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Uncommon Changes
292 Plays3 years ago
There are big changes happening at Uncommon Wealth Partners...and we couldn't be more excited! Sometimes curveballs are just the pitch that you need to shake up your point of view and prepare you for the innings to come.
This week we'll talk about leading through change, the absolute necessity of a talented and supporting team, and how walking the uncommon path in our own business journey allows us to walk even boldly with you in yours.
If you have any questions/feedback, send us an email at podcast@uncommonwealth.com
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Transcript
Introduction to the Uncommon Wealth Podcast
00:00:00
Speaker
Everyone dreams of living an uncommon life and the best asset you have to achieve your dreams is you. Welcome to the Uncommon Wealth Podcast. We're going to introduce you to people who are living uncommonly. We're also going to give you some tools and strategies for building wealth and for pursuing an uncommon path that is uniquely right for you.
00:00:25
Speaker
Hello and welcome everybody to the uncommon wealth podcast where I'm your host Phillip Ramsey and I'm Aaron
The Theme of Transparency
00:00:30
Speaker
Kramer. Thanks for tuning in. Hey, we have a fun one. Kind of a interesting one today. Yeah, it's different. It's a different one. Uh, and I, I really want to build a practice that is fully transparent with our listeners, with our clients, everybody.
Brian's Departure and Team Commitment
00:00:45
Speaker
Yep. And so this conversation is one that I've had with many of you listeners, if your clients,
00:00:51
Speaker
Uh, but some of your listeners that are just kind of on the peripheral, if you will have no idea what just happened. So let's just talk through it. Uh, first things first, let's just stick or shock this thing out. Brian is no longer with uncommon. Yeah. So as, as hard as that was like, Ooh,
00:01:07
Speaker
Let me just give you a story. Like he came to me and said, Hey, have a once in a lifetime opportunity. I want to be bought out of the practice. And so it commenced the 10 and a half years that we've been together, trying to figure out what's the best way to kind of unwind this and value it and make sure everybody is happy and it's fair. And, uh, as hard as it was, cause I mean, as you guys know, he's been in this whole thing. He's been together for a long time, divorce.
00:01:30
Speaker
Yeah, I mean a little bit, right? But I'm excited for Brian and want to just kind of honor him in this podcast and kind of like talk through, you know, what's the new normal now here at Uncommon Wealth? And I will say that we have a rock star team that's staying here at Uncommon Wealth. 80% of the team is staying here to be able to serve clients like we always, we've done yesterday and always have done.
00:01:55
Speaker
And to give the listeners, though, real quick, I know you tell people this, you always tend to leave out the important parts. Both of you gave everybody a choice if we
Navigating Changes: The Whitewater Rafting Metaphor
00:02:06
Speaker
wanted to stay. Yeah, our staff. Our team. Our team, yeah. Because you even said, hey, I can find you a different, and all this, 80% of us, we're like,
00:02:17
Speaker
No, we want to stay in common. So that was a huge honor. And this is something that you didn't sign up for. The team didn't sign up for something like this. And obviously, this was a shock to us. And we'll talk about that in a second. But I just wanted to make sure that everybody felt like they were, one, appreciated, and two, they knew that they didn't have to go down this path if they didn't want to. Because this is what they signed up for.
00:02:40
Speaker
And the analogy I gave was a whitewater raft. Like, hey, we're going down this river. And around this bend is going to be some whitewater that you never really signed up for. And we can't really see it, but we can hear it.
Collaborative Approach: Lessons from University of Iowa
00:02:51
Speaker
Sounds pretty gnarly. And so if you want me to paddle over to the shore and help you out of this boat, I totally will. And meaning, I'll try as hard as I can to get you a new job. And all of them said, give me the paddle. Let's go. Which is like, give me goosebumps. But that's cool.
00:03:09
Speaker
And an honor, right? That our clients understand and have been bought into this mission at Uncom wealth partners to serve people in such capacity to help them and move forward. And so, man, what cool thing. So let me kind of tell you, um, one, we have a unique team and each one of them has a, such a unique gift that they pour in and then they help clients propel forward. Um, so.
00:03:33
Speaker
That's powerful and that they're staying is really awesome. And then we want to build a collaborative kind of partnership, not only with our team, but our clients. And we've done that with our clients for a long time, but, uh, I'll tell this story quick. So the university of Iowa does a really cool thing, uh, for their patients, their hospital, um,
00:03:54
Speaker
in healthcare, but they have pods. They're called. And when you first go in as a doctor, you get assigned a pod and each pod has a different set of specialists, dermatologists, oncologists, and I can't even, the whole team surgeon and all these things, whole team. Well, when you're a client of one of those doctors, your
00:04:16
Speaker
client patient type will be put up on the screen and the pod will talk about your case.
Adapting to Challenges Using Team Strengths
00:04:22
Speaker
And each one of them brings their own expertise into that case to say, well, Hey, you know, I don't see that Dr. Smith, like I see this from my experience and then they're all in one area or.
