For Advisors By Advisors - AI, Independence & The Future of Advice - The Standard Deviance

FABA is back — and we brought a (potential) co-host.

In this Season 3 kickoff of For Advisors By Advisors, host Evan J. Mayer sits down with longtime friend and fellow advisor Scott Brown of Edgewater Family Wealth for an unfiltered, "in-the-trenches" conversation between two advisors who've seen it all — the wins, the mistakes, the home-office headaches, and everything in between.

This one we're calling a "Standard Deviance" episode — less polished, more honest, and built for advisors who are tired of the same recycled industry talking points.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Yeah, F A C A four device divides by Evan J mayor with a real talk business, no filters, no flavors, how they structure their practice, how they build a team, independent route or employment chain, talk platforms, payouts, culture, and growth. What really works when you out there on the road local devices being straight. Real conversations from the people who relate to the podcast. Four advisors by advisors.

SPEAKER_02 0:24

This is Ford Advisors by Advisors. I'm your host, Evan J. Mayer, and today we have a very special, special guest, which will be eventually a potential co-host, Mr. Scott Brown.

SPEAKER_01 0:39

Am I being auditioned? Is that what's happening?

SPEAKER_02 0:42

I think so. We'll see how many views we get. Oh goodness. And we'll chop up the wallet share. Um good to see you as well. Uh we we actually talked a lot about this podcast and kind of the thoughts. You know, we we stopped recording it about a year and a half ago, and then I think I ran into you at a conference. I mean, you were like, you know, why don't we bring that back and why not why don't I join it? I was like, that sounds like a great idea. Let's cut let's come up with some ideas. And then between going to different conferences, advisors were walking up to me saying, How come you don't do that anymore? I love that podcast. And you know, honestly, I never tried to get a bunch of subscribers because it wasn't a financial thing for me. And so I never promoted it really. I just kind of put it out there and like whoever got to enjoy it got to enjoy it. And I said, Maybe there's a lot more people listening to this than we thought prior. So here we are.

SPEAKER_01 1:33

Yeah, I well, I was I was a fan. I mean, you had me on pretty early in the game, and then you went moved on to more prominent spectacular guests after me. But um, yeah, I I think that this audience is lacking, I don't, I don't really know what to call the voice, but a more a less polished, a certainly I fall in that category, a less uh, you know, uh a more forthright voice to, you know, who somebody for two guys that are in the trenches every single day, um, who have done a lot of different things, a lot of them good, some of them not so good. In in both our cases now, helped I think mentor and raise some pretty good advisors that are now in both of our systems. We've seen mistakes that people have made. We've been advisors who've had complaints with home office, we've been advisors who have had issues with products, we've been advisors who made mistakes with clients uh that we would prefer not to repeat. So I think a less stodgy uh as per the getup uh approach to this is needed. And I think you were filling that void for the most part, and I've kind of intruded on your gospel.

SPEAKER_02 2:44

No, it wasn't intruding, it was actually great. It was I I think it was you that said like Michael Kitzis brought out like the top 10 or 20 best podcasts for financial advisors, and like you listen to probably half of them, and you're like, no, this has nothing to do with our our business the way it should be represented. So uh I couldn't I couldn't agree with you more. Thanks for coming back on. And uh, I have some ideas around doing some interview styles with you. So the next one up actually is is Paul. So that would be funny to have you in.

SPEAKER_01 3:13

But oh, but you're gonna see country, you're gonna see contrasting styles there. He'll probably be in a three-piece suit or something.

SPEAKER_02 3:18

He was always in a suit. We were at our national sales, well, I will call it a national event. It was purely AI focus, a lot of AI focus, which was great because I've I've I did come back with some really cool ideas, which which I rarely go to meetings and come back with cool ideas, but this one was. And Paul, I had two meetings with him, and both times he was wearing a suit. Actually, three we had a dinner too, and he was wearing a suit there, too. So yeah, he is definitely uh that you guys do contrast. He's got to put that hat on with the suit. That'd be good.

SPEAKER_01 3:45

I got I don't think you could pay him enough to put this hat on. And for people who don't know, Paul is my longtime business partner and certainly the more handsome, thoughtful of the two of us.

