Episode 19: The Human Touch in Wealth Management with Candice Jay

Candice Jay: 0:02

So again, ai cannot replace that. That is something where we need to talk to the client's professionals, understand and hear where the emotional cusps are and to help the clients through that and to help them understand and explain things in different ways. That helps resonate to the message of whether or not they should be doing something. So it comes back to we are coaches to our clients. We are, in a way, therapists to our clients. At the same time it is so much more than just an investment job, a wealth advisory job.

Sam SIvarajan: 0:41

Welcome to the Future Ready Advisor podcast. I'm your host, sam Sivarajan, wealth management consultant and behavioral scientist. Join me and my guests, from industry experts to top advisors, as we explore the pain points the financial advisors face, how they can solve them, free up their time and make their practice future ready. Hi everyone, I'm Sam Sivarajan. Welcome to today's episode of the Future Ready Advisor. Today I'm here with Candice Jay, a wealth advisor, who is here to talk about the role of holistic advice, the evolving needs of clients and the role of financial advisors. Candice, welcome to the show.

Candice Jay: 1:34

Thank you, sam, a pleasure to be here.

Sam SIvarajan: 1:37

Delighted to have you. Let me quickly introduce you, candice, to the audience. Candice is a wealth advisor with CC&L Private Capital in Toronto. Cc&l Private Capital is part of Connor Clark and Lund Financial Group, one of Canada's leading independent investment management firms. Her practice is focused on helping charitable foundations and high net worth clients, including women entrepreneurs and families, achieve their long term financial goals. Candice would love to dive in and, if you can, share with us a little bit about your practice and your personal practice philosophy.

Candice Jay: 2:16

Hello everyone and thank you, sam, for having me on as a guest of the Future Ready Advisor.

Candice Jay: 2:22

So I've been one of the lucky ones finding out very early in my career that I love working and helping out clients in the investment counseling space and I've been working in this area for over 16 years and the industry continues to evolve and so do our titles.

Candice Jay: 2:39

So in many firms that we are called wealth advisors, as Sam introduced me. Now, within the 16 years, your clientele also evolves with you and I like helping everyone, but there are certain clients that I end up becoming best fits for and it's for the firm that you're in and the advisor that you are. So at this juncture, my practice as a natural market for entrepreneurs who have recently had a liquidity event or people who've come into inheritances or looking for change within the investment market landscape, really calling for investments outside of the traditional stock and bond portfolio and CCNL does have the platform to provide the direct alternatives and continue to innovate in this landscape that escape that we're seeing that keeps changing, and the other natural market is to help executives of public and private companies with their unique complexities, as well as incorporating philanthropic and charitable giving plans and conversations to the overall discussion of giving legacy wealth and really the knowledge transfer on and, as a side benefit, the tax savings.

Sam SIvarajan: 3:48

That's great. I'd like to dive in on one aspect that you mentioned. I think it's very timely the role of direct alternatives. Find having to do with clients to get them to understand the risk, return, liquidity and other aspects of this type of investing.

Candice Jay: 4:07

Yeah. So the need is coming out because the market is changing. It's harder to find growth, it's harder to find returns in your traditional market sense, and so people are exploring other options. They're looking into other companies, they're talking with their friends what are other people doing out there? And there's also more to talk in the news about.

Candice Jay: 4:27

What are these alternatives? How are these able to help people diversify and really the conversation there. It becomes a true sense of talking about their risk and return, understanding that alternatives do provide a different type of liquidity risk, which is you have less liquidity but you're going to have a lot more of the returns that are uncorrelated with the traditional stock and bond market. So when clients do have a good fit in terms of the time that they can invest what they're looking for, it becomes a very good fit in providing a pension style investment portfolio for them where they couldn't really get from the traditional side. So this is becoming more popular. People are coming to our website just on their own trying to find out more about what is going on there.

Sam SIvarajan: 5:22

Yeah, I can totally see that and, as you say, I think that there's particularly with entrepreneurs. I'm assuming that they are understanding this idea of lack of liquidity, that they understand and be comfortable with that risk but recognize the outsized potential for gains and that liquidity premium that you have for not having that day-to-day liquidity. Exactly as a female advisor in the financial industry, what unique perspectives do you bring to the table and how do you navigate the challenges that comes with being in a male-dominated field?

