December 4, 2024 • 31 mins
In this podcast episode, I welcome Libby Greiwe, host of The Efficient Advisor podcast and and a former financial advisor turned business efficiency coach.
Libby shares her inspiring journey of transforming her practice from 80-hour weeks to a thriving seven-figure business while working just 24 hours a week. Her story and strategies offer a roadmap for advisors looking to scale their business without sacrificing their personal lives.
Libby's Journey:
- The Turning Point: In 2008, she faced a crossroads when she became a new mom, leading her to overhaul her business to achieve balance and freedom.
- Key Strategies: Libby highlights the importance of automating, delegating, deleting, and streamlining tasks to free up time and boost revenue.
- Efficiency in Action: From cutting her hours to 24 per week to quadrupling her revenue, she reveals how processes and systems changed everything.
The Four-Lens Approach to Practice Efficiency
- Efficiency Coaching: Libby provides advisors with tools, templates, and frameworks to streamline their practices.
- Tech Integration: She teaches advisors how to use tools like Zapier, AI, and workflow systems to save time and scale operations.
- Customized Approach: Her methods are tailored to the advisor’s unique goals—whether it’s more personal freedom, higher revenue, or both.
Looking Ahead
- The Future of AI: Libby emphasizes the importance of integrating AI tools to stay ahead in an evolving industry.
- Client-Centric Innovation: Advisors who improve efficiency not only benefit personally but also enhance the client experience.
- Investing in Yourself: She encourages advisors to embrace coaching, community, and lifelong learning to achieve their full potential.
Bottom Line:
Success in advisory practices doesn't require sacrificing personal life. With proper systems, modern technology, and strategic thinking, advisors can build profitable practices while working fewer hours. The key is starting now and allowing improvements to compound over time.
About our guest: Libby Greiwe, host of The Efficient Advisor podcast and and a former financial advisor turned business efficiency coach.
- You can learn more about her work:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/libby-greiwe/
https://www.theefficientadvisor.com/
About Your Host: Paul G. McManus is an accomplished author and expert in helping financial professionals grow their businesses. With over eight years of experience working exclusively with financial professionals, Paul has helped his clients generate tens of millions of dollars in fees and commissions.
Claim your free audiobook copy at: www.theshortbookformula.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
If you're like most advisors, I know you're caught
in a familiar trap.
Your business is growing, butso are your working hours.
Every new client means lesstime with your family, less time
for yourself and a constantfeeling that success in your
practice means sacrifice in yourpersonal life.
You probably wondered is thisjust how it has to be?
(00:25):
Our guest today proves there'sa different way.
Libby Grywe has not only builta thriving advisory practice,
but she's done it while workingfewer hours and creating real
freedom in her life.
She's taken what many of usthought was impossible growing a
profitable practice whileactually having a life and
turned it into a reality.
(00:46):
Now she helps other advisors dothe same.
She's also the host of theEfficient Advisor podcast, where
I recently had the pleasure ofbeing a guest.
After a conversation, I knew Ihad to have her share insights
with you all.
Libby, welcome to the show.
I'm excited to unpack yourjourney and show our listeners
that there might be a better waythan what we've all been taught
about building a successfulpractice.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Yeah, ever since we had you on the podcast, I have
been looking forward to thisconversation, because it's
really not that different thanwhat you're doing right Figuring
out an efficient way to write abook and actually get your
product out into the world, anddo it in less time 100%, and
just before we recorded, we werehaving this nice conversation
about AI and it's amazing justthe tools that are being made
(01:30):
available now.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
It's just crazy how efficient you can become.
I found myself just doing thiswith AI and using different
tools, that my own productivityand efficiency is significantly
higher than it was just a fewyears ago.
Thank you for being our guesttoday and before we dive into
the topic, I'd love to have ourcommunity just to get to know
you a little bit better.
So what's your backstory?
(01:51):
How did you go from being afinancial advisor to now helping
advisors create more efficiencyand more freedom, more personal
time in their own practices?
Speaker 2 (02:08):
time in their own practices.
Yeah, absolutely so.
