From Compliance to Connection: Redefining Client Relationships in Financial Advisory with Lauren Jeffery

Lauren A Jeffery: 00:00

Straight.

Sam Sivarajan: 00:02

Hi everyone, I'm your host, Sam Sivarajan. Welcome to the Future Ready Advisor. Today, I'm joined by Lauren Jeffery, a registered psychotherapist, certified executor advisor, and doctoral researcher, who brings an interesting new perspective to the advisor-client relationship. Lauren started her career in compliance, helping firms navigate the regulatory side of financial services. But after a life-changing series of events, she took a different path. One that led her to psychotherapy, to working with some of the most vulnerable populations in society, and ultimately to redefining how we know our clients in financial services. Lauren, welcome to the show.

Lauren A Jeffery: 00:44

Thank you so much, Sam. I'm very happy to be here.

Sam Sivarajan: 00:47

Well, I'm delighted to have you. And I think this is, to me, it's a topic that's near and dear to my heart, because I do believe it's one of the things that makes us invaluable to our clients is once you get to know them truly. So let's dive in. You've had a unique career path, as I described, from compliance trainer and educator to psychotherapist to academic researcher. Maybe you can share a little bit about how that journey unfolded and how it shapes the work you're doing with advisors today.

Lauren A Jeffery: 01:20

Yeah, absolutely. So as you alluded to in that wonderful introduction, the year was 2019 and it was a perfect storm of a lot of things, personally and professionally. And I had reached a crossroads where I'm not independently wealthy, I need to work, but I also need to work at something that fed me and nurtured me. And so I thought, well, I will become a psychotherapist.

Sam Sivarajan: 01:42

Right here? Right here?

Lauren A Jeffery: 01:48

And so it was in the first class of my first course, if my master's program, and I get called out by my teacher and they say, we understand that you understand what you're reading, but how would you apply this in your real life? And I'm like, well, that's an excellent question. Because I've just spent 25 years, as I used to joke with people teaching financial advisors not to steal.

Sam Sivarajan: 02:05

Right.

Sam Sivarajan: 02:13

Hmm?

Lauren A Jeffery: 02:17

But, you know, helping them navigate these really critical conversations. And now this academic is like, well, how does biopsychosocial theory fit? How would you apply that with your advisors? And we were talking about actually the therapeutic alliance because we use psychotherapists today in Canada are taught first things first is biopsychosocial theory. And what this tells us is that every single person is the sum of their biology, so their physical body, and all that that brings, the good, the bad, and the ugly, their psychology, so this is not only how their brain functions, but the lessons they learn, how they choose to engage in problem-solving, decision-making, and all of that good stuff, as well as the social component, which is the people and places that you hang out in, where you work, where you live, where you play.

Sam Sivarajan: 03:17

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 03:17

So you are a sum total of all of those things. And so as a therapist gaining insight into this through creating this therapeutic alliance, and this is the big tip off, the research tells us that the better the therapeutic alliance, the better the outcomes. And it's this that I go, huh, that sounds kind of familiar.

Sam Sivarajan: 03:37

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 03:44

advisors, it's all about the relationship with their clients. And so the better the relationship, the better the outcomes. So I start, you know, and so I start having to write about financial advice giving, because I have to apply it to what I know today. And this is what I know. Financial advice in Canada. So this actually lends me to move and shift from becoming a full-time psychotherapist

Sam Sivarajan: 03:47

Mm-hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 03:51

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 04:14

So I currently run a very, very small practice by design, but I start this company PointShift, which is a practice management education company, because now I recognize that there's this critical intersection between financial advisors and the clients that they serve.

Sam Sivarajan: 04:23

You.

Sam Sivarajan: 04:27

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 04:33

So I'm doing research and then behavioral finance comes across. And I'm like, this is really interesting. Let's see what behavioral finance has to say. So I'm learning all about this. I'm like, yeah, this is really great. But how do you do it? How do you do behavioral finance? Because the School of Economics created this. So they did the math.

Sam Sivarajan: 04:51

How do you apply it?