Candice Jay: 6:00

So, first of all, it's truly an advantage to be a female in this world.

Candice Jay: 6:05

You are one of the few and it's not a true representation of the gender splits of the clients that you serve and what's out there.

Candice Jay: 6:12

So there's always situations where someone wants to choose to work with a female advisor, for whatever their reasons may be, and the other side is because there's not as many of you. You're really there to help each other. It's a community where we understand each other. There's more than enough clients to go around. So help each other out, help mentor each other, have conversations that can benefit the end client, and it's more of a collaboration and joy of meeting and working with other female advisors to become even better versions of themselves. And the last thing I wanted to mention is you really do need to learn your advantage in this world and don't hesitate to have male mentors. A lot of men have missions to help out the women in the industry and I had a fabulous male mentor when I went through a formal mentor program at Women in Capital Markets and all he wanted to do was help out and get more female equity in the industry.

Sam SIvarajan: 7:10

Yeah, I think that's a great perspective and in my own experience, I've been fortunate enough to work with and lead some top female advisors and what I've generally found is that, again generalizing that their strengths tended to be that they did a better job of listening to the client and the egos were a lot less present than perhaps their male counterparts might have been and to be able to demonstrate that they had the answers. When I've come to believe that the secret to success in this industry, both for the advisor and the client, is not to have the answers but to ask better questions, and I think that women advisors, at least the ones that I've had the privilege of working with or knowing, tend to be better at asking the really important questions.

Candice Jay: 8:04

Yes, thank you, sam. I mean you said it, not me, but I do definitely see that out there too, that the female advisors, they do take the empathetic side of the conversation as well and spend the time to really do the deep dives, as you said answer, ask the questions and make sure that they're able to help beyond just the investment portfolio.

Sam SIvarajan: 8:31

And that's an interesting topic to maybe go a little bit deeper on, especially when you're dealing with the type of clients that you deal with that are entrepreneurial, that have had a liquidity event, that have gotten inheritance. There are many, many facets to their particular situation. How do you work with these clients to identify the key areas of relevance or where they need help on, and how do you go deep into that discovery process?

Candice Jay: 9:06

So a lot of it comes out naturally. But you look for clues, you look for cues. A lot of my discussions actually evolve around the philanthropic conversation of the family. Within that conversation you get to hear about the family's mission, their values, what they want to accomplish, and from there you can actually work backwards in understanding how it all comes together. So it does take part within many different aspects of the conversation and if you can get into that deep dive of the overall purpose of what they want to accomplish in life, it actually helps out a lot. So way beyond investment management discussions, way beyond planning and taxes, that philanthropic conversation is really key and so helpful in doing the deep dives.

Sam SIvarajan: 9:58

And is it fair to say that this conversation, the deep dive, the discovery, if you will, it isn't a one and done, it's an ongoing process and certainly my experience has been that you might discover something in the 10th conversation two years later that you hadn't known for the previous two years. But part of it is to build that rapport, that dialogue, that trust, that relationship that facilitates that kind of sharing of information 100%.

Candice Jay:: 10:30

So it is definitely a long term type of conversation. I would say it normally takes around four years to truly get into understanding what the mission is and to set up from the portfolio aspect of how we can help out further in their philanthropic giving. And it is a time consuming but genuine type of conversation that not a lot of advisors actually want to take part in. So a lot of advisors want to be more transactional. They want to understand how they can be helpful immediately. But a lot of these other types of conversations take a very long time and patience and you can't really do it unless you're truly genuine about it. So that's the one key thing is how genuine you are about helping them. It doesn't matter how long it actually takes for us to get to the end results, but it's for the client conversation to be as purposeful as possible.

Sam SIvarajan:: 11:28

It is a long term relationship. It is a long term investment. You're not solving the surface problems, but obviously the client is coming to you as a brand new client with certain particular issues that they're looking to address in the short run. And as a business as an advisor, you run a business you have some certain short term goals that you also need to manage. So how do you balance, as an advisor that is building a long term relationship and practice? How do you balance the short term and the long term?