I'll take you back to 2008.
So 2008 was a very scary yearfor me as a financial advisor.
For the previous four years, Ihad been working around the
clock like a crazy person,building my business nights,
weekends, 70, 80 hours a week.
Then came 2008.
And usually when I say that,most people will think, oh,
because the market crashed andI'm like no, something way
scarier happened.
I found out I was pregnant andthis was great because we wanted
(02:30):
a baby.
But this was really scarybecause I had been running
around like building thisbusiness and I just remember
having that moment of gosh.
There is no way I can be themom that I want to be and
operate like this.
So I set out on this mission toand at the same time, I was
really happy with the amount ofmoney I was making.
(02:50):
So I was like, okay, how can Ido both?
And so I set out on thismission to start building more
systems and processes to reallyfigure out okay, how do I
whittle down from 80 hours aweek to my goal of 24?
I realized in that moment that Ididn't really have a business.
I had a Libby, while I had astaff member and I had an office
(03:11):
.
If I didn't show up, stuffwasn't getting done, it wasn't
scalable, it wasn't wash, rinse,repeat.
I was winging it, recreatingthe wheel every single time.
So I really set out on thiscrusade to start actually
stepping out of that advisorrole and into that role of CEO
of my own business and to startthinking strategically right.
(03:32):
How do I cast a vision for thebusiness?
How do I start building systemsand processes?
How do I start taking more offof my plate so that I'm not that
mom that's tethered to herphone during soccer games and
constantly putting out fires onthe weekends and bringing out
the laptop?
And that's really where itstarted so fast forward three or
four years I had quadrupled theamount of money that I was
(03:55):
making per hour worked.
We had scaled to a seven-figurefirm as a solo advisor and I
had dropped my hours down to 24hours a week.
You hit the target.
Yeah, I hit the target and itwas all through really three
main things.
But advisors started gettingwind of what I was doing and it
wasn't like oh, she's on theEast Coast, where everybody has
(04:17):
lots of money, in the West Coast, where I was this advisor in
Ohio.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
I think the haters would think that's like ah, she
has it lucky, oh, oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Yeah, something special is going on.
I can promise you there's not alot of special stuff going on
here in Cincinnati.
Yeah, I worked with normalclients, right?
I didn't work with ultrawealthy.
I didn't have these like accessto anything that anybody else
had access to, and so advisorsfrom all over the country
started getting wind of what Iwas doing.
We're like, okay, where do Istart?
And that's really where theEfficient Advisor was born.
(04:48):
I started finding that I lovedsharing the behind the scenes.
Here's how we did that.
And here, take my templateDon't create it, Because I used
to absolutely despise going toconferences and these speakers
would come and they'd sharethese life-altering ideas and
I'd have so many ideas swirlingin my head and I'd get back to
my office and be just staring ata blank piece of paper going
(05:09):
okay, but and that's reallywhere it came from is I wanted
to be the how.
I wanted to show people howthey could fast track it and
think about in a way that was somuch more simple.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
I want to follow up with a couple of points that you
made.
So first, I love your humor.
So you're like, yeah, it was2008 and this traumatic thing
happened and everyone's oh, weknow exactly what happened the
markets crashed.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
You're like the baby thing way scarier.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Yeah, that wasn't it.
So, going from 80 hours down to24, but being intentional about
it, I love to unpack that alittle bit, because the saying I
forget which law it is is thatwork expands to meet the time
available, right.
Speaker 2 (05:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
So when you realize that and are intentional about
your goals, it's amazing whatyou can accomplish.
I think a lot of people justthink, whether it's 40 hours or
80 hours a week, eight to fiveor whatever the hours are, I
need to go sit at my desk and dostuff.
But that's just ridiculous.
Can you share a little bit moreabout that?
Because that seems like 80 to24, seems like a real revolution
.
How did you have the confidencethat you could make that happen
(06:07):
, that you could make that work?
Speaker 2 (06:08):
I don't even know if I did.
I think it was like more ofwhen you have to you figure it
out.
