8 - Who Coaches Coach?

In this latest pile of TRAP, the chaps discuss

• Which coaches and external influences have had the most impact on our development as financial planners/people
• Business planning for the next 12 months: who does this and why?
• The Trap Pack answers questions from our beloved Trappists @gp_mantini and Ben F
• Culture Corner

Links referred to in the show:

• Artificial Intelligence: ChatGPT: Optimizing Language Models for Dialogue
• The Godfather, Mario Puzo: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Godfather-Mario-Puzo-ebook/dp/B009GJ870Q
• UK Tax App: Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.geekycoders.uktaxcalculators&hl=en_GB&gl=US
  Apple: https://.apps.apple.com/gb/app/uk-tax-calculators-2022-2023/id460977743

============================
Take part in the conversation! We want YOU to suggest topics and questions you’d like the Trap Pack to answer. The best way to do this is to ask them here.

Help us to help you! The more followers we have, the more we can do stuff going forward. So please:

• Subscribe and Like our YouTube Channel
• Leave a 6/5 star review on iTunes
• Share TRAP with your peers and colleagues
• 'Enjoy' the Twitter chat at @AdviserPodcast.

Transcript

Unknown: 0:07

Welcome to The Real advisor podcast, t r a p twerp. Please follow us and join in the conversation on Twitter at advisor podcast where you can suggest ideas and themes you'd like the truck team to discuss. Also remember to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel and leave a six out of five star review on iTunes. Doing all this really, really helps us which means we can do more to help you. Now let's head over to the studio for the latest pile of trash.

Nick Lincoln: 0:41

It's indeed the attackers. Welcome back to the latest pile of trap. My name is Nick Lincoln and joining me in the studio of doom as ever are the three other Horsemen of the Apocalypse. The trap back Khawaja out and smoke and Andy Hart Now gentlemen, we have a show full of absolutely nothing. So let's start unpacking it immediately. We had a we had a trap summit last week in in London at a gastropub on the edge of Regent's Park, the four of us and about eight other people 12 top people from the Financial Services profession. It was a very good day. Lots of very good CPD material. very constructive. I came out of it. I felt a better rounded person. Carl, what are your views on on our day in North London?

Carl Widger: 1:27

I definitely come out a little more rounded person, that's for sure. And I have to apologize that I left all my trap swag in Ireland Smith's apartment. That's all I have to say about that event.

Nick Lincoln: 1:41

Mr. Smith your microphone is is muted fella.

Alan Smith: 1:46

Amateurs here. You told me everything. Thank you very much Nick dick. I'm a student in in trap swag. I've got more hats than ribbon in trap than a hat shop. Yeah. Oh this one not not not to forget this. What we discussed last time. Let me know what it is. All right, sorry. Again.

Nick Lincoln: 2:07

Again for the listener we're with oh yeah, this is great, great audio stuff. We were showing the fantastically high quality plaques that I got for the for the trap pack which have got me nothing but grief as have the basement have also gotten

Alan Smith: 2:17

the mug. The mug is good though. To be fair, it looks nice. That looks like you have a competition. For the TRAPPIST listeners you can win your own trap mug or hat actually that the hats they could do.

Carl Widger: 2:28

The Jews were trying to gain listeners if at all.

Nick Lincoln: 2:33

So the World Cup is progressing on and England have beaten Senegal Haven't they? So they're facing. This is where the depth of my knowledge runs out. They're facing France or Holland next week. France, France, France on Saturday night I believe.

Andy Hart: 2:46

France tomorrow night. Yeah. Tomorrow night France.

Nick Lincoln: 2:49

But England and France tomorrow. By the time this goes out.

Andy Hart: 2:52

This show goes out on Friday, Nick.

Nick Lincoln: 2:56

Thank you, Andy. For midday. That is completely useless interjection which didn't help anybody. So let's crack on. topical stuff, a point you made last week and the FH last last episode you made this interjection which caused quite a bit of grief behind the scenes. Do you want to talk about DIY investors?

Andy Hart: 3:11

Yes, so following on from a presenter at my conference, where he said on stage in front of 300 financial advisors that on average DIY clients end up with better investment returns than advise clients. And this is something that I've always thought to be the case. So I thought I'd just unpack it a little bit now just to sort of clarify it. So there's DIY investors, people that just go into a investment platform and just pick some random funds. There's advised clients that get a financial advisor in their life and build them a portfolio and then I'd say there's a third option, you know, behavioral financial advice clients, literally the clients of our firms that get told the truth about money, which is slightly different. So I just unpack the first ones, the DIY investor, it's usually smaller accounts, usually younger people, they're just getting started out, they don't really have any expensive money questions. And they literally just throw some darts at the board that's got some various investment funds, usually equity funds, even individual shares. So the portfolios are not very appropriate, let's say but anyway, they do okay over time, just because they've thrown some darts at some equity funds and then just hopefully have stuck to it which is which is the challenge and then there's the advice client that goes to see a financial advisors very qualified financial adviser gets the individual to fill in a misconception mirror, that nickels a mumbo jumbo questionnaire and they end up with a portfolio of a multi asset mess, you know, multi asset it's easy to sell because it's you know, portrayed as it being well diversified. It is well diversified, but it's in the wrong assets. So it's almost a non starter from my world. So they end up with a portfolio, you know, got a shedload of bonds fixed income in it. So long term. It's arguable that the DIY investor will beat that portfolio from a purely investing point of view. The third option is going to see someone like ourselves the firm's that we run predominantly behavioral global equity firms, you know, where the financial advisory is focused, and obviously building the financial plan, ensuring that the client doesn't make any mistakes, you know, we're in their corner, when they become a client of ours, we say you never gonna make another financial mistake. Again, we build a portfolio that's predominantly got global equities in it, which we know is the real wealth creation engine long term. And we try and create a portfolio that the clients got as the maximum exposure to global equities that they can stick with in terms of the volatility and the fluctuation in price. And that's the third option. And as I say, the best portfolio the client that has is the one that they stick to, and this can change, you know, I've got clients now that a 90% 100% global equities, but when I first took them on many moons ago, they were 50% global equities, 60% global equities, and then they become calmer as this as the as a stuck with that portfolio not made the mistakes along the way. And then we nudged them up over time. Because that's, that's where we know the returns come from. So there's three options, there's the DIY client, slightly younger, throw some darts at the board, there's the advised client that gets multi asset portfolio, because that's the correct thing to do, according to the current, you know, financial investing dogma. And then there's the third option clients of our firms and many other firms out there that have sort of tried to unpack that whether real returns come from, and that's it, really. So I just thought I'd unpack that over to Carl.

Carl Widger: 6:30

Yeah, so I'll be bold enough to say that I was doing that through the choice out of the Paramus Mall. But over that last comment, and then we had a big argument in Trump. But look, that's the beauty, I suppose of this, this foursome in that, you know, we do push back on each other sometimes, just to pick up on one or two things that you said there. Look, I thanks for the clarification. First of all, I'm not sure you're being entirely fair, though, here. And I think saying that a multi asset and advised client who goes into a multi Asset Fund, typically, the multi asset funds are equities and bonds.