SPEAKER_02 3:56

Yeah, and just to plug that uh podcast is gonna be more about recruitment and building offices and some thoughts around that. He loves that part. You don't love that part as much. Uh, and so you love taking care of clients, and I think that's uh a huge thing. I did want to just touch base a little bit on Ray J stuff. That's cool, because why not talk about stuff that we we got involved in? I was just in Elevate in Las Vegas, I don't think you could make it. Really cool then. I went to see the Wizard of Oz, the sphere at the Wizard of Oz, which was like, you know, absolutely amazing. The one thing I took away from this is ways to use AI. And we just started using, just got access to Copilot, the advanced co-pilot that actually connects with ChatGPT and Claude. And you can go in there and create amazing things, uh, reports for clients. Um, we just developed something where normally I send out the birthday emails uh every morning. I kind of wake up, see whose clients' birthdays it is, and send it send them an email. This is created the emails and are automatically systematically sending them out at eight o'clock every morning for me now. So it literally took care of that. Uh, my question to you is like, I am really just getting started with it, but I am mesmerized by it, and it's been a life-changing. I started using ChatGPT probably two years ago, uh, not for client stuff, just for you know, regular useful needs. And then I got into grok and kind of making videos a little bit and and now songs. Well, have you done anything yet with AI, with the business? Have you have you gone down that path yet?

SPEAKER_01 5:25

Yeah, so like you, I used it for everyday things like uh, you know, just curiosities more than anything else in the beginning. But um, for those that don't know, I do radio once a week. I write a column every month for a local paper. And while I I refuse to allow AI to write my column, and obviously it can't do radio for me, what it's done is it has allowed me to expedite the research process. In other words, if I think I want to talk about home ownership or I want to talk about stock ownership or historic market trends or anything that requires data, historically I'd have to set aside an entire day and start digging around, reading up, Google search this, call look at that book, whatever. And now I can, because I'll remember, well, I read in Warren Buffett's book, or I read in Charlie Munger's book, or I read in Benjamin Graham's book this thing. And instead of me having to go through my library of books, which as you know, I'm an avid reader and I do actually have one of those. Now I just go to, in my case, the advanced version of Chat GPT, and I say, find the quote by Jason Zwag, or find the whatever. So for me, it's been an expediter there on the money management side. It's been huge because again, everybody doesn't know me, obviously, but I we manage money in-house. I have a CFA on staff, and what it's done for him is allowed him to code a lot more quickly. So he's a coder by trade. So in addition to being a CFA, he's also a coder, which is a really, really smart guy. Really smart guy, way smarter than me, which is why I hired him. And he uses AI to do most of the front-end coding in order to put together algorithms to you know uh we weed through stocks and such.

SPEAKER_02 7:10

Yeah, it's pretty uh it's it's pretty amazing. We're using it and we're connecting it with fact set, with real-time data, upgrades and downgrades, and kind of you know, getting that data instantaneously. Also, like what stocks are moving the most and why they're moving the most, and you can actually add that into the algorithm. So it's really, I mean, it's I I think it's gonna change our business. I heard on a podcast somebody say it's gonna take over financial advisors, and it everybody believes that their position is an emotional connection position that won't be challenged. I believe that for us, I do believe, you know, especially clients, I don't know about your clients, but my clients are in their, you know, average age is probably 65. So I have clients in their 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s. I also have clients in their 20s, 30s, and they do want, even though ChatGPT might be able to give them the advice that they're looking for, they want to run that by somebody. They do want that emotional connection. Uh, I've seen that, you know, from even clients that go, you know, I use some of this AI stuff, but I still want to hear from you, Evan. Like, like at the end of the day, you know, I trust you and and and I know you're gonna lead me right. Are you uh experiencing the same thing with your clients?