If I hadn't gotten pregnant, Iprobably would have just stayed
at that pace, like I reallyneeded that.
I really needed that incentiveto figure it out.
I was doing what most advisorsdo in the beginning, needed that
incentive to figure it out.
I was doing what most advisorsdo in the beginning and I see
(06:29):
this all the time with advisorclients that I work with is you
just go full bore building thisbusiness, whether you get
pregnant or not.
You hit this point where yourealize, whoa, okay, everything
I prayed for now has come true.
I have this business, I havethe revenue, I don't have to
worry about paying my mortgageand putting food on the table.
I'm good.
But, holy crap, I'm overwhelmed, I'm super stressed, I can
barely keep my head above water,and that's that inflection
(06:50):
point where an advisor reallyhas to put on that CEO hat and
say I don't have the time but, I, need to prioritize the time to
actually streamline this thing,or I'm just going to keep
feeling like I'm drowning,playing catch up on nights and
weekends, always feeling likeI'm behind.
(07:11):
That's really for me, like whenpeople hit that moment and they
realize I don't have a business.
I have a Paul or I have a Libby.
I really need to get this quoteunquote figured out.
And the weird part is whenyou're at this three, four years
in and you're maybe at a fewhundred thousand dollars of
revenue, you have this weirdfeeling like I figured it out,
like I'm a good advisor.
I should have this figured outby now.
But the hard part is like yougo into this business so that
you can have your own businessbut nobody teaches you how to
(07:34):
run your business.
You're so engrossed in learninghow to be an advisor and how to
do the tax planning and how tolearn all the things and the
sales we neglect, like thebackend processes and things
that actually help you become aquote-unquote real business.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
So this is back in 2008.
As you're trying to figure thisout, what were your influences?
Can you point to any book orsystem or anything at the time
that helped inform you so thatyou could start developing these
systems for yourself?
Speaker 2 (08:01):
There was one book that I can remember someone
recommending to me, and it wasE-Myth.
Yeah, that classic book, and Iwas like huh, you know what?
Yeah, okay, I'm in.
And that was the first businessbook that I read and that then
catapulted me into the.
What else is out there, whatelse can?
Speaker 1 (08:20):
I read.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Yeah, and it was making investments in myself and
that was really scary for me.
And I don't know if it's justbeing raised as a woman in the
nineties where we poor and wevery rarely invest in ourselves,
or I was vested in my businessand my kids and my husband and
all of the things, but beingable to actually step outside of
that and put money into my owneducation and that's something.
(08:41):
No, you can lose your businessand you can lose money in the
market and all the things that.
This is something nobody couldever take away from me.
I wish I would have done thatsooner.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
I listened to the audio book E-Myth probably
multiple times.
Michael Gerber, I think hisname, and he has a wonderful
voice.
It's almost hypnotic when youlisten to it.
You feel like you're listeningto wisdom and you feel at peace
and he's just a greatstoryteller.
What I found in myself?
Because at that time I wasrunning a larger business and I
loved the ideas, but I found itdifficult to translate those
(09:11):
ideas into day-to-day operations.
In terms of efficiency, I hadsome wins, but overall it just
seemed overwhelming.
So I'd love to dive into, like,how do you help advisors
actually implement these things?
Everyone, I would imagine, hasthe idea sure I'd love to work
fewer hours or I'd love to getpaid more per hour, whatever it
is sounds great, but the realityis that there's a lot of
behavior change that has tohappen.
(09:31):
Just maybe tell some stories,or just who's that typical
advisor that comes to you, whatare the typical challenges and
what's that transformation thatyou help them achieve?
Speaker 2 (09:39):
So the typical advisor is that advisor who's at
that inflection point, right,where they're like I have this
really great business, I'm superexcited about it, but it's
running me instead of me runningit.
And the commonality amongstthose advisors is they're really
good people, right, they'rereally good at sales, they're
really entertaining.
They might be really good atthe analysis and analytics, but
(10:02):
they're so used to doing all ofthe things that sometimes it's
hard to see the forest throughthe analysis and analytics.