Sam Sivarajan: 04:53

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 05:00

So they tell us that there is financial reasons why we need to involve ourselves with our clients' emotions and biases and these other things, because there is a financial consequence to clients because they're making bad decisions around money because of these things. And I call them things because there's like 180 some odd unique biases. Behavioral finance only touches upon 10. So there's a greater human experience that's actually occurring. And so I'm learning all of this as I'm becoming a psychotherapist. So then while I'm doing my doctoral work, sorry, my master's, I have to do a placement. So I have to now start actually becoming a psychotherapist. At this point in my journey, I know I don't want to be a nine to five Monday to Friday psychotherapist, so I get myself a job.

Sam Sivarajan: 05:36

Ahem.

Lauren A Jeffery: 05:57

in a transition house in Toronto called Alpha House. And it's a transition house for men recovering from substance abuse who are trying to transition back into the community. So I start working and it's during the height of COVID when all of Toronto is locked down. So I'm locked in a house with 18 grown men, I think about half who had been paroled out from the prison system. And so I now am hanging out and talking with these men trying to help them.

Sam Sivarajan: 06:08

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 06:27

reintegrate back into society? Well, this also brings up a whole new set of questions. What do I know about a guy who's been homeless for 25 years? Nothing. What do I know about the 18-year-old kid whose mom got him hooked on crack? Nothing.

Sam Sivarajan: 06:39

Hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 06:49

What about the kid from Forest Hill whose parent, you know, had big houses, big money? So now seeing all sorts of life and how do we navigate through that? And so I start asking these critical questions of men and point shift comes to be at the dining room table of Alpha House with these men. And so I start, and this is where my KYC model comes in.

Sam Sivarajan: 06:59

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 07:18

because I know we're not asking the right questions. Because one of my clients is an ophthalmologist. So how does an ophthalmologist go from living a really great life, living in a high rent neighborhood to being homeless? from an 18-year opioid addiction.

Sam Sivarajan: 07:34

No.

Sam Sivarajan: 07:39

I think those are bang on. I think to your points, I think it's such, it's coming from a different sphere, as you say, like in that kind of transition phase. But I think the parallels to the financial advisory space to me are right there to see, right? And I would think that the audience would agree with that. You are as an advisor, you're talking to people that, you don't have a complete picture of their, and I love this biopsychosocial framework, you don't have a good understanding of their health or living situation. You don't have a good understanding of their psychological biases, preferences, or any of those. And you don't have a good knowledge about their social circumstances. And that includes the experiences that they've had that have defined them, whether you know, with money or with, you know, significant others or what have you, but getting, I think to be, a holistic financial advisor in today's age, you need to have that your foot in each one of those three areas to get a better picture. And I think what you're talking about, I know that many people would balk at the characterization of this as therapy, but In a lot of places in the US, there are a lot of institutions now that are actually offering accreditation in it's called financial therapy, right? And I don't think that's a bad way of looking at it that, you know, the advisor of the future in my mind would be that element of it's going beyond what we used to call a coach. I think that's an important element, but that therapy element that you're talking about, I think that's critical.

Lauren A Jeffery: 09:11

Yes.

Lauren A Jeffery: 09:19

Yeah, and so not only are we, as you said, starting to see these different accreditations and institutions, but it actually goes far, it's far broader than that because you actually hit the nail on the head with like the appetite to have this discussion. I just talked to an advisor a few months ago and they were like, I don't want to talk to my client about their divorce. And I'm like, what? And they're like,

Sam Sivarajan: 09:56

Why not?

Lauren A Jeffery: 09:58

I don't want to get involved in it. I'm like, you're not getting involved in it. You're asking him how he's doing. He's fine. And I challenged him and I pushed him back. And I was like, you're not doing a good KYC update. That didn't go over well. But this is what needs to, because there's ego.

Sam Sivarajan: 10:23

No, look, I think if I can, I totally agree with you. And I think that this is, I might even go further than to say, leave aside the KYC element of it. And because I agree with that. But if you are trying to build a deeper relationship, look, I get that it's uncomfortable, but the question, you know, I would ask myself in that situation is if this was one of my friends. Okay. One of my close friends or somebody that I've got, you know, more than a passing relationship. how would I interact with them in this similar type of situation? And if I was in that situation, how would I want my friend to interact with me?

Lauren A Jeffery: 10:25

Yeah.