Candice Jay:: 12:06

So if you have an established practice, the short term is really maintaining your client base. Everything is running smoothly there. The long term part of building new prospects, relationships there is always happening on the side. So when you have the not necessarily needing the short term, it's a rolling type of cycle. So as your long term gets closer to becoming clients and you're having you're having some success in closing some business there, then it starts sort of rebuilding. So the cycle has to move in a very long term fashion.

Candice Jay:: 12:43

But I guess the first part is to make sure that you have a stable practice to begin with, so that is able to fulfill your daily communications and needs and everything that you require in running a practice, and then you can work on the long term aside. It's a hard question because you have to do both at the same time and there's never enough hours in the day. But that is truly how you just have to do it. You just have to work very hard and build that base in the beginning and then you're able to focus on the long term side as well.

Sam SIvarajan:: 13:14

Yeah, I think it's a very good way of putting it. I was going to say that's the proverbial chicken and egg. Where do you start? I think obviously you do have to build up a base of business et cetera, where you can solve immediate problems. But you're in the process, you're trying to deepen that relationship with the client, that you can solve bigger and more broader problems. But it's not easy. As you say, there's as much art in this business as there is science, but it's being true to your particular values.

Sam SIvarajan:: 13:48

I think you said at the outset what are your strengths, what is your focus? The firm that you're with, what do they offer, and the clients that you're looking to serve. Where is that trifecta that is really going to make a difference for you, for the firm and the client that you can serve in a long term way? So the industry, the investment industry in Canada is quite fragmented, but it's still dominated by the big banks. You work for one of the larger independence. How important is differentiating your practice and your personal brand, even within this firm, to your success? Can you provide some specific examples?

Candice Jay:: 14:36

Definitely so. The main differentiator, as we talked a little bit about before, is the investment platform. That does give a lot of interest to people in the outset as a primary conversation, but the other side is for you and my other partners in the firm, as advisors, to have a very holistic mindset, is to work with other professionals in the industry, whether it's different types of lawyers that need to help out the families, whether it's the accountants that need to help, whether it's a transactional advisor for a business sale. So the holistic mindset is really there to build a team for the client. The client is the CEO of their life and we are providing that outsourced service and professional abilities to help them through different areas as they progress as well.

Candice Jay:: 15:30

So personal branding is, of course, huge. It's what people know you for, it's, in a way, how you market yourself and how things can be, what people come to you and directly for. So one of the areas of personal branding that I've always focused on and really, to be honest, not knowing it was called personal branding when it first started was within that philanthropic space. So within that area, I'm a part of groups called the Canadian Association of Gift Planners, cagp. It is a national organization. It is a group where there are a lot of the Canadian charities I would say mostly Canadian charities are part of it. Plus there is an advisor arm to it as well and really connecting the two sides together of how can we help our donor clients give more efficiently. And so that is an area where I focused on over 10 years ago. It started off a long time ago. Nothing happens overnight and it was a true passion of mine to really be diving deep into this area. It wasn't really, like I said before, not a purposeful personal branding exercise, but in the end, like if I look backwards, it truly has become that I am definitely known in the industry to help out charities and donors alike on being able to move their philanthropic conversations forward to actual gifts that are more efficient but also able to do so much good in the world and to help other people out and to help the charities out with their missions as well.

Candice Jay:: 17:12

So that is one side that I definitely wanted to help out in, and another side where also unexpected is I had an interest in governance and beyond boards at a very young age, and I started off by being on nonprofit boards, small ones, realizing the challenges that can come from every type of nonprofit board.

Candice Jay:: 17:36

But getting to a point where I have two main boards where I focus on now I'm on the board of the U of T Alumni Association and also one of the arms of the UHN Foundation. So within those two sides again, genuine interest in wanting to help out and be part of it you start creating a personal brand within those organizations as well, whether you bring your financial expertise to the table, whether it is that you are just helping out with the overall mission of spreading the news, of being in the community, helping out with different initiatives that they have going on, you get known in the industry and you get to meet a lot of fantastic people. So really, what you want to do is meet as many great people as possible, have great friendships, genuine relationships as well, and then things happen. Things will just actually work itself out. I know it's not really a great answer, but if you do things right, if you do things with true passion, it will work out. On the other side, on the business sense as well.