But they're so used to doingall of the things that sometimes
it's hard to see the forestthrough the trees and really
figuring out where do I actuallyneed to spend my time.
So the first thing that wealways do is we start to look at
there's really eight coreprocesses that every financial
advisory practice has and westart to look at them through
the lens of what can I automate,what can I delegate.
(10:23):
Look at them through the lensof what can I automate, what can
I delegate, what can I deleteand what can I streamline?
So automate, obviously beinglike what tools, resources exist
out there that we can make thishappen automatically Workflows,
calendaring, all the littlethings.
Delegating what are the thingsthat are in this upper
right-hand quadrant of what'steachable and what's templatable
(10:43):
, and how can I start to givethat away?
Then the most underutilized oneis delete, right?
There's a lot of things thatadvisors do because we think we
should be doing them, becauseDave in the cubicle next to me
does them.
I was trained by my brokerdealer that I should do these
things.
Often they don't actually haveany impact.
So we're really picking apartevery single thing that an
advisor is doing, every littletask, and saying is it even
(11:06):
necessary?
Does this enhance your clientexperience or is it just neutral
?
And if it's neutral, if it'snot adding to the client
experience, we take it away.
And so then, of course,streamlining being, can we
create a template for that?
Can we build something thatallows you to do it better,
faster, smarter, cheaper, easier?
Right, instead of retyping thesame email 37 times?
(11:28):
Can we make a template?
Then it's getting all of thatorganized, and that's the
hardest part for most advisorsis we're not naturally organized
people.
When I started sharing that Ihave ADHD, I always called it
advisor ADD.
I'm ADHD.
I always called it advisor ADD.
I'm like I don't know.
Maybe it just started when Ibecame an advisor because there
were so many hats Now that Iknow more about the diagnosis.
Like I understand, I've had itmy whole life and that's my
superpower.
(11:49):
But a lot of advisors havestarted sharing oh my gosh,
that's me too.
I have a hard time focusing, I'mscattered all over the place
and it's really helping themmanage themselves so that they
can better manage people, andreally starting to build some of
those things where they canjust start the process and
somebody else can actuallyfollow it through, recognizing
(12:09):
where our strengths are andwhere our weaknesses are,
scaling ourselves first beforewe just jump to hire somebody.
But really looking at everysingle thing that we're doing in
a process and saying is thisactually impactful?
Does it make a difference?
Do the clients care?
Or am I doing this because it'ssomething that I think I should
be doing, because I was onlineand I saw so-and-so does this,
(12:31):
or I listened to this podcastand such is doing this.
But if you're serving adifferent demographic or a
different ideal client, thosethings might not be necessary or
they might actually be takingaway from the client experience
as opposed to enhancing it.
Speaker 1 (12:46):
One thing that I see and I'm interested to get your
take is that and I struggle withthis that you had a very
specific goal of wanting to getdown to 24 hours because you
were a new mom and you haddifferent responsibilities, and
so you had a very tight budgetof time that you wanted to do it
specifically.
You had differentresponsibilities and so you had
a very tight budget of time thatyou wanted to do it
specifically.
I think for men perhaps,because typically they're not in
that role.
Myself, for example, I'm alwayslooking for ways to get more
(13:06):
efficient, but it's not so muchso that I have more time to do
other stuff, it's simply so Ican grow my revenue.
It's simply so I can make moreper hour.
I'm just curious Do you seethat dynamic in terms of if I
had more free time, I wouldn'tknow what to do with it?
Speaker 2 (13:19):
I would spend it poorly.
Yeah, every time I speak at aconference, I include this now
in my talk, right?
So I do my opening and I talkabout how I went from 80 hours
to 24 and how I quadrupled theamount of money that I was
making per hour.
And I always will have somebodycome at me and go.
It's not work.
If you do what you love and Iwant to work 40 hours a week or
I love the grind, I love working60, 70, 80 hours they say, okay
(13:42):
, great.
Well, if you're going to dothat great, you do you right.
I'm not saying workingpart-time is for everybody, but
you might as well be making fourtimes as much as you are right
now.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
I think that's the person who I've been.