Andy Hart: 7:07

No, no, I think the default loads of other stuff, private equity, commodities, loads of stuff.

Carl Widger: 7:13

Well, the multi asset funds that I've seen, right, that's, that's, I suppose, inverted commas, diversified investing, where you've got like private equity, but I haven't seen private equity in many multi asset funds.

Andy Hart: 7:25

But anyway, there's loads and loads of stuff that turns off in them.

Carl Widger: 7:29

Okay, well, just bear with me. And if you don't mind, let me make the point. I think the difficulty array arises where people add complexity. So that's adding the likes of commodities and private equity. I don't think they're fit for purpose for the average investor. And I think most of the difficulty, in fact, arises when financial advisors start making changes to portfolios along the way, in reaction to what might be happening in markets. And we all know that the best solutions and outcomes for our clients are to invest in something that's fit for purpose at the outset. And just keep the client in their seats then going forward. So my understanding certainly of multi asset here in Ireland would be most of the vast majority of the multi asset funds have equities and bonds, yes, some of them may have absolute return funds, which are absolutely not, some have property, which I don't think is fit for purpose in a in a diversified portfolio. And that equally increased costs that's not required. So I just think, you know, investing in in, you know, equities and bonds, it's appropriate for your client, the vast majority of it in equities, that's where the solution is. Totally, totally. Look, I appreciate the clarification. But yeah, that's that's a that's

Andy Hart: 8:59

just a final point on that you diversify within the right asset class. So you have 1000s of companies in the in the in the global equity element, and you have 1000s of companies in the bond element. Yeah, a split between global equities and global bonds, well diversified. That's a great portfolio.

Carl Widger: 9:13

But all the all the other Gamson dimensional world allocation funds does,

Andy Hart: 9:17

which is many, many funds, but there are multi asset funds that have eight different asset classes in them and a whole load of mess that I don't want my clients getting anywhere near but the split between equities and bonds big fan.

Alan Smith: 9:59

I think you're both right. In this. I have come across I mean, I agree with your car, a diversified portfolio should you know there are simple asset classes that we should all be aware of and news from time to time. And I don't Well, I do know what it is. There's a love of complexity when we come across clients and don't want to be to sort of direct or opinionated too much early on in this conversation, particularly they are they come from the UK, you know the world of the day discretionary Portfolio Manager, fund manager, whatever you want to call them. And this seems to be we don't know, the power of a dark side. The most of these people are the ones I've met a very nice, honorable, intelligent, well intentioned, but they have a love of complexity. And so we we pick up clients from them from time to time. And, and you're right, Andy, it is just, it's like, Could we just make this fun, you've never heard of this funds, you know, we do have a bit of an x ray, a deep dive analysis. And as far as you can't, you can't find anywhere doesn't exist kind of offshore, you know, without, you know, lock up things, you know, complex hedge funds, structured notes, you name it, and Chi waves, you know, complexity without utterly I don't even know what asset class some of these things are in, but it may be shows, tells the clients and the customers, we know this stuff, we've got access to the stuff and you haven't. So that would have an impact, I would think on investment returns over the long term. And one, just just just a little as we're in, we're still in the kind of topical stuff right now. Just wanna bring something right up to date, which I thought was relevant to this conversation somewhat which there was an article I just posted something on Twitter yesterday, the weekend, there was an article, a financial journalist who writes for The Times posted something about her own personal saving for retirement journey. difficult it was for her to accumulate the amount of there's a number of online tools, you can find it to work out how much you need to save every week or every month every year. And one of the big things that she was saying is I think I'm going to move from the default balanced portfolio, I think 5050 equities bonds, to sub to the adventurous even these naming protocols adventurous, it sounds a little bit dodgy a bit. And and I think I don't, I can't remember if she actually said well, how old she was. But she did refer to something like a 30 year time horizon before she even starts to retire. If she retires on time. And obviously, then all being well, health allowance. She'll be retired for decades after that, to be 5050. Equities bonds when you are, let's say 30 years old. Geez, it's nuts, isn't it? Guys, I know that we may be a bit too overly positive about global equities. But that is going to be for big company pension schemes to have a default for all their staff regardless, until they then they go into the kind of would you call it the lifestyle in your life, it's even more dangerous, even worse, dangerous, which put younger people into a load of bonds, just seems just irresponsible to say the government.

Nick Lincoln: 13:05

I think it's the government's ski. I mean, I don't get involved in auto enrollment. But nest certainly one of the big ones that maybe they will do it after, they were told to put people joining the schemes who are so 1819 20, but a significant amount of their funds into bonds. Because you don't want these people upset when they look at their valuations and see them decline in the early years. So I mean, talk about pandering and reinforcing really bad practices rather than educating these people in the saying, just don't look at the valuation for the next 20 years. We make the state makes it worse and says no, we're young people who were the ones who can afford to ride out all this volatility and should be loving it. They are totally without knowing because most of them don't even know what they're investing, they go into something that won't cause them a fence. If they see it drops in. It's like, wow, you separate the problem is Andy.

Andy Hart: 13:51

But weirdly, I'm quite a fan of that. That's, that's a behavioral intervention that the government's taken a view on, because they didn't want you know, a 19 year old to join, and invest, let's say 1000 pounds over a year, and then look at their statement within the first unit, say, a 50. Because then the thing or bug is I'm just going to stop doing the whole thing. So I'm a, I'm a bit of a fan of

Alan Smith: 14:14

that isn't work this year that has it investing in, it hasn't worked.

Andy Hart: 14:17

I get it, I get it, I get it. I get it. I get it. But I understand why they intervened with that, that that was quite smart. From their point of view, which is quite rare for a committee to come up with such a wide ranging rule. I was a fan of that. Yeah, I

Alan Smith: 14:30

think it should be maybe I mean, that's you're talking about auto enrolment big? Yes, surely, surely, that's a responsibility amongst I don't think any of us are particularly big in the we're certainly not in corporate benefits, company, pension schemes and so on. But surely there is a big role for education for employers, of course, setting up these company pension schemes. And rather than just say, rather, I mean, because that is that is pandering, isn't it? We're going to give you a suboptimal outcome, just in case you get worried about it. Why don't we educate you, but as you say, there's nothing to worry about. And you know, you can't touch this for decades anyway. You can't get it out once in a pension scheme until you're well and

Nick Lincoln: 15:07

also don't talk about it in making it making the employer the de facto parents of all these people all the time. And that's another burden. Mate. Why don't they cut Why don't kids come at school knowing at least a little bit about finance and just a little bit about how these things work? Different subject, it is a whole different subject, but the government's just putting a BandAid on a massive, massive wound by saying that you will be in a rubbish fund that will lose money in real terms after inflation just so you don't wet the bed, and that's okay. No, it's not okay. It's not good enough. All right, have we done? This one is the ground? Yep. Move on. Okay, cool. And you spoke at length, but you're gonna speak at length again. So because on our on our agenda of dreams, you've got a point in there, my friend. So the floor was once again yours. And then who are you going to hand over to once you've given us your super?