Lauren A Jeffery: 11:04

Mm-hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 11:05

And I think to me, an advisor, it's not that you're going to be a friend to your clients, but you, if you are more than just processing transactions, if you want to have a valued relationship, a trusted relationship, I think there's got to be some emotional involvement. Now that doesn't mean that you're going to have them lying on your couch and they're going to tell them all about your childhood and everything else, but you have to show some real genuine, authentic interest in their lives and the things that matter. And in this case, I think as you're talking about the person that has gone through a divorce, I can't imagine that this is not something that that's on that client's mind, you know, almost 24 seven and for you to not acknowledge it, for you not to talk about it, for you not to be empathetic about it. I think that's not just a missed opportunity. I think you're actually hurting your, you know, the, the depth of your relationship with that client.

Lauren A Jeffery: 12:07

Well, consequently, the client just cashed out.

Sam Sivarajan: 12:12

Interesting. Yeah.

Lauren A Jeffery: 12:14

So, you know.

Sam Sivarajan: 12:16

Ahem.

Lauren A Jeffery: 12:18

So I think there's so much tabooism around, right? And especially because of the demographics that we work with with our financial advisor base right now, we still sit primarily in that 51% of white men over 50. Like we're still, you know, and we raised a whole generations of men who were told to be strong.

Sam Sivarajan: 12:28

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 12:46

who were told to, you know, this is not emotional, you need to detach, which is complete bunk, as you know. And so we are suffering the consequences of that because now it's actually become, it's now an entry in the DSM. We have something called financial advisor anxiety or the FAA, which is a lot like white coat syndrome, right?

Sam Sivarajan: 13:09

Okay, yeah.

Lauren A Jeffery: 13:11

And so for those of you don't know what white coat syndrome is, like your blood pressure goes up about 40 points. I'm one of those people when you walk into a doctor's office, right? So people are having this same response when they're walking into a financial advisor's office. And if you're ignoring that, then you're not upholding your duty of care. Because really what a lot of my research keeps coming back to is like the client's always at the losing end of everything.

Sam Sivarajan: 13:19

Yep. Yep.

Sam Sivarajan: 13:24

Interesting.

Lauren A Jeffery: 13:40

because of an unwillingness or inability, whether they don't know, they don't care, they're not comfortable, they don't know how, to actually say, like, man, are you okay? And to not be scared about what comes back, you know, because when we are respectfully curious about somebody else's life, that's a big green flag to use today's vernacular.

Sam Sivarajan: 13:53

Mm-hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 13:58

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 14:10

That one small question can shift a whole relationship because you've just showed somebody you care and you're putting somebody else's needs ahead of yours, which you should be doing as a financial advisor anyway.

Sam Sivarajan: 14:12

Mm-hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 14:23

No, look, I think you're absolutely right. I think that the and I would say that in my experience that most advisors genuinely care and want to be in that position that they can support their clients even on these elements. I think the challenge is, as you rightly put it, that we've been taught to focus on the technical. We've been taught to talk to focus on the objective. And I think that there is a degree of.

Lauren A Jeffery: 14:25

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 14:27

agreed.

Sam Sivarajan: 14:49

discomfort to get into things that they believe are perhaps too personal or they don't know how to handle it. And I think that this segues into one of the questions that I wanted to ask you is that, I think that most advisors are taught to ask the questions, the hard data questions that they need. to ask in order to get the information that they need. And this is very much in the KYC, the, you know, the form filling and everything else that you have to do, which is an important element of the practice. But I've always believed that the magic happens in the follow-up questions and the silence. I remember talking to, you know, a veteran advisor who shared with me that he has his usual intake form for his clients with all the questions, et cetera, but that the real value in that intake form is on the back up pages, et cetera, because he's just jotting down notes as the client is talking instead of, know, I've got question two, then it's question four, et cetera. Now, from our conversation, I think you share that belief that this follow up questions that that silence letting the client kind of sit there and reflect on things that they might not have reflected before. What advice would you give advisors on, you know, to put it crassly, how to become better listeners and perhaps ask questions, as you say, from a place of curiosity and not control?