I'm not sure if you know thisperson.
His name is John Cutton.
He has his own podcast calledthe Quantum Growth for Financial
Advisors podcast, and I'vegotten to know him over the past
, I want to say a year and ahalf or so.
During that time, when I methim, he was already doing 9
billion AUM.
Since then he's now at 14billion AUM and I'm helping him
write some books and so I justget like a bird's eye view of
(14:11):
him and he's probably thebusiest person I know.
He just grinds and it's becausehe just has this passion and
desire to grow his enterprise atthis time and he's just
increasing his value.
It's not about, in his case,having more time to allocate
elsewhere.
It's simply how do you get muchmore efficient in growing your
business?
Speaker 2 (14:30):
That's interesting because even when I was down to
three days a week, I still hadmassive growth goals.
My husband at the time wouldalways go what's the big deal
with a million dollars?
And this sounds like the most?
I am fully aware of how firstworld this sounds.
But what's the difference?
If you make a million dollars ayear or $800,000 a year, is it
really going to change yourhappiness levels?
(14:51):
And I'd say it's not about themoney, it's because I know I can
and that was always it right,like it was just that way that I
was wired was like okay, so now, if I can make a million
dollars in 24 hours, can I make1.2?
How about 1.4?
Right, and it wasn't even aboutwhat that dollar could do for
me, it was more just because Ithink I can.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
So you're very goal oriented in terms of time.
But what I like about what Ilike about what you're saying is
that it's also you still havethose growth goals and now and I
heard you say it earlier justreally more measuring it by the
hour, almost right.
So it's a little bit differentmeasurement but it's more
precise.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
And not to take it totally off topic, but I always
say there's a huge differencebetween contentment and
complacency For me.
There are advisors who want toscale, scale and 10X their 10X
with no end in sight and hireand have these big mega
practices and that's beautiful.
And then there were people likeme who were like, hey, that's
not my jam.
Maybe it would have been orcould have been if I hadn't done
my business, but I just want tomake as much as I possibly can
(15:46):
in these in this time constraint.
I'm not complacent because Istill want to grow, but I also
just have this ability to becontent and for advisors
listening that, I think there'salways this pressure that you
have to form these multi-advisorteams and bring in juniors and
more and more.
And that's not the only way togrow a business and it doesn't
mean you're complacent, You'rejust happy making a million
(16:08):
dollars working part-time.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
As we're talking, I wanted to go a little bit into
processes In today's world.
Here we are in 2024, andthere's so many different ways
to do the things that you said,whether it's to automate,
delegate, delete or streamline,and just some of the things that
I've done myself or I've seenis you can hire a virtual
assistant, and there'stechnologies like Zapier, online
(16:32):
automation processes and, ofcourse, the big one nowadays is
AI.
So maybe, starting with thefirst one, about getting,
perhaps, a virtual assistant,what are your thoughts about
virtual assistants?
Speaker 2 (16:42):
I always tell people, before you even think about
hiring, you really need toanalyze how you're spending your
own time first, because I knowwhen I started I remember them
being like oh, you need to hirea phone call.
So there's two things right.
Like first, I actually reallyneeded.
Before I could bring anybodyelse in and lead them, I had to
lead myself better.
Am I really actually maximizingevery minute that I'm spending
here in my office?
(17:03):
Am I being effective?
Do I really need to jump tohiring somebody else and do I
have my stuff together so thatif I hire somebody, I can
actually give them a track torun on?
So if I'm over here justwinging it every time, how am I
going to train somebody else towing every time?
The other thing with that is Iremember there being like this
very distinct pecking order ofhere's what you do you hire a
phone caller, then you hire anadministrative assistant and
then you bring in someone who'slicensed, and it was the road
(17:25):
that you followed.
What I realized is that I hiredthe phone caller and I had this
phone caller for about threemonths.
I realized she's not that greatof a phone.
Like I'm better on the phoneand meanwhile I'm over here
filling out paperwork andgetting not in good orders like
it was my job because I suck atdetails.