Andy Hart: 15:49

Oh, I'll just speak quite quickly about this point. So the meat of this show is other professionals that us as financial advisors used to become, you know, better at what we do more successful. So I'm putting this whole category into sort of coaches, you know, coaches for everything, personal development, really, I sort of banging on about the three health, mental health, physical health, financial health, they're all sort of important. They're all sort of interlinked. So we obviously have accountants that help us I mean, I've got over the years, I've used personal trainers, business coaches, public speaking coaches, I've had remote mentors, people I listen to online, there's financial advisors, course courses that we've gone to, we've got a lot of education and training around investment management and practice management. So yeah, it's just opening up to you guys, really, who's been some of the most influential people that have helped you along the way. What coaches do you still employ today? What have you, what coaches have you employed over the years? Yeah, so let's,

Nick Lincoln: 16:45

let's kick off with this okay, with your coworker, Alan, and then we'll get a car. I mean, Alan, if he starts to tell us the coaches you haven't used?

Alan Smith: 16:58

Yeah, I'm all about improvement. Nick, you should try it sometime.

Nick Lincoln: 17:01

Now. I tried it. Once my I had five minutes. Absolutely. I

Carl Widger: 17:06

coach was the coach was wrong.

Nick Lincoln: 17:08

Because the coach had to go for therapy. And I thought this is

Alan Smith: 17:15

not you? Well, you're right. Over the years, I have because I do I do believe I am always looking to try to improve be better. I don't have any immediate I saw that I saw you raise this. And I thought why don't have any sort of art. I've used this particular coach. And she he or she was amazing. I've used a series of different people at different times, my view is on coaching is that it should never be a kind of perpetual thing, you should, you should have an issue that you want to get better at work with somebody for a period of time and then perhaps step away from it, and then do some of the stuff yourself. But over the years, one of the things I think that a coach does, and there's a lot of similarities with a good financial planner is this thing called accountability. Because and you talk about health. Now, I mean, you obviously tell by my wonderful physique that I'm a regular visitor to the gym. But I, but I do go to the gym, Baker Street

Andy Hart: 18:13

Sweepers gym,

Alan Smith: 18:15

almost. But one of the reasons I wrote a blog about this a while ago, and my personal trainer, Andrew, shout out to Andrew from South Africa. He's I said I pay you to count to 10. What I used to do much more than that. And I thought, well, of course, of course he does. But what if I was there this morning at 630 in the Monday morning, which is not the ideal place, I'd rather be in my life, but because he sets up this facility for me, and he's there and he's waiting, and I get like, hold my backside out of bed at that time. So I think accountability is a huge thing that coaches performed a lot of us, I think just human nature is quite lazy. And we wouldn't necessarily do things unless we had somebody or something to do. And I think there's a lot of there's a lot that you know, the work that a good financial planner does, let's face it, some of it is just very, very basic. And you in theory, you can do it yourself, you know, to keep fit, all you need to do is you know, eat less or eat healthy and move more. That's it, but most of us don't do enough of that same with financial planning, or we need to you know, invest, automate your savings, low cost, you know, have a plan, there are few things a few basics really, and you're sort of 80 90% of the way but most people don't. So financial planner is a good accountability, roll accountability partner. Other than that, no, I mean, there's there's nothing that really stands out to me in particular coach's reign, I've spoken to a number over the years, they've all been good at different times, both on a personal basis, and a professional basis. And I definitely have a lot of value in seeking an independent third party because you simply you know, what's the thing you can't see the label of the job that you're inside of you that you live in, in. So having someone else give a unique view of who you are, what you're doing and what you might want to consider doing to get better, is very, very valuable. I'll gonna pass it to call because I know he's done. He's got a lot a far better answer, probably because he spent a fortune on coaches over the years.

Carl Widger: 20:09

I yeah, yes, I have, but I promise you, not as much as you. The whole room the whole accountability. thing I love Mitch Anthony's quote on that it's countability is holding your feet to the fire of your best intentions. I just I just I think that's just brilliant. It's exactly what It is, yeah, I actually wrote a blog on this pretty recently about kind of the outsourced inspiration that I've employed both personally and intimate as as well. So I have a couple that I'll just kind of run through, I think they, our client advisory panel has been absolutely amazing for us. So this is kind of, I suppose specific to business and our business and how we run our business. So it's a bunch of our best clients. And we get together, maybe twice a year, we do maybe two presentations. So it kind of gives them an update as to where the businesses that give them quite confidential information in terms of finances, and all that kind of stuff. And then we'll do some other presentation. So maybe one of the team will present as to what they're doing. I know, we just opened the floor to kind of, you know, I have, you know, kind of some basic questions, what are we doing well, what should we continue to do? What are we not doing? Well, what should we definitely stop. And if we have specific items coming up on our kind of short to medium term strategy, we'll just run those by them. And they'll tell us if they're a good idea or a bad idea. And you know, it's not an echo chamber, so that there have been times where they went, That's a terrible idea ditch that. I like who best you know, who could be better to tell us exactly what we should be doing in terms of our, you know, strategic meet short or medium term strategic goals than our best clients. So that's worked really, really well. And a couple of years ago, back 2018, I think, one of our best clients, Tom Tierney, I asked him to become chairman Tom has was not in our industry was involved in a couple of very successful businesses. And Tom has come in and acted as our chairman, since since then, I suppose the role has evolved. In that I wanted to make sure the Metis was, you know, acting like a proper firm, as opposed to flying by the seat of our pants, which maybe we were a little bit, and Tom has come in and you know, made sure that our corporate governance is is much better. To 2019 We put together a proper board, we do proper board meetings, all that kind of stuff. But more than that, Tom has acted as a mentor, and, you know, we run i Run i have an awful lot of ideas. And there's never a week goes by that I'm not on the phone two or three times at a time. And we can have robust, robust discussions as well. So that's worked really, really well. And if you can find someone who, you know, has a knows the business and has been there, done that, I think that's absolutely brilliant. And we brought in a consultant, Tommy Geary of Chinko consulting, and that was more around, you know, putting together a high performing team. And Tommy has done great work in terms of, you know, I suppose, asking the team exactly what they want, and then we delivered on it and there's no point in bringing in these consultants or coaches, if you're not going to actually deliver on, you know, the recommendations and that kind of stuff. So highly, highly recommend that and Tommy's work with us is ongoing as indeed Tom Tierney's is, and I absolutely value and respect their opinions. And I think that's absolutely crucial. And both those guys as well have been there, done that. And that's really, really important. I've meant mentioned a couple of times the Monster High Performance leadership course. So from a personal development point of view, that totally transformed how I approach leadership. I won't go into it again the Metis team as well as as the team has evolved, and I've I do believe and respect that I have high performers with me they inspire me and and sometimes I'm a passenger in the madness team and that's totally okay to and so I would say I've had an awful lot of inspiration from there and then guys you know, we call it the in our WhatsApp group the Six Nations but like I do see that hopefully, I've added some value myself but but certainly I've got tremendous for those listening on podcast, both Allen and Nick are shaking their head that I have not indeed that's okay. Maybe someday but but look, you know, I've said it before 98 out of 100 messages in our WhatsApp group have been you know, about nothing really. But Phil Yeah, yeah. That never ever ever to be disclosed. But But yeah, look, there are some absolutely magical ideas out of this and and certainly stuff that I have put in place out of this. So if you can find a bunch of your peers who are going through, you know, roughly similar types of of scenarios and and issues in their business. I think you know, that's absolute gold. If you can, if you can, you know, like know and trust people So yeah, that's me.