Lauren A Jeffery: 16:22

So I love this question because it's especially with financial advisors because it's so complex, right? Especially that control piece. To become a better listener, you just have to stop and listen. That means putting your phone away, putting your pen down, you know, just listening to them and not letting your mind in. really an act and it's a skill that is learned and it takes practice. Even as a psychotherapist, you'll see me at times like biting my knuckle because I just got to keep my mouth shut, but I'm like, right? And so, you learn because, and especially in today's day and age, there's a million ways that we can capture technology and data. And so I always say that the questions are there to shine light on the liminal space. Because for me, that's where life and living really happens, is in that liminal space. And that is in the questions left unanswered, how the questions are answered, the silence.

Sam Sivarajan: 17:18

Okay.

Lauren A Jeffery: 17:35

But we also have to give our clients space. And that space is the silence. Silence can be uncomfortable, right? But uncomfortable doesn't mean scary, bad, dangerous. It just means we've hit a conflict that we don't understand or we don't have an answer to something. And when we speak to the form, because that's sort of my thing, is we teach advisors to speak to the form because you need to get the paperwork.

Sam Sivarajan: 17:38

Mm-hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 17:44

Right.

Lauren A Jeffery: 18:04

and the compliance piece through. And so we don't give them the space and the opportunity to actually reflect. And so this whole notion prompted me to create, this is what helped me create Where You At, my online questionnaire, the KYC tool, right, that you can send to your clients. They're gonna answer 24 questions and 24 scenarios or or situations about their current life today. And you as an advisor get 24 questions back. These are all questions that I ask. And so it gives you an opportunity to have that conversation about, listen, what are you struggling with today? Like, is it your family or is it money? Or is it because your family needs a ton of money? Because all of those things are very unique.

Sam Sivarajan: 18:13

Mm-hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 18:41

Mm-hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 18:43

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 19:02

and distinct things in a person's life, right? It's the silence, it's the liminal space, it's all of that contextual stuff that comes up when you ask different questions instead of, how old are you, Sam? 29. Oh, thanks.

Sam Sivarajan: 19:18

I'm not for the listeners

Lauren A Jeffery: 19:26

The last time I tried to actually say that, honestly, I was really wrong. So I always like... But you get what I'm saying, right? So when we just speak to that form, we don't understand that at 29, you've already had all of these life experiences, whether it's a tragic loss of parents or a sibling or losing money and access to schooling, because you had to drop out, right? You just don't know what brings people

Sam Sivarajan: 19:29

Hahaha

Lauren A Jeffery: 19:56

to today. And most people don't even know what today looks like for them, which is what prompted this where you at questionnaire. Because, you know, the first thing I say to my psychotherapy clients and even actually my practice management clients, we just got to stop for 24 hours. Let's just stop the crazy, stop the noise, and let's just breathe. And then let's talk about what's going on.

Sam Sivarajan: 20:20

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 20:25

because everything comes at us so fast. Time is money.

Sam Sivarajan: 20:30

No, I think, look, I think it's very powerful what you said. I think to your point that the silence, we're not used to it. And yes, it could be conflict. I do think that the type of questions that you're talking about, the ones that are not filling the form, right? That are easy, that we know the answers to, they're deeper and they require reflection. And, you know, for a lot of clients, when you're asking that deeper question, there are questions that might, they might never have been asked or that they've asked themselves. you know, the silence isn't that you're, it's, it's uncomfortable because we make it uncomfortable because we think, especially as financial advisors who are type A and that, you know, feel like that they're the expert and that they have to have an answer for everything. We're uncomfortable in that situation thinking that we have to fill that silence, but the, the, client isn't offended or anything else. They're actually just thinking, right? And I think to your point, like leave them the space to think it through and let them come up with an answer. And I think one challenge I'd be interested in your thoughts. One challenge is that, you know, because it feels like 10 seconds or five seconds of waiting feels like forever. And because we're in a rush, because we have only limited time and we have to produce, cetera, I think as soon as that client ultimately gives the answer. I think we move on to the next question, et cetera. And I think that the real, real magic in my experience is asking the next question, right? Like, I mean, when I say next question about the answer that they just gave, cetera, dig deeper, because it might be the initial thing that they come in and you want to test it. to say, okay, let me make sure I understand. Is this what you mean, et cetera? Or can you give me an example of, you know, how that kind of thinking is applied, you know, lately or something like that, or how that has changed over time? And I think this isn't questions for the sake of questions or conversation. You're actually kind of asking the client to reflect on it, to make sure that the A, that you understand as an advisor, but B, that you're making sure that the client themselves understands the nuances of what they've said, right?