00:04:34
Speaker
zoom or whatever they do and they get to talk about that and collaborate over and collaborate. Yes, that's the key. And so when anybody goes to University of Iowa, they get like this collaborative approach, but they're only working with one doctor. And the powerful thing about that is that everyone's talking about your case to try to give you the best
00:04:54
Speaker
recommendations that they can to try to give you the most successful path. The powerful thing about that real quick, like I love about it, is you read studies and you see every, all these professionals and go to like an old professional. It's like 60, right? Yeah. And one of the number one thing we find out they are old, they're smart, they're experienced, but they're stuck in their ways.
00:05:15
Speaker
So how do we deviate from that and help prevent that? Because we all do it, we're all human. We find a way, we find a few ways to really work things. Maybe that's the cutting edge at the time you started it. But 20 years down the road, it's not. It's changed, yeah. But you get so comfortable in doing something one way,
00:05:35
Speaker
through this model that you're creating here at uncommon, it challenges us, make us see it in different ways. Right. You get a vetted in different angles because we all have different expertises and that's what we're building. And so over this course of the last couple of weeks, just going through each one of our current clients plans in this way has been awesome. So great.
00:05:56
Speaker
And I feel like our clients are like, wow, like thank you for this different perspective. And so that's kind of the vision of uncommon wealth moving forward in that. So, uh, obviously Brian has unique gifts as well. Uh, and we're going to take those and what we learned from him, and then we're going to start implementing those in, in that way of just like, Hey, this is exciting, but we also have a team too that we've learned from Brian and now we're going to like, you know,
00:06:20
Speaker
go past that and he's no longer here. And so something I have said to each one of our team members, and this is to Brian as well, like, Hey, our practice won't be the same without Brian, but that doesn't mean it doesn't have to be as good. It's just different. So if any one of our teammates leave us, it won't ever be the same, but we'll have to adapt and overcome, which is basically the uncommon life story.
00:06:41
Speaker
Like building a business, understanding a business.
Strengthening the Partnership without Debt
00:06:44
Speaker
And so we are practicing what we are preaching today. And we're adapting and growing and learning. So it's been a challenge, but it's also been kind of life-giving too. And we're all in the boat paddling as hard as we can. And I love this because at some point, no matter what uncommon life, you're gonna get overwhelmed. And there was a time in this whole kind of like negotiation of Brian and I, like I was just like, I was down. And I texted the whole team like, having a rough day.
00:07:10
Speaker
You know, and they're all like, what do we need to do? Like Aaron, you called me. Yeah. Uh, Ashley called me Haley was texting like, what, what do you need? And what a gift that is to be able to be honest and have a team that like is ready to call out there for each other. I mean, it's like one of those things. Yeah. Like Brian has his gifts and we all loved him and we all wish him the best, but this is like the difference when you have a team that really works well together and effective.
00:07:37
Speaker
It's a, okay, what did Brian do well? Where do we need to pick up Slack and what are we missing now that he's leaving? You know, because you were by his side the whole time. And I know you guys, me being here, coming in, bringing my book in and joining up with you guys for a year is fascinating to watch, you guys. These are my own personal things, but I was like, I see you just like, build him up and even in like,
00:08:04
Speaker
Appointments or events they'd make you like not be the numbers guy. Mm-hmm. And I was always just like what? I don't understand because we'll be all I don't clients will see this and listen, I'll see this but like we'll be behind scenes and we'll rattle off numbers and I have like here I feel like I'm pretty good with numbers. I'm pulling out my you know calculator and Phillips like it's this I'm like I
00:08:28
Speaker
No, you're right. But my calculator says you're right. So it's like, you are a numbers guy is you're such a good team player that you're easy to let people put someone in their role, which I think is amazing. But, uh, but the point of this was.
00:08:42
Speaker
It was like we found an area that like Brian was really good at. And I admit it, like coming in and watching all you guys's superpowers, like Brian was amazing with that. He was. The way he can organize
Embracing Change and Maintaining Client Trust
00:08:51
Speaker
that and stuff. And, but we mentioned it as a team. It's like, okay, like here's the gap on guys. And like, and you have, being by his side, you've learned 85% of his tricks and his trades. My knowledge is like Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, like,
00:09:04
Speaker
Dr. Watson is always around Sherlock Holmes. And eventually, Dr. Watson does get to glean a lot of information. Exactly. And so now we're kind of implementing that. Yeah. And it's been really cool just to see the whole team step up and like, well, here's my superpower. Like, what? That's amazing. So that's been life giving. I also want to honor Brian in this way. Brian and I were the primary providers for both of our families.
00:09:28
Speaker
And starting a business from scratch is, one, the fact that we took it to where it was at and where it's at currently is such a big deal. There's not a lot of businesses that get off the ground just having one person provide for their family. So the fact that we did this with both of us providing primarily for our families
00:09:48
Speaker
was a big deal and one thing that, oh man, I just can't believe we did this, but we never took out debt. That's crazy. Not once. Now we had a line of credit there just in case we needed it, but we never had to tap into that. Like, holy buckets. Like even thinking through that, I'm like, how did that even possible? But God provided for us in a way that was like,
00:10:09
Speaker
Looking back is just really cool. You guys did what you preached. You don't like learning how you did invest in your business and stuff like that and get up and started. But it is crazy that you guys built what you guys built.