Nick Lincoln: 26:18

Okay. That's thanks. Thank you, Alan and Carl, that's great. Anandi coming back to you, can you identify one external person to you, who is who has helped you to become the successful IFA that you are today?

Andy Hart: 26:33

Still on that journey, I think we underestimate how much stuff we've consumed over the years. And we're talking about coaching, but forget that it's just it's just general personal development. So us as individuals, then as businesses, I think I'll hit hit on the point. It's other financial advisors I've probably learned the most from and it's and it's, it's not in a sort of structured way. It's just sometimes a throwaway comment, or, you know, a chat conference and one or two ideas. You know, I'm, I think it's fantastic. That is, is our careers as financial advisors, we're almost paid to become better and better. You know, I say to my clients, sometimes I read all the books so you don't have to, you know, we're constantly reading marketing books, constantly reading business books, constantly reading investment books, constant listen to podcasts, constantly listen to YouTube's constantly going to conferences, and constantly have social occasions. So I mean, it's a wider subject of personal development. I mean, I've I've massively been impacted by a coach in the US called Nick Murray. Again, I've gone out to see his conference twice in New York, I've consumed his newsletter for seven or eight years. I've yet just consumed as much information as I can from him read all of his books. I'm hugely influenced by, you know, Warren Buffett, Charlie Munger, Jack Bogle, the sort of heavyweights of this of this mighty profession. And then I've dabbled in a load of other sort of courses and individuals closer to home. Yeah, I think we underestimate how much we have consumed. I even put marketing in that as well. You know, we've we've all employed marketing companies and consultants over the years, they come into our business, they tell us good ideas, they, they explain things to us. So yeah, I think, I think yeah, we've, we've spent a lot of time, effort and energy on personal development and using various different people. Even yourself, Alan, obviously, you you work with business consultants, when you're, you know, expanding your business buying other businesses. So, you know, I'm grouping everything into that just everyone that helps

Alan Smith: 28:30

when you got such a wide topic here. And I'm just reflecting on it. Because there's there's different needs and requirements. So one is one of the reasons I think that we all even starting this podcast is because we're all quite curious, right? I mean, that's why we there's, there's, apart from all the kind of you know, that the so called ballroom chat, which is all funny, and a good laugh, there is a common thread between all of us, which is we're all into personal development, when we want to grow personally, we want to grow professionally want to get better. So we're all consuming stuff. We read, we listen to podcasts, and we do and we discuss it just offline everything ourselves. And we've all and you're right, Carl, I was joking, you've added a load, you continue to add loads and loads of ideas and inspiration to this group. Look at him. He's always he's frozen in shock. But by the positive feedback, God, so there is. So there's that. So there's learning and I'm not really sure Well, yeah, there is you do get it from so called consultants. But I think there's better ways to consume I don't need to sit in front of a person and tell me I mean, there was just no shortage of stuff. So we all consume things in different ways. But I come back to this accountability thing, and probably the gentleman in Carl's life from professional viewpoint, they are holding his feet to the fire with his potential or whatever it was, he said, but so there's an accountability rule and I think that's the biggest thing of all that I have referred to before that's you know, we can learn all the things in the world but what's what are you going to do about it? Once you've got this knowledge all in your head? What

Andy Hart: 30:02

what are you going to change?

Alan Smith: 30:04

This is a challenge I've got even going to conferences, use those you can wave conference 27 different ideas, think about law, I'm overwhelmed and what to do, I'm going to do anything Yeah, to know if I can come away with one idea and somebody holds me accountable. So you said that was a great idea. What specifically are you going to do in your business or your personal life in order in order to you know, to execute and take action? So yeah, I think there's a there's a wide wide range of places to learn

Nick Lincoln: 30:29

your hammers race

Carl Widger: 30:30

car. Yeah, just just to say like, look, absolutely valid. On all fronts there and Andy's point about continually learning and being curious and all that kind of stuff. I think that's actually probably the most important thing, isn't it? You know, that to always try and, you know, learn more and do things better. And like after lunch the other day, I had long conversations with three different individuals. And I can tell you, I definitely learned an awful lot out of each of those conversations. I doubt any of the three people learned my show to me, like but but maybe someday I'll be able to give back but like, that's informal. It's in, you know, a social setting but by God I you know, I really got some absolute gold out of that and So you could remember it. Yeah. No, I can't I can't Don't worry. I was in bed alarm before you voice. But anyway,

Nick Lincoln: 31:23

you in the sushi you in the sushi.

Carl Widger: 31:26

So now Nick, Have we any new words for this week? They anyway? Yeah, no luck. So I think you know, don't only be trying to, you know, engage formally in terms of paying for consultants and all that kind of stuff, just just be curious and just be that sponge and just go and talk to people. And look, we've said it before and we people are nice people like to help. So you know, as long as you give off the vibe that look, I'd like to learn from you, I respect you and your views? Well, then I think you're gonna get absolute gold out of those conversations.

Alan Smith: 32:04

We raised in a previous episode, the idea of mastermind groups, if you're not, in one, getting one create if one doesn't exist locally create one because there is not another profession that I'm aware of where people openly share their very best ideas with no expectation of anything. Anything bad. Yes,

Nick Lincoln: 32:22

definitely. Yeah, I think that's just just maybe just tying a bow on this as we, as time moves through. And I've said this before and Andy's to definitely do this. But I do think that the best help I've had becoming the still not fully formed person you see in front of you today is from my peers. And that's, that's that's, that's, that's as cold as said those three people he spoke to who, who later on had to be revived, but at the time seemed to be enjoying themselves. You know, they will take much more out of those conversations than I think he would do.