Sam Sivarajan: 20:31

produce. Yeah.

Lauren A Jeffery: 22:50

because oftentimes that's the first time the, like the first time the advisor's hearing it is also the first time the clients heard it. And so that is what I like to say to a lot of people is when clients come to us looking for help, oftentimes they bring us their peanut butter sandwich problem. So peanut butter sandwiches, your kids come home and every day you make them a peanut butter sandwich.

Sam Sivarajan: 22:58

Yeah, yeah.

Lauren A Jeffery: 23:18

So your kids come home, so you make them a peanut butter sandwich, your kid melts down because you didn't cut the crust off, which incidentally you haven't done ever, right? So is the problem really about the crust or is it that your kid fell on the playground, got yelled at by the teacher, their best friend said something mean, right? Like they just had a bad day. And it is our job as helpers, right? to actually find where we need to help. And if we just take the low hanging fruit, the peanut butter sandwich, like then we get caught up in this like spiral of nothingness that never resolves itself. The client's still resentful. You're not gonna see any traction, because the client's not doing what you are proposing, right? Because you're talking about the peanut butter sandwich. But thank you. Thank you.

Sam Sivarajan: 24:13

I love that, Lauren. I love that analogy. It's wonderful. No, I think you're absolutely right. It's like the, you know, we're solving the surface issue and not the deeper problem, right? And it's easy to do that because it looks like we're, you know, in a problem, you know, solution, right? It's the hammer and nail story, right? So like, if you have a hammer, if you approach, then everything is a nail, right? And I don't think that solves the problem.

Lauren A Jeffery: 24:39

because your clients may be coming to you for financial advice, but it may not be financial advice about their retirement. They know they need retirement help, but the fact of the matter is they're struggling today. And if you don't have a handle on what's happening in your client's life today, you can't help them anyway effectively about tomorrow because you don't understand what's happening today. Today is the predecessor to tomorrow, right?

Sam Sivarajan: 24:53

Thank

Lauren A Jeffery: 25:08

So, yeah.

Sam Sivarajan: 25:09

Yeah, no, I think, look, I think that's a great point. I think, you know, we live in, I think the financial advisory space is unique in the sense that we have to help our clients balance the today with the future, right? They have to have a plan and everything else. But I remember like, you know, there's always this question about, okay, if you're helping a client, for instance, on paying down debt, you know, there's what's the right debt, what's the debt that they should pay down first, right? And so there's two different models to that. The first model is of course you pay down the most expensive debt, right? The one that has got the highest interest rates, let's say credit card or something like that. And look, from a pure technical financial point of view, that makes total sense. That is what you should pay. That's the most expensive debt that you have. But from a more behavioral, know, understanding the whole person point of view, It might actually make more sense for them to pay that small debt that they have, even if it's the cheapest debt that they have, because they've solved the problem today. They've built this kind of sense, self-sense, self-awareness that they can, yeah, you know what? I can pay down debt. the impact of that paying down that one small debt. even at a relatively cheap cost of debt is monumentally more than paying down that more expensive debt, right?

Lauren A Jeffery: 26:38

So it's about small successes, small wins, right? But this also you had asked about a few questions ago, you were asking about control. And a lot of control is wrapped up into this as well. And we don't realize, right? Because financial advisors also have this duality, right? They get paid to manage somebody else's money.

Sam Sivarajan: 26:44

Mm-hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 26:47

Mm-hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 26:50

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 27:04

So when they're managing somebody else's money, they're also acutely aware that their bottom line is impacted by this. So there's that element of control, right? Because you have to run your business. And so, and then this also frames, and this is why control is such a big thing, because of how the system is set up. I think I went off on a bit of a tangent here, but control is a really big piece on both sides.

Sam Sivarajan: 27:10

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 27:34

of the equation because of the personal nature of money.

Sam Sivarajan: 27:39

No, I think that's fair. So your point is, if I can, I'm interpreting here. So obviously the advisor, you know, by nature of it being a business, et cetera, and the fact that the client is coming to them for solution, there's an element that they feel that, you know, that they have to exercise control, show control, et cetera. But are you arguing that the client also needs to feel that they have some sort of self-actualization and control in their own affairs, that this is their decision as well?