I was great on the phone, sowhen I flip-flopped us and had
(17:45):
her doing the paperwork, I wasmaking the phone calls.
We were so much more effective.
So it's not just about beingefficient, right, being
efficient is great, but it hasto be effective.
You have to be efficient andeffective and it has to be
enjoyable for everybody.
So what I learned through thatprocess was is that everybody
has different needs in theirbusiness based on their
skillsets, who they're serving,how they're serving them, right.
(18:06):
So if you're running a virtualRIA where you don't have a
physical office space, you'renot meeting clients in person,
your business needs differentthings than a 10 advisor office
in Boise, idaho, where everybodycomes in face to face.
Every business is not built thesame.
So if your business is one, avirtual administrative assistant
(18:26):
is huge and I have no problemwith where.
It's interesting because I justhired a VA outside of the US.
It's funny because when I tellthat to my friends, everyone
immediately assumes that you'regoing to have very low quality
work because it's low cost.
I'm like there are brilliantpeople all over the world that
are very good at what they do.
I am not great at buildingfunnels and editing video.
(18:50):
That is not my sweet spot.
I could find somebody here todo it.
It doesn't matter to me wherethey are, as long as they're
trained and good at what I needfor my business.
So I would say it depends onwhat your business needs and
what you need help with.
If you need a physical personin the office to greet clients
and seat them and make themcoffee and deliver experience,
(19:11):
or if you need someone overseas,now I will say and I'll
probably get shade for this butif you have someone calling your
clients, there still is amisconception or a preconceived
notion about how people feelabout talking to somebody and
not being able to understandthem if they have a really thick
or heavy accent.
If you have something that isclient facing the world in which
(19:31):
we live, it's probably helpfulto have someone with a very
clear English tone right, likeit doesn't matter if they have
an accent or not, but they haveto be easy to understand.
I hope we're moving as asociety away from that a little
bit, recognizing that there arevery intelligent people all over
the world.
I think hiring help in general,whether it's virtual, in-person
, overseas, here, is going togive you the best leverage for
(19:54):
your business.
Speaker 1 (19:54):
I've had an online business location free since
2015.
And I've experimented withhiring American contractors,
hiring contractors from thePhilippines, hiring from Latin
America and, interestingly, Ifound that my preference is
Latin America.
Some of the reasons is thatthey're in the same time zone.
The accent to your point if youhire the right people, it can
(20:16):
be indistinguishable.
I have two contractors rightnow that are virtual assistants
in Latin America and you can'ttell the difference.
They can be on client meetingsand unless I say hey, so-and-so
is in Brazil, no one knows thedifference.
But the benefit to it is thatthe cost per hour is
significantly less than hiringan American contractor.
So for me, as a small businessowner, that can make a huge
(20:37):
difference.
But to your other point youfirst have to lead yourself,
because I've recommended this toa lot of people.
It's hey, you need a virtualassistant, and I think the
mindset that people mistakenlycome to it is that hey, I'm just
going to hire someone and I'mgoing to say go, do all these
things for me and now my life iseasy.
So they want to dump theirworkload on them and magically
think that they know whatthey're doing and they don't.
And so if you don't have thesethings templated.
(20:57):
You don't have SOPs.
If you don't have a process,it's just not going to work out,
and you know that better thananybody.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
Yeah, no, absolutely.
At the end of the day, it allcomes down to processes.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
I want to jump to a couple other things.
Now there's automation.
I don't know how much you getinto this, but there's tools
like Zapier and different thingsthat are remarkable once you
understand how they work.
Of course, email automation,things of that nature but I
think maybe what's even moreinteresting today, in 2024, is
AI.
How involved in AI are you interms of your own business, in
terms of tools and processesthat you are recommending to
(21:30):
your clients?
Speaker 2 (21:30):
I think back to when I started my business in 2004
and we had paper files.
And now I think about wherewe're at today and just the
amount of tech change that hashappened in the last 20 years.
It's only going to continue atthat pace, if not faster.
Speaker 1 (21:45):
It's faster, literally, with AI.
I can expect the next bigupdate a month from now.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
And it's unbelievable .