Carl Widger: 32:56

Is it okay to just name check those people because I did, I do really appreciate it. And it was just a King Robert Stevenson and David Ferguson. So guys, look, thank you for your time, I really enjoyed it. And, you know, I've taken stuff away that's positively impacted me. So thank you. Yeah,

Alan Smith: 33:13

and all legends in their own lunchtime. But you know, the thing that is in common with them, and with you and with us. And this is this is the big difference about consultants, and all the other things is that they have been in the arena, if they aren't already. And the mean, and the names that you mentioned are and all of us are, we are to quote that famous speech, we are all in the arena, we're getting covered in blood and mud and shit and everything else and we're fighting the good fight. With all due respect some of the consultants the job of a consultant is to go around and tell other people what to do without necessarily having to let the same level of scars as the rest of us have. So when you're having a conversation with somebody, you've got a particular issue or challenge you're faced with. And you speak to a fellow adviser or business owner, and they say, Oh, we had that three years ago, this is what we did, or this is what we got wrong. I'd be happy to share all the things, the things that we screwed up on. That's where you learned the most is from those who've really had the battle scars to prove it and through the experience.

Andy Hart: 34:14

And there is there is quite a few good consultants out there. But a lot of them go into IFA firms, you know, early on in their career, they learn a load of good stuff from one firm and then they repackage it and you know, issue it to firm B like it's their original idea. So some of the best ideas that consultants get have come from other financial advisors is what I'm getting at.

Carl Widger: 34:36

There are no original ideas. We're just repackaging all the time.

Nick Lincoln: 34:41

Okay. Oh, we have bigger than that damn good thrashing. We didn't have storytelling with

Andy Hart: 34:53

Alan Smith.

Nick Lincoln: 34:54

No, we didn't have Showtime that Miss Smith was spotted was you know, I'm being judicious with it. But now you've mentioned that people are going to think about it. So again, we've been here for the next episode either, right? Alan Smith, your business planning process for 2023 and beyond. This might be this might be the chance to do Polaroid, Nicholas.

Unknown: 35:18

Grab yourself a drink a very long drink it Storytime with Ellen Smith.

Alan Smith: 35:28

Now, this is going to sound increasingly contrived and I say every week but we don't have to have that jingle on but I do want to give a little bit of background to this. Cast your minds back ladies and gentleman listeners to to win, win COVID hit and lockdown came it was March 2020. Right. Some of you will know I live in London in central London and I knew the direction of travel. I knew what we're going to be be faced with which was a complete and utter lockdown. You weren't allowed to leave your house. Remember those days? You load out once a day for exercise or some such nonsense. And I thought I don't fancy being locked down here. So I packed up my other half my children threw them in the car and went off down to the south coast or rented a cottage which was available to a friend of mine. And I locked myself up there for months and months and months. And in many ways, I know it was a very, very difficult time for people and for the country. But it was a it was quite a good time. For me, the weather was good. And I just I had all of a sudden, I had time and space to think. And I used to take myself for a walk on the beach every single morning. And I would begin to formulate because by that time, I'd been in business for up to 1516 years, and we'd achieved a degree of success. But I've never had much of a chance in those days to, you know, just to pause, pause for breath, and reflect and decide what the next chapter was going to look like. Stop laughing Lincoln.

Nick Lincoln: 37:00

So I'm waiting for you to pause for breath. But

Alan Smith: 37:05

so that's where

Carl Widger: 37:06

he's breathing through his ears.

Alan Smith: 37:08

The idea or business planning probably came in because I've never really built much of a proper thought through business plan up until then it was to quote Mr. widget and flying by the seat of our pants and making it up as we go along. So that was a kind of a COVID dividend, if I may say it just the time and the space to think go for long reflective walks and kind of think about what the next chapter was going to look like, for the business. And as a result of that, we rolled round into beginning to towards the end of 2020. And then beginning of 2021, I got together with the team, I can't even remember now whether we did it remotely or not. Because we were in and out of lockdowns at the time. But I built a five year plan at the time, and it was documented, what we're going to do what good looks like very, very specific. So it was designed to be this is what the business will look and feel and experience like by December 2025, which was gonna be five full calendar years, by the time we'd launched the whole thing. Fundamentally, it was a growth story, I refer back to some of the conversations we've had before lifestyle business versus kind of scaled or growing or larger practices. And I was all about I thought, I've spent so much time building the foundations of this business that to carry on and sort of tick tick along without focusing on growth, which seemed like a missed opportunity. So I've documented and a range of ways that we were going to achieve it, but we're all about fundamentally doubling in size, and then maybe doubling again, or over a period of time. And I've mapped it all out, shared it with the team. And it was great. It was a very sort of energetic response from the team. And everyone we could everyone could see benefits in, in growing as a business, it was going to be very impactful for our clients, we know the good work that we do for our clients. So why do we not want to do it for more? I mean, know that larger a business is the more opportunities that are for those working than the business. So it was it was well documented. And I mean, believe me, it's as who is it? I think Andy said, or heard say before, man plans and God laughs because I tell you the plan we made, we have not followed that to the letter, we have sort of, you know, gone left gone, right. But we're still broadly on track and on target for our for our growth story. So I'm thinking as we're heading towards the end of the year, I'm just I'm raising it as an issue and wondering what other people do if anything around business plans, business objective documentation, you know, how you achieve what you're trying to achieve within your businesses. The specifics that we do is we've we've adopted historically years ago, we adopted broadly that what's called the traction model, but rip from a book called Traction by Gino Wickman. But we've kind of pivoted it slightly. And we embrace a concept that comes out of Silicon Valley called objectives and key results. Happy to discuss that in more detail, don't have car if you've come across that. But it is a very specific way that you can achieve your objectives within a business. So well a good saying we're going to double in size, we're gonna do this and that, this that or the other. But I mean, like this comes back to accountability. And doing so you're going to do because without specific actions documented with accountability and specific people charged charged with doing these actions, then nothing probably will happen. So we've embraced, we've embraced this concept pretty well. Over the last, well the last couple of years. And as we're coming into the end of this year, we're planning what we're going to do q1 next year. That's exactly what we did. We've got our while I've got a meeting the next couple of days to just get into the weeds. There's very, very specific activities of what the company will do and the specific names of the people what they will do in order to ensure that we're still on track towards our sort of grander plans and objectives. So call as we are heading towards the end of the year, looking into next year. What are your thoughts? What are your actions What have you been doing on sort of business planning?