Lauren A Jeffery: 27:39

Yeah.

Lauren A Jeffery: 28:09

Yes. Yes. Because you're asking somebody to manage something that's very deeply personal to you, your life savings, and you're putting that faith and that's a huge relationship. there was a, I remember talking about this back in my teaching days, there was this article that used to always come up around the research about how Canadians spend more time looking for a financial advisor than they do a doctor or a lawyer, right? And if that doesn't speak volumes,

Sam Sivarajan: 28:14

Yep. Yep.

Lauren A Jeffery: 28:38

right, about the importance of this role, the fact that the financial advisors were deemed essential personnel during COVID, right? These people, the financial advisors have inherently a ton of power, right? And with great power comes great responsibility. And so I think this, understanding that power dynamic that we have between our clients, right?

Sam Sivarajan: 28:52

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 29:06

Like all of this stuff goes into how we engage and how we treat, how we interact. It also informs our product selections, strategy. It's this wonderful, it's so, yeah, wonderfully complex and it's been a really interesting place to work and to explore because they're so essential.

Sam Sivarajan: 29:16

Mm-hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 29:26

No, no, look, I think you're absolutely right. mean, look, at the end of the day, it is a very human relationship type of business. And so I think your comment is a perfect segue to the talk about the importance of self-awareness, right? That advisors need to understand their own biases and emotional responses before they can truly serve their clients. I mean, you talked about it a bit, but maybe you can expand on that, why that self work is so critical, not just for the advisors own success, but for their interactions with their clients and perhaps how advisors might start doing some of that self work.

Lauren A Jeffery: 30:12

So that's a really great question. Do you know about social identity theory? Right? So social identity theory is, you know, typically it's something we learn about when we begin any academic research. And really it's about positioning the research to ensure that the data and whatever comes out of it is clear what the relationship.

Sam Sivarajan: 30:19

But for the listeners.

Lauren A Jeffery: 30:40

to minimize bias and blind spots and keep objectivity, right? Which are all things that financial advisors need to be with their clients, right? Because it's not about them, right? It's about their client. And so because we have this lack of self-awareness, oftentimes researchers go through a social identity exercise. And so really what I say is the place that you speak from

Sam Sivarajan: 30:43

.

Sam Sivarajan: 30:45

Mm-hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 30:48

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 31:09

is the place that you stand. And what that means is, what does your citizenship tell about you? What does your gender speak about your decisions? What does, you know, your political, your faith, your age, all of these things, your social class, what does this and how does this inform you with, as it pertains, I should say, to money? So I actually did with dynamic mutual funds, if listeners are curious, there is a CE webinar called Bridging the Gap, where I talk about my doctoral research and I take people through a social identity exercise, because this helps position you, right? What kind of political affiliation are you? Are you a liberal or are you a hard right, hard left? Are you a radical or are you just like, I'm pulling the covers over my head and I vote?

Sam Sivarajan: 31:57

Thank you.

Lauren A Jeffery: 32:06

just because I know that's what I'm supposed to do. That is going to inform how you talk to your clients about, especially about what's happening in today's political sphere. You know, like if you're not political, you may have a problem with your clients that are freaking out, right? So how do you talk about that? Ask simple questions. How do you feel? What do you think? What keeps you up? What scares you?

Sam Sivarajan: 32:15

Hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 32:19

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 32:36

Simple, simple questions and then you just ask the question and sit back and listen. yeah, so doing that self work is super critical and just go through it, figure out, you know, are you a Canadian citizen? Were you born here? Are you a newcomer? Is this home?

Sam Sivarajan: 32:42

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 33:02

Or is this just a place you're staying until you get your PR? People come here for all sorts of reasons. And it's, you need to know why you're doing what you're doing. And that's all of this social identity work. But the quickest and easiest way is go on dynamic, get yourself a compliance CE credit while you're at it, and learn about the place that you stand.