SPEAKER_01 8:17

I I'm actually excited about AI. I'm not even a little bit, maybe I'm naive and that may prove to be true in a decade or so, but I I don't think so. I'm excited about what we're able to use it to do to enhance the client experience. In fact, I I created, I along with a PhD I know on behavioral economics, I created an anagram, I think they call them in anagrams, um, that actually does it like a little personality test. And we've been able to take the data from all of those personality tests, which is geared towards financial planning. It kind of tells a person you might react poorly in this situation, you might underreact in this situation. We were able to compile all this data from all these people that have taken this personality test and put it into Claude, because my junior likes to use Claude, and it was able to give us all kinds of data, anonymous data on the book as a composite. And what it told us was you you tend to do well with these people who have this personality type. The trouble you're having with those people is based on these uh results, I suppose. These answers lead one to believe this. And it's been really eye-opening for me to see the type of people that gravitate towards my message and my team's message. I 100% think AI for the thoughtful, creative, for you know, forward-thinking advisor is gonna be awesome. Now, if you suck, I mean, you know, if you're selling product and calling it a day, you're toast. You're completely toast.

SPEAKER_02 9:47

You are toast. I think that part of the business is is done. It's funny uh you you have a lot of members on your team. Some are those older advisors that you know are doing that, some are the younger, you know, generation. I always say the younger generation because the younger generation always thinks outside the box a little more. And it's funny as you get older, as you get older, you kind of need them around to go, oh, yeah, yeah, that's that's that I should be thinking that way, um, which is which is a good thing. Um, I I had a question regarding Elevate for you. So I went to Elevate. Um, and and for those that don't know, uh RJ on the independent side, Raymond James on the independent side does this conference called Elevate, and it's phenomenal. It's it's uh, you know, you go if you want to go, kind of an event, um, a lot of learning. You know, they had Jay Leno, who was who was interesting, he was funny, looked a little looked, looked like he took a little Ozepic, though. Uh, he had a little Ozepic face going on on stage. But, you know, it was a great, great event. And I took away this AI stuff. And, you know, some of the the conference parts are phenomenal. Like what I really love about them is just engaging with other advisors, right? Like, hopefully, you know, I asked if you were there, I knew you weren't gonna be there. I knew I was talking to Paul. I knew I knew probably 50 to 100 different advisors that I wanted to make contact with that I knew were were gonna be there. It's such a great part of that. There are aspects that stink that, you know, like um there were and I don't want to say stink, but um, you know, they do this gala at the at the end, and it's you know, some cover band or something. And like I'm a few years ago, there were that they had this thing in Nashville, it was like a singer-songwriter thing where they all sat on uh stool. I don't know if you were there for that one, but it was really awesome because it was like the Red Solo Cup singer was doing his thing. So sure so I left that going, like that was the bet the greatest conference. Like, when when can they ever beat that? For you, if you were developing a conference, and I have not been to Future Proof, I don't know if you've had the opportunity to go, but I hear that's kind of outstanding. If you were creating a conference for advisors, what would what would it look like? What would you be adding to it? What would you be taking away from from those kind of events?

SPEAKER_01 11:47

So uh I I'm gonna semi-answer your question, I think. So I did not go to Elevate, and and less and less do I go to Elevate. And it's not because it's not a phenomenal event and very well put together. And like you, I gravitate towards the advisor presentations where I know, oh man, I know this gal, she's badass at this thing. I'm gonna go sit front and row. I might be even doing more production than many of them, but that doesn't mean in fact, that that has no effect on me. I want to go learn what they know about. Um, so I like that part. But what I've done personally is I'm kind of shy, not that I wouldn't go to elevate, I still go from time to time. And I certainly think for young advisors it's a no-brainer because there's just so much to absorb. Now I've been in the business 40 years, so I've been to a lot of elevates. Um, and so for me, the gala and all that kind of stuff has lost its luster. I think if you're a young person and you're progressing through your various clubs and things like that, absolutely you should go and enjoy the benefits of your success. For me, I have spent the last 10 years or so accumulating very successful advisor friends. And what we do is we do side events. So um I'm in a group called the ALPG. Um, that group meets once a year at various spots throughout the world, and we spend three days together. There are 16 of us, uh, many of which are way, way, way more successful than I'll ever be. Um and we play a little bit of golf, we have a couple of drinks, but when we have dinner, it's it's almost one-on-one. There's three or four of us in a little group, uh, and that changes from night to night. So for me, if you're gonna go to an elevator, you know, a big conference like that, no matter who your broker dealer is, find people who are like-minded. Find people who are, I would argue, find people who are 20% better than you. And then the next year, find somebody else who's 20% better than you and start to form your own little clicks where listen, we can all go to the wholesaler steak dinner. There's a plenty of time for that, although I haven't been to one in 20 years, right? Sure. There's plenty of time for you to go eat the guy's steak and have him bug the crap out of you for the next eight months. What you should be doing is reaching out to an advisor across town who you admire, who's kicking your ass, and saying, Hey, Evan, would you mind going to dinner with me? Can we get a couple of three other guys together or gals and go to dinner and just talk shop? I think that is so much more valuable than sitting through in an arena with 300, 500, 3,000 advisors and hearing generic commentary about how you can be successful in things like that. Again, those things have their place. I'm not poo-pooing. I was all into it as a young man, uh, self-improvement, but I'm telling you, you that's the point. The point I'm describing is where you want to get to.

