Knowing yourself is a huge part of being a successful financial professional. You are your brand, after all, and the heart of the business that you’ve been building since you set out on this journey is identifying your own unique offerings. Your strengths are what keep your clients loyal and what attract new clients to your business, and acknowledging and playing to them are what help you keep to your mission statement and goals when helping your clients plan for their futures.
However, just as everyone has strengths, there are weaknesses to balance them out. Knowing those areas of yourself are vital as well so you can see how they affect your business model. Some weaknesses might be those that you’re willing to tackle, for example, perhaps you don’t know very much about using social media, so you put in the time to study up, maybe even taking a course on social media posting and marketing. However, the greatest thing you can know about yourself is what your own time is worth, not just when it comes time to billing, but when you should be willing to outsource something and pay to have someone else handle that thing, as they have more expertise and understanding than you. When it’s worth that, you’ll save yourself the time and energy, and ultimately, the cost of your time being spent doing something that will be more time-consuming than it’s worth while you could be out there playing to your strengths instead.
Some of it isn’t even about hard costs. Perhaps you have always prepared your own paperwork, but you find yourself constantly frustrated by leaving out forms or just the time it takes you to get it all together and complete when you’re much more natural prospecting new clients or engaging in conversations with your current clients. Hiring an assistant, even virtually or part time, may be worth it to you in time saving and peace of mind—knowing that when you go to get client signatures, you’ll have all the forms you need because your assistant is on top of those things means that you can confidently go into those meetings without worrying what you’ve forgotten.
Understanding what your own time is worth and when you should pay for someone else’s time is a vital part of any business growth. As you spend more time hands-on with a larger book of businesses, it often makes more sense to have someone else for the operational side of your business, whether that’s setting up client appointments, preparing and processing paperwork, running your marketing, or managing your larger office. There are levels of growth, but they all start at the same point, and that is understanding your own strengths and weaknesses and knowing when its time to engage someone else’s time to support your own.