Sam Sivarajan: 33:09

Mm-hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 33:26

And by the way, this self-work or self-awareness is ongoing, right? Whether it's for your client or whether it's for yourself, because all of these things change over time. I mean, what you view, you know, I mean, for example, look at what's happening right now. There are lots of snowbirds that thought that they were going to live in Florida, you know, for their whole retirement. In fact, they planned their whole working life and retirement around it. And now that they're rethinking it, right?

Lauren A Jeffery: 33:58

And that's all loss of identity as well.

Sam Sivarajan: 33:59

Yeah. So I think that, you know, like, look, circumstances are always going to dictate, you know, that our worldview on a lots of issues, you know, whether it's political, whether it's on social issues and other things. And that comes, you know, I've learned this my own, you know, in my own journey is that, you know, that changes partly as you grow older, but partly as your personal and family circumstances change. as partly as external events are occurring, that kind of impact your judgment. And I think. You know, I think to your point, it's important that advisors, you know, have a good sense of self-awareness of all of those factors and how that it's impacting themselves. And part of that is to know, you know, how they're, how they may be portraying themselves to clients, but also to, I think, to be aware, if they're aware of it themselves, that those changes and how those are occurring, I think there can be more in tune with what's going on, you know, or some of the, levers or things that might be impacting the client's lives, right?

Lauren A Jeffery: 35:05

So another piece of my work that I do, I'm also studying the social determinants of health and the relationship that money has. So the social determinants health, there are like 12 things that like everybody needs to like live a good life and that's housing, transportation, education, da da da da. And so when you do this social identity and then you overlay it, with these social determinants of health, this is what is going to inform your relationship with money. So one of the things in my research that I'm doing on financial advisors in Canada is I'm asking them all sorts of questions around money. What are their thoughts, beliefs, attitudes around money, work, and their life? Because those also inform.

Sam Sivarajan: 35:40

Mm-hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 35:43

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 36:00

Some great research has been done by researchers out in BC analyzing Canadian advisors, both IIROC and MFDA. I know it's all the one and the same now, but analyzing trades and financial advisors, personal accounts look just the same as their clients. That's a problem.

Sam Sivarajan: 36:18

Mm-hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 36:21

It is. I've, you know, if that's interesting, I'll just add to it because that was a little bit of my doctoral research and also I've looked at the research and I think that the good news is at least from everything that I've seen and I've seen, it's not that there's not a, there's nothing nefarious going here that advisors are doing, et cetera. It is simply coming from, I think a good place where advisors believe

Lauren A Jeffery: 36:44

No.

Sam Sivarajan: 36:51

this is where I would invest my money today. And as a good advisor serving my clients in the best way possible, that implicit thought is kind of translating into the way that they're recommending portfolios for their clients, for instance, right?

Lauren A Jeffery: 36:55

Yes.

Lauren A Jeffery: 37:04

problem is if you just assume that your clients share the same values, because this is what comes out of the research, is this whole like, well, my clients share my values and I most assuredly don't share my financial advisors the values, right? Not all of them. so, but as a client, I expect my financial advisor to come at me with solutions that meet my needs. And so if they already have that in their head, that bias, that shortcut, it's not serving me as a client. And it is to my detriment. Yeah.

Sam Sivarajan: 37:23

No, no, I don't understand.

Sam Sivarajan: 37:39

Yep.

Sam Sivarajan: 37:42

So I, so I, no, so I a hundred percent agree with that. I, nothing I say is trying to say that the, you know, they call it, no, that's okay. I think that it's not okay. You know, the client is coming because they have from a KYC it's perspective. It's not okay from a client suitability perspective. It is not okay from a long-term client goal achievement. It's not okay.

Lauren A Jeffery: 37:55

I know.

Sam Sivarajan: 38:16

All I'm trying to say here is that there isn't something that barriers going on, but I think it ties back to your point that understanding this for advisors, understanding that self-awareness of where their bias is and how these things can play out is going to be critical for moving from the status quo to someplace more towards where the clients want and need it to be.

Lauren A Jeffery: 38:19

comes from a place 1000%.

Lauren A Jeffery: 38:42

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Lauren A Jeffery: 38:46

Yeah. And the other neat thing is when we start shifting these conversations, a lot of other really great things happen because we provide opportunity, space and options for other voices to be heard. We struggle with women in financial services. Well, why aren't women joining financial services? Well, there's a million and one reasons.

