I don't know what the perfect advisor training program looks like.
I've only been in the industry for a few years, so I'm certainly not claiming to have all the answers.
But I do know this.
Being trusted with real work accelerated my learning more than any other training I have had.
It makes me wonder if, sometimes, we're so focused on making sure new advisors don't make mistakes that we accidentally delay the experiences that help them grow the fastest.
Maybe the key to training advisors is giving them responsibility early on, while making sure someone is there to teach them along the way.
Because sometimes, the best way to build confidence is to trust someone before they have it themselves.