Carl Widger: 41:04

Yeah, we do something similar Ireland. First thing I'd say is, I know you did a lot of planning when you were when you were down to the coast and stuff, but I think you're being hard on yourself because I always you know Learn loads from you in terms of how you are planning the next phase your business. So I do think you were doing some but yeah, I hear what you're saying. A book that I read. I was introduced this book by someone I know like and respect, which always helps. Cameron Harold vivid vision. So in terms of building firm, very short book, absolutely brilliant. I highly recommend everybody get on that. So we're in the middle of the planning at the moment. I think I mentioned it before we're doing our budgets and all that kind of stuff. So I have the aforementioned Tom Tierney is our chairman. He's a chartered accountant and our head of finance is Patty O'Halloran. He's also Chartered Accountants. So they crunched the numbers. We do some budgets and all of that kind of stuff. And it's, it's work that has to be done. But I then share those plans with the team in January. I didn't before last year was the last January is the first time I did that. And everybody said, Wow, this is fantastic. This is brilliant. Because like you're saying, Ireland, I think, if you can give the team? Well, if you want high performers to stay with you, you got to show them the plot is division, what is the what is the strategy, what is the plan. So last year was a bit of a revelation, I should have done it way earlier, I didn't. But anyway, we're definitely doing it again this year. And then I suppose the other thing not not to harp on too much, but I've done a playbook. And I've asked of all of our private client managers, our financial advisors, basically, as you'd know them to do an annual plan. So that keeps us in the short term on track. Because if I can keep the one year plans on track that will feed into our kind of five year plan. And we do have a five year plan as well. And the private client managers, their annual plan needs to be inspired by the Metis playbook. And I suppose what I'm trying to do is to make sure that you don't have to do everything that's in the Metis paper, but, you know, I'm gonna, I want you to do this plan to have to have it done by by next week. That's for 2023. It's it's stuff that we do and matter. So you're picking, you know, whatever it might be in terms of that's how you're gonna grow your book of business. And, yeah, it's it keeps everybody accountable. We kind of break those plans out every quarter then and review them. This is what you said you do, how are you doing it? And we can identify issues then. So maybe a particular rules that you're pursuing isn't working for you. But I do think, like you and I'm much more focused on putting plans in place, and then that, that we seem to be mentioning it a lot, that accountability piece. So making sure that we're all accountable to each other. And yeah, look, I could go on it's a it's a it's a, it's a big subject, a big topic, but you know, I think planning ahead is absolutely it's a must. Isn't it really?

Alan Smith: 44:17

Any better else? Intamin? Other two solopreneurs? Yeah, I

Andy Hart: 44:23

could talk about for a little bit. Yeah, I'm quite into high level number crunching. So I keep a grasp of pretty much all the numbers in the three different businesses that I run. In terms of So years ago, 10 years ago, I used to have quite a lot of goals or in outside a lot of stuff to achieve. So it's like short stuff, I want to do medium stuff I want to do in long, long term stuff I want to do at the moment, it's just growing the three different businesses that I run. So I track everything at the end of the year, really calendar years, I do also do taxes. And then I sort of scope out what the turnover is going to be and what the sort of income I can generate from it if I'm if I'm looking at that. The big focus for me is growing humans on the management, Maven advisors sort of ticking along with taking on new clients and we all know the stresses and strains of running a regulated firm especially as a as a solo advisor. So yeah, my big focus on next year is is grown humans on the management, the premium subscription that's grown pretty aggressively at the moment so hopefully we're gonna hit some good numbers at the end of end of next year but I'm also busy with training because voin is got a big change to go to the new system Yeah, that's my sort of thoughts on it but yeah,

Alan Smith: 45:35

free advertising there. I think the trap podcast which is sponsored by will be sponsored by me even premium or whatever it's called forward to your check Andrew,

Andy Hart: 45:47

the thoughts

Nick Lincoln: 45:50

were to the digital not really I can't add anything to it. So I'll be brief. I had a plan when I started in 2008 and I just I worked back the income I needed to give me the largest I've talked about this before I work the income I needed to give me the lifestyle I want now and my future self lifestyle. So what income do I need and what pension contribution do I need to make? And I work back from that the turnover I needed. Okay, if I need that turn, how many clients can I service and how many haven't had that number? I then knew what what fees I need To charge to generate the turnover, that net of corporation tax expenses will give me the income. And that was really my business plan. And so but you know what I mean, I'm not I, my business sounds like, sounds like I don't do any work at all. And that's not true. My business, though does take over. And as long as I don't goof up, I keep on doing well by people, I will be done well, by my business. So they're always regulated. I think it's more regulatory things from me that throw the change might well like consumer duty, that kind of forces me to change, even if I don't agree with it, that will force me to change things and change my, my business is kind of modeled. But that aside, now, I don't, I don't do any I don't do any business planning. I use an online accountancy package free agent, other people will use Xero. I know at any, any moment that day or night, what my balance sheet is, what my profit and loss is. I was talking to a client the other day, who's a friend, and he's, he's in it recruitment, and he doesn't know he doesn't know what his profit isn't to his accounts and gives him back his books about six months after the end of his business year, and recommit, might Yeah, it's absolutely but with my OCD tray that would drive me up the bleeding wall because I like to be on top of it all the time. Is that a business plan that was not and I always know my numbers, I do compare my metrics year on year are the expenses broadly coming in where I thought is turnover broadly where it should be, I don't just let it ride I do. I do have reflection and analysis. But I'm my biggest critic, you know, I've got this high internal locus of control. I'm very inner directed. And I know if I've let myself down, because I'm nearly always letting myself down in one form or another. But I do hold myself. Okay, I don't need a third party. I'm probably hypercritical. Yeah. So that's where I am on the panel.

Carl Widger: 47:48

Can I just ask you on that? Like, if your clients are getting older say, right, do you have a natural follow up? Like, do you always try and replace those slides? Or do you let that just organically happen? Or how do you deal with

Nick Lincoln: 48:06

when it's image wise, you would imagine, and this sounds this sounds cruel, but I'm using this metaphor. So you people could say beef, especially conveyor belt going along, and clients at the end of their lives will drop off the conveyor belt, and they fall out of your life as fee paying people, okay? I'm not. They're human beings, but as fee paying people, they fall out of your life. And it doesn't matter the conveyor, but you have younger people coming on board and some years, you'll have more people dropping off the end, you'll have more people coming on. I don't have a vigorous client Recruitment Policy, I work by referral only. So I do take on the some children of clients and grandchildren of clients, I get referrals from an accountant. And it kind of washes through car, but it just happens organically. It's not me going out. And you know, I used to do the networking and everything else. And I do I am taking clients on but I am very choosy, and clients are very choosy with me, you know, the vetting process, we are vetting the prospects, they think they're vetting us, we are getting them. And a lot of them don't get through, don't get through the process. So I take clients on but selectively but you lose, you know, one day, I might just be that I've got three clients left, because the rest of them have died. And I shut up shop years ago, and I walk away because my business is I've got my pots stacked up for the rest of my life. You know that we talked about that as well.