Sam SIvarajan:: 18:47

That is a great answer. It's the quintessential 10-year overnight success story, and I think that you hit the key points. I think, in my view, is that, look, you have to have a genuine passion for what you do and you go into it as what can you contribute? What's your interest, what's your passion? And the brand or the reputation or the network or the potential sources of clients those are all just happy byproducts that come out of it. It's the proverbial pot of gold at the end of the rainbow If you chase it, it disappears. I think it's when you're not looking for it that it ends up coming.

Sam SIvarajan:: 19:27

I like what you had said before about holistic. It is a multifaceted type of approach that you need to take, I think, to be a successful advisor. You've got different types of interests, you've got different channels in which you are dealing with your clients and your potential clients and over time, you'll refine that process. You'll refine your value proposition, you'll refine your brand and you'll refine your client base. But all of this takes time, effort and, I guess, a willingness to reflect back and think okay, what is it that you want to do and what is it that you're successful doing?

Candice Jay:: 20:11

That's exactly what it is and I wouldn't ever have guessed that my board work, that I'm just passionate about doing, would lead to a lot of executives who are on boards to be interested to get to know me, have conversations. The investment side, like you said, is a byproduct. You can't go in thinking that is one of your strategies and tactics to find new clients. It is the byproduct and it does work over the longer period of time. So I appreciate what you've been saying.

Sam SIvarajan:: 20:46

So one topic I'd like to get your take on. We see lots of discussion about AI, artificial intelligence, and the potential threat, or existential threat, to advisors in the industry. I'd love to hear what your take on this is and how you are preparing your own practice for this new landscape.

Candice Jay:: 21:06

So I'm actually very excited to see how AI can help with efficiencies within our world. There are a lot of things that are manual. There are a lot of things that we could do better within the investment management world and wealth management world. So with AI, if we can help save some time in a lot of areas, that will leave even more time to create those genuine connections and have conversations with our clients. So I'm actually one where I'm excited.

Candice Jay:: 21:35

I don't see it as a threat. I think it's it's only helpful of anything and we'll see how far it can actually be taken and it will never actually take away the relationships that you build and the bonds that you have on the human connection side. There's just nothing else that can replace it with robots. So where we want to see AI take place is on the more technical side, whether it's through the client relationship management system, whether it's helping. You know we have lots of regulatory paperwork that we need to do within our industry. So to help out there, that would be wonderful to have the help of AI. So it's still very early stages. We're not seeing it impact us too much right now, but if anything, this is the time period that the firms can help redirect on where AI can really provide the extra value.

Sam SIvarajan:: 22:33

Yeah, I think you mentioned something interesting that the AI can deal with what I would call administrative or technical aspects of the wealth management world, but that the advisor should focus on the human side. Now that resonates deeply with me. I always thought that the competitive advantage or comparative advantage a good advisor has is the ability to connect with the human on the other side of that portfolio or the other side of that policy. Can you talk a little bit about how you, as an advisor and interacting with the human, deal with behavioral issues like behavioral biases, the idea of coaching them, because of course, every investor knows that they should buy low and sell high, but there is a challenge doing it when the market is crashing, it seems to me there's a role there for human advisors to play with their human clients.

Sam SIvarajan:: 23:34

Can you talk a little bit about your thoughts on that and how you're putting that to work for your clients?

Candice Jay:: 23:41

Definitely, and I would say that humans are their own worst enemy when it comes to emotional investing. As you mentioned, lots of behavioral biases in terms of investing and that also differs between women and men in what they've gone through, and a lot of it is a historical foundation for what decisions that they make now. So, again, ai cannot replace that. That is something where we need to talk to the clients as professionals, understand and hear where the emotional cusps are and to help the clients through that and to help them understand and explain things in different ways that help resonate to the message of whether or not they should be doing something. So it comes back to we are coaches to our clients. We are, in a way, therapists to our clients.

Candice Jay:: 24:36

At the same time, it is so much more than just an investment job, a wealth advisory job. We really touch on all the different aspects there and when we hear the cues that would cause any concern, that's the time to name it and to really talk about it. Don't just push it under the rug. You have to actually let them know. Like you know, this is actually a bias that is studied in the books, in the textbooks. We actually look at this all the time, and you're not alone out there. You're not the only one that has this type of reaction or thought process to it all. So that type of conversation a robot cannot replace and it's for our jobs to really identify and to help clients through that. That's really why they want to work with someone. Otherwise, they can do the robo advising, they can do the different AI types of tools out there. This is where you know we need to take part and be a part of these conversations and the lives of our clients there.

