Peter Mallouk, president of Overland Park, Kansas-based Creative Planning, a wealth management firm with $45 million in assets, is in no rush to get his staff back in the office. While the region has been spared from the worst of the Covid-19 outbreak and restrictions in the area have been mostly lifted, Mallouk is still cautious.
Workers in Kansas and Missouri went back to work on Monday, May 4 (with the exception of St. Louis and St. Louis County) but Mallouk suggested that his staff stay home. “We're going to encourage them to use video conferencing with clients. If they want to go there and make a few phone calls, get away from home for a little bit, we're going to let them do that, but they can't see clients there and they can't work all day there,” he says.
For those that do return to the office, there will be measures to encourage social distancing such as one-way flows in and out of the break room. “Even when we do return to work in a few weeks, it will still be optional, and we're still going to be encouraging employees to work from home,” Mallouk adds.
As stay-at-home orders are relaxed and the economy slowly begins to re-open, financial advisors, who are deemed essential workers, are figuring out how to navigate a new work environment amid one of the most treacherous bear markets in recent history.
“It's more than just the market, the vast majority of our clients are small business owners and they're struggling themselves to think about more than just their portfolios,” says LPL Financial LPLA executive vice president of products and platforms, Robert Pettman. Remember, the market is only down 12% year to date or so. It's a lot less about the market for many of our clients and more about their businesses getting up to speed,” he says.
Pettman predicts financial advisors will see some aspects of their jobs change as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. For instance, advisors may need to make more house calls instead of holding client meetings in their own offices. “You’re going to start to see advisors meet clients where they are,” he adds.“That's a new way of doing business for advisors; meeting clients doesn't necessarily mean it has to be in an office behind the mahogany desk anymore.”
In the meantime, LPL is trying to make the work-from-home environment a little more seamless for its advisors. For example, it’s enhancing virtual conferencing tools so advisors can get adequate face-time with clients who may need more hand-holding now than ever before. A significant portion of LPL’s advisors operate in America’s heartland where the outbreak has not been as severe (at least, not at this point) as it has been in other regions of the country.
Julia Carlson, founder and CEO of Financial Freedom Wealth Management Group, (part of LPL) returned to her office in rural Newport, Oregon on Monday, May 4. She’s allowed employees who are uncomfortable coming in to continue to work from home but claims her staff of 14 was ready to get back to work. Everyone returned to the office when Carlson opened it back up.
Shirl Penney, president and CEO of Dynasty Financial Partners whose advisors manages $40 billion in assets across the country, is working on a flexible plan to get his team back to its St. Petersburg, Fla.-headquarters over the next few weeks. “At first we'll start by limiting it to a smaller number of people, whether it's 25 percent or 50 percent [of staff]. We're still working through that, but we can cycle people through so that everyone's not here,” he says. Employees that aren’t ready to return to the office will have the option to work from home.
Given Dynasty's vast geographic footprint with advisors based in cities across the country including New York, Beverly Hills, Calif. and Deephaven, Minnesota, re-openings for locations outside of its Florida headquarters will be determined separately. “It's not a one size fits all reopening process,” he says.
The same can be said for thousands of wealth management firms across the country.
This article originally appeared on Forbes.