Carl Widger: 49:18

Andy's plan, and His plan is that you'll give up in a few years, and he'll take it all on. But anyway,

Nick Lincoln: 49:23

yeah, we've got to find someone I trust and like, and this is where this whole thing was. We made this joke last. Listen, guys, we're 48 minutes. Yeah. And I think that we've had to two meat and potatoes subjects there that we went into quite some debt. So I think if that's okay with you, we'll just we will transition to answering readers questions posted to us mainly on Twitter. And the first one is from Ben F F as in Foxtrot who doesn't let the Twitter handle so you might not be on on Twitter. So going forward, I'm asking if they're not on Twitter to leave a LinkedIn profile. So at least we can put that in the show notes. People either will have a Twitter or LinkedIn profile. Anyway, pen F says, and I'll maybe deal with this. And then you guys can chip in. But can you talk about how you manage sequencing risk in retirement, absolute return structure products and prove smoothing funds have all held up well in the current drops? But I understand you prefer not to use these Can you talk about how you deal with this risk, but there's approaching retirement love the show, Bear? Well, I maybe I'm talking for you please step in because if I'm stepping over you, I don't have a different policy for accumulation and decumulation clients accumulate in equities and they do cumulate in equities. There is this thing called sequencing risk where you're buggered if the markets collapse in the first couple of years and you're drawing money out of your pot. So I would say the retirement approaches you go nearly all equities, the great companies of the world and they have a reserve bucket of maybe two years living expenses, allowing for state pension rental income, any DB stuff you've got coming in. And the minute I would say that this is not advice by the way to anyone listening. Bring your husband or wife 50k and premium bonds as 100k There's your liquidity for the temporary declines. Hopefully you never need to touch it anyway. If you're very unlucky, and you're the one in four people who enter retirement just as the markets are going down, then there's your pot so we're not we're not selling to that falling market but but Ben That's what I would everything else is noise And again, there's a whole swathe of consultancies out there who will tell you, you need to have a separate policy. And you know, you need to have these smoothing products. And we've got this hybrid annuities now where you can cash out. And they're doing that, because they make a turn on it. Just keep it simple, stupid. That's my answer to Ben. Anyone else?

Carl Widger: 51:32

100% agree,

Alan Smith: 51:34

I would I agree, the only thing I would add was just strengthens what you just said, Nick, is I mean, Ben's reference to things that proves smoothing fund and blah, blah, blah, absolute return funds, and so on. But they're not doing anything. That's that's just a reporting mechanism. Underneath it, they're still invested in equities and bonds and, and other other things. There's just some, I put something out last week, which is quite popular about if you look at market returns, if you looked, look at a graph where you got a daily equities and posted, that price is posted daily, I just look at the performance of a fund, let's say, you know, global equities, if you look at it daily, looked at it monthly and looked at it yearly. And this is the point. So that's a smooth, that's effectively what Pru and others effectively do they smooth that out because they don't actually give you the it's not to use the vernacular is not marked to market. They just tell you the price is XP, but you know, God forbid, you actually want to get your money out during a period when there's a huge market tension and stress, you won't be able to the funds get locked up, etc. So this really is this is the this is the actual art of financial planning, isn't it? This is where you add value if if the answer was a buy a bunch of these absolute return funds and smooth with profit type funds and and if they actually work, then you wouldn't need us. But they don't work. Still

Nick Lincoln: 52:52

I had a look at proof. I mean, I'm not knocking your brand here I had a look at proves with profit asset allocation the other day, and I think it was their growth one I think it's like 55% in equities, which intuitively tells me that 50 45% is not in equities. And that's just not for me, that's not going to happen over a three decade retirement, I don't care whether you put a smoothing gate at the front of that or not, it's not going to generate a sufficient return from my put away from the way I see the world going forward. So

Alan Smith: 53:15

so a high quality, thoughtful relationship with an experienced financial planner, looking at the person in the round, looking at national savings, looking at guaranteed income, like state benefits and what you need to know property retirement income. That could be a whole range of different things that you put together like a jigsaw puzzle to identify, you know, where's your income going to come from? What's absolutely essential income and God forbid, even in Mark in extreme market times, you might have to fly business class and not first class. Yeah, you know, but ya know, yeah,

Nick Lincoln: 53:50

I've had that conversation with your client, treat them as you would wish to be treated. Right. Just tell them the truth. Okay. Okay. Thank you. So that the next the next question from our Twitter followers is a chap called GP mantaining? No, it's not a GP. He's not doctor who's Gianpaolo. He's of Italian descent, but we don't hold that against him. He's on Twitter, as at GP underscore min teeny, and Gianpaolo says, and we have kind of touched on this in a big way earlier on. So maybe quickly on this one, I'm not gonna ask one of you three can what's been the most valuable or influential course seminar for your respective careers? Is it still available?

Andy Hart: 54:28

I'll click on that. For me. It's Nick Murray. And number one position Nick Murray. Number two position Nygma. And number three position, Nick Murray from me. What courses

Alan Smith: 54:36

courses Nick Murray do? Does it matter to you? Of course.

Andy Hart: 54:40

He does his behavioral investment seminar once a year in October, I believe does a monthly newsletter of eight pages of pure gold has got four of the greatest financial planning books ever written. Yep, he's been more influential in my life and business than anyone else combined. So yep, that's for me over to call. Okay. Calm.

Carl Widger: 55:02

Boring, because I'm going to repeat something the Monster High Performance leadership course. Okay, Alan.

Alan Smith: 55:09

All right, I'm going to say something that I haven't I don't think I've said before, which I think is relevant and interesting, which is gonna be a fresh story. Now, it's not fresh Starbucks. Of course, I went on a couple years ago and was in person course I believe it's still going which is the Daniel Priestley dent key person of influence program. That was a series of meetings, you get together with God and my time it was the 80 or 90 business owners. And you go through this process, and Daniel has got this whole thing mapped out the sort of five P's about how to become a key person of influence. And I think that this course in this program and the book and the whole kind of online thing that supports it is highly relevant to most financial planners, where we are today, every one of us, maybe what in nearly every listener should they wish to be? And it feeds the answer to some of the some of the other questions that get raised as well as how do I generate more opportunities? How do I win more business? Well, if you went through that program, and you followed what Daniel and his colleagues share with you, you will, I'm pretty confident you'll be able to attract more clients, more customers and grow your business. So it's not a financial services one but I think it's highly relevant to all financial services practitioners, so keepers of influence by a company called Identity n. T.

Carl Widger: 56:23

If you don't mind Ireland, I You said that to me before and I had a look into it. I think they've moved the course to online now. So just a quick question. And I might help the listeners was a lot of the learning you got out of that I know you are going to kind of in person events for that over a period of a year, or something like that. What was what would you say that the learning you got from it would have been less if you weren't meeting other entrepreneurs, other people in the same boat as you?