Sam SIvarajan:: 25:39

That's a great perspective, candice. We're coming to the end of our podcast, so I have a few final rapid fire questions for you, what I ask all of my guests to go through. So, if you're ready, number one what is the most important lesson you've learned over the years?

Candice Jay:: 25:58

The most important lesson is to be patient. Everything is about patients out there. There's not much more you can do about it. If you are patient and you do things the right way, good things will happen.

Sam SIvarajan:: 26:10

I think that's a great perspective. Patients as an investor, I think. Patients as an advisor, building a practice. I think that's a good lesson. Number two finish the sentence I wish I had known.

Candice Jay:: 26:27

I wish I had known what a tough journey it would be being an advisor, but how fulfilling it is as well. So I do know that now, but I wish I had known before I started, because there are definitely days where it was very tough and you question yourself. But once you come through that, then it is the best thing that you could do Great.

Sam SIvarajan:: 26:55

Number three what do you think is the biggest pain point for most advisors and what advice would you give them?

Candice Jay:: 27:02

I think the biggest pain point, and what I hear all the time is clients ghosting them. They're like why aren't they responding to me? Why does it take them two months, three months, whether it's two weeks? Two weeks is okay, but even two weeks feels like a very long time, and so I would say that is the biggest challenge is that you don't want to feel like you're desperate. You want to be helpful. You want to understand why are they not responding to me right away? But on the other side they're very busy. I work with some executives where it takes them a year to respond back, and that's okay Because I know like if you have the confidence that you know that you're helping them, then it doesn't matter. It's on their timeline. It's not a big deal, you know it's on their timeline. It's not on your own timeline.

Sam SIvarajan:: 27:51

That's a very interesting comment. Do you mean clients or prospective clients, or both?

Candice Jay:: 27:58

Perspective clients, mainly for that.

Sam SIvarajan:: 28:01

Awesome, Candice. I've really enjoyed our discussion. Lots of insights to take away. If listeners want to learn more about you or find out about your work, where do they go?

Candice Jay:: 28:14

You can find me on LinkedIn. I'm pretty active on there. I do lots of posts. I'll respond to messages and reach outs, but also through our company website, ccl privatecapitalcom, you can find our suite and my partners of all the wealth advisors across Canada on there, and myself as well. So always happy to chat and talk and to help see if I can help get someone to the next level within their practice or whatever questions they may have.

Sam SIvarajan:: 28:45

That's great, Candice. It's been a real pleasure. Thank you for joining us today on the Future Ready Advisor podcast.

Candice Jay:: 28:52

Thank you, Sam. It's a pleasure to be here as well.

Sam SIvarajan:: 29:08

In today's episode of the Future Ready Advisor, I spoke with Candice Jay, a wealth advisor with CC&L. Here are my three key takeaways from our discussion. Number one the importance of patience and a holistic approach. Candice emphasizes the importance of patience in building a financial advisory practice. She believes that good things will happen if you're patient and do things the right way. She also highlights the importance of a holistic approach in financial advising, which involves working with other professionals in the industry, such as lawyers and accountants, to provide a comprehensive service to clients.

Sam SIvarajan:: 29:44

Number two the role of female advisors. Candice discusses her experience as a female advisor in a male-dominated field. She sees being a female advisor as an advantage, as it allows her to bring unique perspectives to the table. She also mentions the importance of collaboration and mentorship among female advisors in the industry. Number three the power of personal branding and genuine interest. Candice shares her personal branding journey, which involves her interest in philanthropy and governance. She believes that genuine interest and passion can lead to success in the industry. She also emphasizes the importance of building genuine relationships and meeting as many great people as possible. Thank you for listening to this episode of the Future Ready Advisor. Please be sure to subscribe to this podcast and if you can rate it while you're at it, I would appreciate it. Visit SamSeverajancom, where you can download a behavioral coaching guide and find other resources. Join me in the next episode for more tips and tools to make your practice future ready.