SPEAKER_02 14:42

I'm under full agreement with you. I I look for those one-on-one meetings when I'm at these places. But I mean, uh, you know, full disclosure, you get a free trip to Vegas or a free trip somewhere. I normally latch it on with my wife. We extend a few days and we make a good trip out of it, and and and and we show face to make sure we get invited back, uh, for sure. Uh and then occasionally you pull you pull some great stuff out. So I think there's there's obviously positives to to to to both. I uh I think there's ways to make these conferences even better um and and highlight that. It's funny we're we're on the advisory council, and that's the one thing we're not necessarily talking about is like how do how can we make Elevate like significantly better? Um, but I think there's a couple people that like running that show and they have it the way they like it, and and it is what it is. So um I want I did want to talk about family and the business. So your son works for you. It's actually um I met him before I met you. Uh he got matched up with us in a golf golf event and could really drive the ball, and we were pretty outstanding to have him as a partner and uh drove with him that day, and it was great. Uh, my daughter is entering the business. Now, there are a lot of uh when I say entering the business, let me be very clear. She's 15 years old. This is all she's ever talked about, this is what she wants to do, so on. Now that could change in three years, and we'll and we'll find out. But I I see when when I talk to other advisors, some want their kids working with them right away because at the end of the day, they're gonna learn the best process, what they think is what is the best process. And so it why send them somewhere else for a year or two? Some advisors are like, no, I don't want them here. I want them learning from somebody else, I want them engaged in that time. I've always been a little reluctant to hire those kind of people because I know eventually they're going to leave. So, like, why sit here and spend two years or three years teaching somebody else's kid uh how to do the business and then for them to go and and take all the great ideas, which is fine. I don't care if they take the ideas, but but but but then not you know leverage them. What did you do with your son? Did you bring him in right away? Did you, you know, did part of if you if you didn't, did part of you want to send him out? I I don't agree with the whole send out thing. I don't understand it. Um I I could understand if you can't afford him. Like your your business is too small, but for you, your business is big enough. My business is going to be big enough uh by the time she joins. What are your thoughts there?

SPEAKER_01 16:52

I don't necessarily think I'm disagreeing with you, but I did go the other route first. So my son wanted nothing to do with the business. He probably told you this story, but he was a musician, he made fun of his old man for uh many, many years. I think at some point he he at 23 or 24, he looked around and said, huh, this this rock and roll business ain't working so great. And the old man's not that bright, and he seems to do pretty good. So let me let me check into this. So, with that understood, he got a regular job. He went and got a job somewhere working for audiovisual people who do conferences like much like Elevate. Um, he did that for about a year because I wanted him and I didn't tell him what to do, I just said go get a job. And so he did, and I wanted him to see because our business can be somewhat bubbly, meaning if you're not in our business, you know, we we have it pretty good. You know, I poured concrete for two summers, I tarred roofs, um, I bagged groceries, I unloaded trucks. He I wanted to make sure he felt what that is, and not and and those are uh amazing professions. I could have kept doing it, although I think my body would have given out at some point. Um, but I wanted him to have that same experience after that year. Um, I have a buddy across town who's with LPL. I said, Look, man, I want him to go see uh what you do. I want him to see different before he comes here. And I'm not disparaging my buddy by any stretch, but he does business entirely differently than I do. And after about six months, my son's like, All right, I don't want to do it this way, Dad. I kind of know how you do it. I'm like, fine, come on back. Now I funded that. I actually paid my buddy to pay my son, right? Conversely, I had another buddy across town who sent his son to me for six months to do the same thing. And I knew, I knew the entire time he was gonna leave. Um the guy was a pal, the kid was great. I would have kept him forever if I could have. But I have no qualms with doing that because, first of all, the things that you and I do that people are worried, well, they'll take my secrets, or they'll listen. First of all, there ain't no secrets. What they learn is you gotta bust your ass and you gotta work hard and you gotta take care of people, and you gotta give a shit. I can cuss on this one, right? Yep. I mean, you really gotta give a shit, and you gotta put your heart and soul into it. You can steal that all you want, but if you don't do it, it doesn't do you any good. There's no secret sauce in the sauce.