Alan Smith: 56:54

Yes, is the short answer. Of course, like all conferences, all meetings you go to, we've talked about it before you go around the coffee machine around in the bar afterwards or whatever. There's a lot more and I really benefited there was there was one or two other financial services people there. But unlike other things, I've gone to this other thing I haven't mentioned, Strategic Coach, Dan Sullivan, Strategic Coach, which I spent three years on, which is also very good. But that was was lots of other financial planners on that. So you weren't necessarily getting a sort of diversity of thoughts. But this key person of influence, I think I was one of maybe two financial services people. So all sorts of different business people. And of course, they just had similar issues and challenges that I had as a business person, first and foremost, which obviously, I don't get, I don't think you're getting to the same level. I think we were the last one to go on in person one, mate, but you probably if you do it online, you probably aren't getting all you know, you're getting the the information, the data, the reporting, the templates, the tools that they give you. You're just missing that on that social, but I think that they arranged some social events as well, just to complement it not still worth doing as far as they're concerned. Yeah, I would say so. Yeah, I would say it's definitely worth

Andy Hart: 58:01

investigating. As an introduction. The book is amazing. Who is timeless KPI. Yeah.

Alan Smith: 58:06

But what I'm seeing on that as well, I read that book. I don't know, when it first came out years and years ago, and it was one of these. Yeah, it was alright, quite interesting. It shows you there's a time then things resonate more, because I read it again, you know, a couple of years ago before I went on the on the program. And it was I thought, wow, this is exactly what I need to learn right now. So I think you can you can read a book at different times. Wrong, it doesn't resonate.

Andy Hart: 58:27

Yeah, right, but wrong time.

Nick Lincoln: 58:29

Okay. Yeah.

Alan Smith: 58:31

gestion to Mr. Min. Thank

Nick Lincoln: 58:32

you, Alan. Right. So moving on, guys, I think we should be getting a culture corner because we're at 57. And Rob Stevenson and a video call that you'd like to tell the practice about?

Carl Widger: 58:45

Yeah, so this came from my conversation with Rob last week. So he pointed me to a video that he had posted on Twitter, so we put it in the show notes. It's called succession power scale. So it is a question that a lot of financial planning firms are asking, you know, how is my business valued? And I think we've even been asked it in our in from from some of the Trappists in terms of questions coming in. So really good video that that Rob post that's well worth watching in terms of how businesses are valued. And looked at dozens this actually proved the point. You know, if you're, if you're willing to try and learn and be curious, there's so much stuff out there. It's all out there for free. Right? His his expertise in a 50 minute video or something like that, for free. Go and watch it brilliant for everybody

Nick Lincoln: 59:34

with excellent stuff. Thank you, Alan, you've got open AI, artificial intelligence, many applications for financial planners to expand.

Alan Smith: 59:42

Yeah, I'm talking about for free artificial intelligence. We've all heard this phrase bandied around for years, it hasn't. I haven't really noticed much in the way you know, does Siri work every time there's Hey, Alexa and all the rest of it. I'm scared of saying things aloud in case music's turns on or something right now on live on the podcast. But I came across this quite recently, again, put the show notes of the company called Open AI and they've got this chat bot thing called Chat. GP T is amazing. Now, if I was a, I don't know, right now a copywriter or someone creating written content, but there's a whole lot of extra applications go to this, it's free see into it that I mean, I just did, for example, write a 500 word essay on the meaning of true wealth, for example, which is something which is kind of dear to me part of our strapline that we work on as well. And it just within seconds erode a thing now was it perfect? No, but it was I'm telling was 80% good enough, a bit of tweaking and you can post that stuff out and I thought God that would take hours to create anything close to that. And I've seen some other examples. I mean, somebody in the US just said can you do a sale purchase agreement, legal contract and if we can, I mean, you know, New York State or something. So it understands that you know, law I mean, I don't know the applications more think about a for financial planners are it's both an opportunity and potentially a threat in some cases as well. So check it out. We are this is this free Island. Is for so you can have so many of the you can do Somebody for free. And then you got to start paying for it. I didn't get you. I think you could do 20 or more of these examples for free. Ultimately, it is a paid for service. Some of the examples that I've seen online I mean, it is You didn't think anything was ever going to challenge Google. This challenge. This is a better version of Google. If you're if you said, Can you write a piece of code for me to put a new thing on my website, it produces the code there and then for use copy and paste into your web program, it is in sane is one of these moments and as you go through life, you've there's been some sort of moments of deep breath Bloody hell, this may be the start of something completely new, completely different. So you heard it here. First, folks, it well worth exploring. The link is in the show notes.

Nick Lincoln: 1:01:59

Lovely, great stuff. Thank you. And the all in podcast this week, they had they had an example of that actually, where they Jason Calacanis set up a script, with all four of them don't just go the AI the background, and they came up with a script for know for them with sort of wearing character. It was it's cleverly done in the style of Quentin Tarantino, without the swearing, and if the UK tax app.

Andy Hart: 1:02:20

Yeah, that's it. That's the recommendation. It's called a UK tax app. I've tried a few of these over the years, I think it's really decent, is really good, because it allows you to put multiple incomes, if you get various dividends, various salaries for various self employed profits, and it breaks it down per year, per month, for weekly. And it's got a whole pie chart of total tax paid how much you get per week, per month for everything. It's really, really good if you're doing any sort of personal income planning for those who are predominantly self employed out there. So it's called Yeah, UK tax app.

Nick Lincoln: 1:02:49

Okay, sounds interesting. I look forward to seeing the link to it in the show notes. We didn't get Jonathan discussed the autumn budget

Carl Widger: 1:02:55

spiring way to finish that is

Nick Lincoln: 1:02:57

quite clear in the autumn budget is that many, many people are going to need to do tax returns with the reductions in the dividend allowance and the savings interest rates going up and the capital gains tax. That's gonna be the complete shitstorm for many, many people who don't know what's coming down the line.

Andy Hart: 1:03:09

Oh, you're gonna be the outcome of that Nick. Paton you think it's gonna be out? You think that's gonna be

Nick Lincoln: 1:03:15

a lot more? It will it will be the app. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. My one is, that's not the Godfather, fantastic film. And the Godfather two is one of those rare examples where a sequel is at least as good as the first comeback. I read. I read the book for the first time this week. And I raced through it's 500 pages. They've got a bit of a cliche, but the Godfather by Mario Puzo, US Edo. Just a really, really good bit of fiction. me because I loved the film so much as well. I can sort of visualize the characters but it was I enjoy a race through 500 pages got through very quickly. Okay, that's a culture corner done. So the trap is we in two weeks time we're going to have a special episode nine will be a Christmas special devoted just to answering your, your questions, our sack is bulging with your questions. So we're gonna have a really good stab to get through maybe 10 to 15 of them. We haven't ignored you we are we're in the hopper. You're in the hopper of doom. And we'll be pulling you out and going through it in the next episode. So looking forward to doing that. But in the meantime, when you've got an add on moment, what are you going to do? Because you're gonna leave a five or six out of five star review on iTunes, you're gonna go on to YouTube, but liking subscribers so we can then flog you with relentless advertising, which keeps this going or not going as the case may be gentleman, have you got anything else to say? Are we done?

Alan Smith: 1:04:26

Thank god that's it for now.

Nick Lincoln: 1:04:28

Okay, all right, guys. Love you guys. Take care and see you in two weeks time.