Sam Sivarajan: 39:00

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 39:09

I'm gonna tell you right now, it's because the system doesn't work for us. And so when there is enough momentum and, you know, I said this before, we only know what we know. And to your point, we're trying to do the best that we do. We can, but we now know that the system doesn't work as intended and life is changing and people are changing. The challenge is, financial advice and financial services and how we teach advisors hasn't changed. We get the old guys that have already put in their 20, 30 years, they're not ready to retire for whatever reason, right? So we trot them out, we trot them across the country, do these road shows, they teach all these newbies all of their business tricks. How we did business 10 years ago even. doesn't necessarily mean this is how we're doing business today because our demographics have changed, right? And the markets changed, right? But we're not teaching them any differently. And so this is the disservice because my doctoral work is in education, right? And how we educate financial advisors. And so we're doing them a huge disservice, which then, yeah. Yeah.

Sam Sivarajan: 40:11

market has changed, right?

Sam Sivarajan: 40:18

No, I think you make a great point. So let's zoom out for a moment. So based on all your research and work, what do you think the advisor of 2040 needs to look like?

Lauren A Jeffery: 40:40

they need to be a therapist.

Lauren A Jeffery: 40:44

because initial research that came out five years ago from one, I think it was McKinsey, who's the advisor of 2030. And they very clearly stated that clients are gonna want a highly, highly personalized Netflix-like experience, and they will want and primarily need their financial advisor for basically financial life coaching.

Sam Sivarajan: 41:01

Mm-hmm.

Sam Sivarajan: 41:05

Yeah, I think.

Lauren A Jeffery: 41:11

It's no longer the, I'm gonna talk to you once a year and say like your company is still, you're still putting in your 300 bucks a month. Great, see you later.

Sam Sivarajan: 41:20

Yeah. No, look, totally agree. So Lauren, we're coming to the end of our podcast. So I have a few rapid fire questions that I ask for all of my guests. So if you're ready, number one, professionally, what is the most important lesson you've learned over the years?

Lauren A Jeffery: 41:34

Mm-hmm.

Lauren A Jeffery: 41:38

pause to stop. 24 hours, don't do anything.

Sam Sivarajan: 41:48

That's good.

Lauren A Jeffery: 41:49

gets you out of a lot of trouble because when you respond without giving it some thought, bad things happen. 24 hours.

Sam Sivarajan: 41:57

I totally agree. just as an anecdote, I can share that like I've, know, in my corporate days, I used to, you you get an email and I've draft a response and I would always set it in my draft folder for 24 hours. And so I've got it out of my system, but invariably I will go back and dramatically edit it before it actually goes out. So, yeah. So number two.

Lauren A Jeffery: 42:16

Yeah, yeah, who can't say that?

Sam Sivarajan: 42:23

What is one practical tip you would offer listeners who want to better know their clients?

Lauren A Jeffery: 42:31

Be respectfully curious.

Sam Sivarajan: 42:35

I love that. I love that. Yeah, it's being genuine and authentic, right? I mean, you this is not, you're not prying. You're not being standoffish. You're not being, you know, unprofessional. It's, I think being respectfully curious is a very nice way of putting it. Lauren, this has been a great, intriguing conversation. If listeners want to learn more about your work or connect with you, where should they go?

Lauren A Jeffery: 42:57

Thank you so much.

Lauren A Jeffery: 43:01

LinkedIn for sure. I'm active on LinkedIn and I'm building up my website so you can catch me there. And as things start to come out, I'll be sharing it more, but you can always find me on LinkedIn and on my website. There's always good stuff there. Yeah, absolutely. It's www.

Sam Sivarajan: 43:20

Can you share your website domain?

Lauren A Jeffery: 43:26

Point hyphen shift dot ca. Point hyphen shift dot ca.

Sam Sivarajan: 43:30

Awesome. It will be in the show notes for everyone. Lauren, thank you. This has been such a great conversation and I think timely. Thank you for joining us today on the Future Ready Advisor.

Lauren A Jeffery: 43:37

Thank you.

Lauren A Jeffery: 43:45

Thank you very much for having me. I've really appreciated the conversation and the questions. Thank you, Sam.

Sam Sivarajan: 43:50

My pleasure.