Supernova Advisor Teams

Strengthen and unify your Financial Advisor Team

Teams are the principle building blocks of the strategy of successful organizations. The focus of your organization may be on service, quality, cost, value, speed, efficiency, performance, or any other similar goals, but teams remain the central methodology of most organizations across sectors.

Vertical teams and horizontal teams can transcend organizational silos and boundaries if properly focused and supported. Building collaborative teams can improve the client experience. In Supernova Teams: Effective Team Strategies for Financial Advisors, you’ll discover the macro rationale and justification for teams, as well as the micro benefits of team formation.

• Boost your team’s effectiveness

• Discover different leadership styles

• Write winning team vision statements

• Get familiar with communication strategies

From on-boarding a new team member to finding effective ways to bolster the ones you already have, this book shows you how to turn any team into a cohesive, productive unit with like-minded goals.

Foreword vii

Preface xi

Acknowledgments xv

Introduction: Why Form a Team? xvii

Chapter 1 Stepping Outside of Your Comfort Zone 1

Chapter 2 Distinct Types of Teams 11

Chapter 3 Team Effectiveness 23

Chapter 4 Leadership Styles/Leading the Team 33

Chapter 5 Establishing a Vision, Mission Statement, Value Proposition, and Elevator Pitch 43

Chapter 6 Operationalizing the Five Star Model 61

Chapter 7 Team Collaboration 73

Chapter 8 Shock Trauma Surgery Teams: A Compare and Contrast View 87

Chapter 9 Team Contract and Agreement 99

Chapter 10 The Key Drivers of Your Business, Forecasting Growth, and Building Your Business Plan 111

Chapter 11 Recruiting, Hiring, and Retaining Good People 123

Chapter 12 Onboarding and Mentoring a New Team Member 139

Chapter 13 Team Dysfunction: The Elephant in the Room 149

Chapter 14 The Leader/Manager Role in Building and Coaching Teams 161

Chapter 15 Wealth Management in the Digital Age 173

Chapter 16 Diverse Teams and Niche Markets 185

Chapter 17 Team Summary 199

Index 211

CURTIS C. BROWN, JR. is a Practice Management consultant with Supernova ­Consulting. Previously, he spent 30 years with Merrill Lynch in a variety of leadership positions, including National Sales Manager, Regional Director, and Special Assistant to the Chairman and President.

ROBERT KNAPP is the architect of the Supernova model he developed with a team of financial advisors and leaders at Merrill Lynch. He created Supernova Consulting Group, LLC. with the purpose of improving the client experience worldwide. Previously, he was Managing Director of Merrill Lynch where he worked for 34 years.

Teams are the cornerstones and the principal building blocks of any successful organization. While the focus of your organization may be on service, quality, cost, value, speed, efficiency, or performance, it is the creation of great teams that remains the winning approach of most organizations across industries including financial services. Supernova Advisor Teams clearly shows how vertical and horizontal teams can transcend organizational silos and boundaries once they are properly focused and supported.

The authors outline the Supernova model that has a proven track record of building collaborative teams that are effective in helping financial services’ organizations meet their goals. Supernova Advisor Teams outlines the factors that determine if a team will be successful. Great teams that serve have a unifying vision, a business plan with a delegation of duties and responsibilities for each team member, and they must have a working agenda as they approach each day. Excellent teams schedule communication strategies and performance is measured weekly, and they deal head-on with common failures and dysfunctions. In addition, successful teams are well-coached teams.

Supernova Advisor Teams explores a wealth of topics in-depth including what it takes to rampup a financial services’ team’s effectiveness, which leadership style is best for a particular team, and how to create a targeted vision statement. The authors also explain how to develop team communication strategies and what it takes to onboard a new member on a team. In addition, the book offers suggestions for the manager becoming the coach of a team and how to best use digital tools to enhance a team’s success.

With Supernova Advisor Teams as your guide, you will be able to form well-functioning teams that will improve your organization’s productivity, boost your clients’ experience, as well as enhance your overall teams’ satisfaction.