Financial planners looking to add high-net-worth clients will be pleased to know that opportunities for doing so are growing. According to the 2008 World Wealth Report by Capgemini and Merrill Lynch, the global population of high-net-worth individuals is on the rise, with holdings that have increased by more than 50% since 2002.

Yet merely knowing that there are more fish in a pond doesn't guarantee a good catch. Firms seeking to tap into this growth must grow and evolve. As good advisors are in high demand, it is more important than ever for firms to attract and retain advisory talent to bring in and serve new clients. A key factor in doing so, the report notes, is investing in support.

The Key to Happiness

"Without a doubt, the key to growth is keeping your advisors happy and keeping them productive," says Matthew Tuttle, a partner in Private Client Group, a New York City planning firm that has approximately 60 advisors. "All an advisor should have to do each day is service his or her existing clients and find new clients. Everything else should be taken care of by other people."

Tuttle says that his firm is willing to spend whatever it takes to support its advisors and to keep them as productive as possible. Toward that end, the firm employs 20 support staff, including administrative assistants and information technology professionals. Private Client Group provides BlackBerry wireless devices to its advisors, along with state-of-the-art computer systems.

That kind of investment is represented in employees' working conditions, says Kenneth D. Evans, a consultant with Moss Adams. Investing in support, including technology and support staff, is important to attract good advisors and keep them happy in their jobs.

"For many planning firms, it simply comes down to time management. If an activity is taking up a significant amount of a professional's time, and it could be done by someone else—freeing up that time for the professional to earn more—then it makes sense," Evans says.

Firms' investments in technology have remained flat over the past few years, Evans says, adding that the average firm spends approximately 2% of its annual revenue on hardware, software, peripherals and support. Of course, that will vary somewhat depending on the goal of the firm. For financial planning organizations that are just getting started learning a new customer relationship management program, for example, the start-up expenses could be much greater.

Tech Upgrade

Financial Advantage, a financial planning firm in Columbia, Md., with eight advisors and three support staff, is completing a total technology upgrade. The ambitious upgrade included an investment in several platforms for financial planning, trading, customer relationship management (CRM) and portfolio management, among others.

Chad Norfolk, who spearheads the company's investments in technology and support staff, estimates that the firm has invested approximately $75,000 on building support, plus the cost of consultants and training over the past year. This is broken down into trading software ($10,000 in initial investment, plus $20,000 licensing and support fee); financial planning software (approximately $3,000); CRM software (approximately $9,000, including training); portfolio management software ($10,000 per year); and document management software, which helps eliminate the need for paper files ($25,000 per year). The trading, portfolio management and document management software licensing fees are annual expenditures.

There is also a real cost attached to the time it takes to get these systems up and running, although it is hard to put a dollar figure on how long it will take for all staff members to learn to operate them and for the systems to be fully integrated, he says. Norfolk estimates that most firms will spend between six months and a year getting the new systems adjusted to the practice's needs.

That time commitment and the day-to-day operational changes made to incorporate new systems also take their toll. While Norfolk says that the firm doesn't have turnover among advisors, it has had some support staff leave because of the changes to how the firm runs.

"One of the biggest challenges for support staff is change. How they adapt to the new technology has had a big impact on whether or not they stay," Norfolk explains. He adds that support staff members have experienced rigorous learning periods, causing some to leave.

He and Evans agree that gathering feedback on technology changes from support staff and incorporating their reasonable requests is a good way to stave off turnover at that level. "When you do that, they feel like they have skin in the game," Norfolk says. Adequate training is also essential to ensure that support staff are comfortable with the technology and able to ease its adoption throughout the organization.