SPEAKER_02 19:19

So I you like sending you you you you believe that's a better model for them to see what they have versus what they don't have.

SPEAKER_01 19:28

I kind of I think it's I think it depends on the kid or the young person. You know, Paul, who you're gonna have on, will tell you an entirely different story. His daughters both came right on board, and they they're they're fabulous. So I don't think it's a one size fits all.

SPEAKER_02 19:41

You know what is it also interesting is I have some young guys here, and I I constantly tell them, like, you know, you don't know what it's like out there versus here, and and and and they can't see the difference, and that kind of scares me too, because down the road I'm like, you know, if they think the grass is greener on the other side, they haven't been to that other side and we have, right? So it's uh it's a it's a hard part of hiring younger people is is deciding, you know, do I keep them here? Do I, you know, how do how do I keep them engaged with what we have, you know, currently going on.

SPEAKER_01 20:13

Um I I I have a young advisor, and he's been with me forever, and I'll tell a story on him. Is one time I was getting on him about the hours he was keeping, I didn't think he was keeping enough of them. And we were standing in uh uh in my top floor of my building, which has all glass floor to ceiling, and he and it's Florida, it's August, it's like 98 degrees with a zillion percent humidity, and he says to me, Well, you just don't realize how hard I work. So I looked out the window and I pointed at four guys on a roof, yeah, and I said, No, you have no idea what hard work is. That is hard work. So, yes, there is a little bit of hard work, uh, a little lack of understanding sometimes.

SPEAKER_02 20:57

Um, this is this is a qu an interesting question that I have for you. And and and and and I think people probably have different means. Now, you've been you've been in the the Raymond James ecosystem for how many years?

SPEAKER_01 21:09

Uh 26 years.

SPEAKER_02 21:11

So, what I notice about advisors today that are going independent, and I was I I was very similar to these advisors, is they wanted to brand under a different name. They want to use Raymond, you know, Raymond James is a big name, obviously, for for recruitment purposes or bringing clients on. It's got a stable name behind it. But at the end of the day, they like to create their own website name. Their email addresses are different. Like my email address is Evanet420wealth. Um, I branded. But what I've noticed is there's a lot of advisors that are on the independent channel here that have been here for years, uh, that that use the Raymond James email address and they and they primarily promote Raymond James as the brand they are. Why do you think that is? Is it just a comfortability level of hey, I've been independent for all these years and I know I'm independent, so why have to show? a a different brand, or is is there another rational reason why that is?

SPEAKER_01 22:05

I think you would, if somebody were to debate me on this, and many have, um I they'd be hard pressed to prove to me why they're doing that. Um and again, to your point, Raymond James is, in my mind, the by far and away the best broker dealer on the street for a variety of reasons. They're not perfect. Certainly, but but they there there certainly is value in teaming with Raymond James. Having said that, I think a lot of them are insecure. I think they're insecure about what their brand, whatever they call themselves would be. I don't think they're thinking about the future where they may or may not want to go somewhere else. I think they also just overvalue brand in this day and age of spec like 20 years ago I could almost you know if you want it to be Merrill Lynch or Morgan Stanley, I kind of get it. Today that's ridiculous. It's it's preposterous to think that that brand means anything to anybody.

SPEAKER_02 22:57

So when you promote yourself, do you go around like if somebody says hey you know what do you do for a living? Who do you work for? What's your answer to that?