00:10:21
Speaker
and being the only sole provider, breadwinners of your families. It is, it's crazy. Cause I know I built my practice like I brought over and I'm like, well, I'll tell you what, like I wasn't paying my family much and we were living off to teach ourselves. So like, and it's not like I brought over a really tiny book. No, you, you were in the business for a while. So like, it just, it's not easy to grow a business in this industry. Yeah. And you guys did it. So anyway, so, uh,
00:10:48
Speaker
This wasn't expected, obviously, but life and business owner is rarely predictable and we should often be thankful and things shake us up because it challenges us to be better. And I don't know if the normal human nature is to be like, well, what kind of thing can I make my life harder?
00:11:06
Speaker
And so sometimes you just get things that are hit, and then you have to adapt and overcome. Now, I feel like we're a quarter way into this race. And we've got a long ways to go, but to see people unite in a common understanding and a common goal has been such an honor for me and encouraging. Yeah, I mean, I'm excited. I was excited when I came over. And as much as it hurts to see Brian leave,
00:11:34
Speaker
because I was excited for what was to come and now he doesn't give you a part of that, but that's okay because he has other opportunities. He's excited about them. That's like any team. As much as you love a teammate, if they're not in love with what the path is going, you want them to be happy. Even though you can see an amazing opportunity or the value that they could bring to the team, but if they're not on board for that,
00:12:00
Speaker
I mean, it is one of those things you gotta adapt. So, but like, dude, I'm so excited for where we're going. Like, all the conversations we're having, and I know you gotta reel me in sometimes, cause you're like, not right now. I'm like, it's like, yeah, that makes sense. But, uh.
00:12:16
Speaker
It gives us a chance just to be our best and be our best. And these conversations that I'm having with, you know, past clients have been encouraging as well. Like we trust you. We know that you have our best interest at hand and we like the future of what you're trying to build of like this team approach, this collaborative thing for our benefit.
00:12:37
Speaker
And you know, it's funny because when you just think about one review, we've talked about this, one review, you would think that like, well, it's just an hour in front of the client and we've done the math. It's like four to eight hours before the review happens that our whole team is putting in and pouring in to people's plans because we want to be the best. And obviously this is a different change. It's an audible, but audibles can almost be the most
00:13:05
Speaker
like the best thing for you in life. And then just to be able to understand who are the people around you, who's supporting you, who's trusting you and things like that. It's, it's been a gift in, in part that I was like, I would never want to do this, but, but that's, that's the whole story. And back to the beginning of this, I want to be transparent and I want to be that, that firm that will talk about things and be open on and that. So if you have any questions, we,
00:13:30
Speaker
right here to answer those call and let's talk through those. Transparency is amazing. I, I learned that early on and I know some people don't totally believe in that, which I'm like, okay with. Like finally you can be the way you want to be, but
00:13:44
Speaker
I love the fact that one, you as a leader is like amazing, but then they're like also feel this transparency point because it's like, you're going to like, when you get us, you get us, you get us. You won't find us. If you go out to a restaurant or a party or something and you see us, that's a good point. You won't be like, who is that? That is not my advisor. Yeah. No, instead of we're goofing off rough housing, doing whatever we're doing, like you're like, yeah,
00:14:09
Speaker
Those are the people. Those are all of my people. We don't have two sides to us. There's not two sides. You're going to get us. That's a good point. And so it was, this is the last story I'll say. It was over spring break that this whole thing kind of transpired. And I asked the whole team, give me the list of all of our clients and over spring break, I'll never forget it. Rosemary beach. I'm in front of a coffee shop in the car. Cause I was like,
00:14:33
Speaker
the coffee shop doesn't want to hear this conversation over 150 times. And I just called people for three days. I just called people and I just, and I wasn't like, Hey, you need to know this. I got to go buy. It was like, Hey, this happened right here. What questions do you have? I need your rockstar family.
00:14:49
Speaker
And my rockstar family, right? Like they sacrificed that, but they knew it was important to me that I had to, we had to just be, we had to call, we had to communicate. You know, like when things change in a relationship, the biggest thing that you can do is just communicate. And so thank you for entrusting on Commonwealth partners to be your advisors. We couldn't be more excited about the future. Eric Kramer, Ashley Fox, Haley Phillips, Ryan Garvey, all amazing people. And we're excited to serve you. So.
00:15:17
Speaker
Thanks
Conclusion and Call to Action
00:15:18
Speaker
for listening. You've been listening to Uncommon Wealth Podcast. I've been your host, Phillip Ramsey. And I'm Aaron Kramer. Talk to you later. That's all for this episode brought to you by Uncommon Wealth Partners. Be sure to visit uncommonwealth.com to learn more about our services. Don't miss an episode as we introduce you to inspiring people who are actively pursuing an uncommon life.