SPEAKER_01 23:05

Um I say I have a little boutique investment firm over in College Park in Orlando and we cater to uh wealthy individuals and helping them you know do what they do, good get where they're going.

SPEAKER_02 23:16

What firm are you with, Scott?

SPEAKER_01 23:18

I'm with Edgewater Family Wealth.

SPEAKER_02 23:20

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 23:21

So you promote yourself individually uh when when 100% of the time every all the sh we do summer shirts for our clients I mean that we got people all over central Florida going to the beach in Edgewater Family Wealth.

SPEAKER_02 23:32

So so I do this too. So that I guess my question was was when I and again I'm not saying you but I see other people that just love like they'll call themselves that name but but but the advertisement is Raymond James. And I'm wondering why now now you're right there there was some insecurity on my behalf because I came from a bank and I wanted people to know that we're different that this is that we're that we're that we are fully independent. We make our advice independently for our clients while our broker dealer is Raymond James for you know tools and technologies and safekeeping and SIPC and you know custody services uh we want that partnership and we want a strong partnership we've always liked to talk you know say our name separately and I was just wondering why there are so many people on the Raymond Raymond James ecosystem that just like to use that name only and I don't I don't know what the answer is to it.

SPEAKER_01 24:22

Well and it's again I don't think it's necessarily detrimental in a day-to-day conversation or a client you know get a referral and they walk through the door calling yourself Raymond James. I don't I don't think it's a negative no um but I I I also don't think you build community so you know in my little community in Orlando uh where my primary practice is located I sponsor Jazz Fest. I sponsor a variety of community events at a variety of charities. Now if I called myself Raymond James that could apply somebody could walk up to the Raymond James guy three blocks down and go, I see you sponsor Jazz Fest and he'd probably go I don't remember doing that but cool. You know but if it's Edgewater family wealth everybody damn well knows who that is in the community. So that's that's my reason for doing it.

SPEAKER_02 25:09

Yeah absolutely and like I said I I I branded as the mayor group with Raymond James when I joined because I I was the mayor group with Suntra so I I kind of wanted that that and then about two years later three years later I said you know if I'm going to build a team of advisors some people don't necessarily want to operate under my last name right they want to they want they they they want a company name or a family name or or something that felt holistic for everybody. So um so we switched it to Fortuna wealth and it's been it's been great. Let's talk about your son your thoughts of the business. Now some advisors are never going to retire. They're the you know they'll they'll they'll retire at their desk they're you know it's becoming easier and easier with AI with the tools and technologies with Zoom with every you know thing to just keep doing the business and not work as hard as you once did when your business is where it's at and and doing what it's what it's doing. Do you have an exit plan? Do you you know you're you're older than me uh thanks for bringing it up not to spill the beans but I don't have this exit plan yet because I'm kind of waiting for my daughter and making sure she wants to do it and and if not down the road maybe maybe I sell I plan on being in business for 20 plus years. Sure. But is there an exit plan for you? Is there any have you put a time and a date stamp to it are you going to stick to it?

SPEAKER_01 26:30

Well there's not a drop dead date although if I drop dead that'll help things in terms of drop dead dates. No it as it stands right now I do have an exit plan. I do we're already executing on it. My son is actually has way more accounts than I do. Every new I don't take new clients at all. You know if there's a billionaire out there that wants to call me maybe I'll consider it but for the most part I don't take new clients and my son is a very skilled practitioner so I'm not worried about that. I am still doing a lot of behind the scenes stuff. I'm helping with marketing creative marketing is kind of my thing and I enjoy it. So I will do that for the foreseeable future and I have 65 clients that I'll probably hang on to for the next half a decade or more but the day to day the HR uh I still do a lot of that but over the next year and a half to three and a half years I'll be 65 in in three and a half years and at that point I probably will have nothing to do with the day to day of the business. I I've been doing this 40 years. It'll be 45 at that point. Not that that's you gotta stop just because of some arbitrary number but for me I work with the people I love I tell people say well how do you pick the client you're gonna work with is it assets I say no it's people if I would have lunch with them and they had no money with me that's the person the people I picked.