So we're very heavily utilizingAI inside of the business and I
have an AI partner that he andI are building out some stuff.
It's really just to startteaching advisors at a basic
level.
Yeah, how do you Zapier?
How do you create zaps betweenRedtail and your Outlook?
How do you start just makingthese simple bridges using AI?
Because it is such a big thingfor advisors.
(22:12):
When I was speaking at XYPN lastweek, every advisor, when we
talked about AI, mentionednote-taking.
That's literally where we're atright, like it's like
note-taking and it's so muchbigger than that, and so that's
where.
But we have to do it likestep-by-step.
Okay, the first thing I can dowith AI is get my notes off my
desk.
Okay, now, what else can I do?
Now, ben and I are starting tobuild some programs for advisors
(22:34):
that kind of show them likestep-by-step, like here's
something else.
Even if you're at a brokerdealer and you can't control
your tech stack, there's stillso many ways that you can use AI
in a way that's compliant toreally support your business,
and I will share that.
If you're not using it, youwill get left in the dust.
You have to stay ahead of it.
You have to stay on top of it.
You don't have to be coding andyou need to be integrating AI
(22:57):
into your business in order tocontinue to be successful.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
What you're saying is that this isn't just a fad like
the internet?
Speaker 2 (23:02):
Yeah, that's exactly and we think about if you use
the internet as a great example.
Back when that thing came out,it was like an email.
People were like, is thisreally like email?
Is this really going to takeoff?
And we all learned it andthat's the hard part is
resistance of I don't havecapacity.
Our clients aren't going to beable to learn how to use a
portal to upload their docs.
We are always putting thesebarriers in place.
(23:22):
We look back and, like mygrandmother was born when they
still had a carriage that sherode around in and the ice man
stopped by and dropped offblocks of ice.
When she was 95, she was usinga smartphone.
So anybody can learn anything.
It's just a matter of beingintentional and building time
into your calendar to learn itand to have your team learn it
(23:44):
and to be the best at it.
Speaker 1 (23:45):
I would agree, and I would add to that that it's just
becoming easier and easier.
The AI, in my case, is morewhat's the use case, and you
said this before.
Right, it's everyone has thenote taker.
And I was thinking the otherday I was on a zoom meeting and
suddenly it was with one advisorand before he showed up, he had
three AI note takers on thecall with me and I'm just like
sitting there a little bitnervous, thinking, okay, what's
going on here?
Then he showed up.
(24:05):
I'm like, do you realize?
You have three AI note takers,like the best I definitely
noticed on these Zoom callseveryone has their note taker,
whether or not what they'redoing with it's a different
matter.
There's a couple of tools thatI've come across, so I'm big
into AI.
I got into AI, I think in 2022,just before chat GPT became
popular, and this was two yearsago.
(24:26):
But back in the days of I thinkit's called Jasper, and Jasper
was like the one that went fromlike a startup to a billion
dollar company over the courseof a year and I went to their
conference in the beginning of2023.
I'm like, okay, I'm sold, Ijust need to build my business
around AI and I've been doingthat ever since.
I found some really specificuse cases where I can't work
without it at this point.
But there's so many cool tools.
Just throw out a couple.
(24:46):
There's Claude.
So if you're doing any writing,claude is the best, in my view,
for writing, whether it's blogposts or for note taking.
An organization it's calledNotebook LM.
It's a product by Google andit's remarkable the capabilities
that it has and it's free, andso there's so many different
things that you can do Just inyour own business.
Curious what tools are youusing personally to help your
(25:07):
workflows?
Speaker 2 (25:07):
Yeah, we use a ton of Zapier, so we have lots of zaps
that zap back and forth.
Between all the things we douse transcripting and
note-taking, ai.
We use a lot of chat, gpt tohelp build content, calendars to
create different SOPs.
We use a company called Scribeto create SOPs.
There's so many cool tools.
Speaker 1 (25:26):
So, as we start to wrap up, what has you personally
most excited about the future?
So you're running this fabulouspart-time business making, I
think you said, a milliondollars, pretty cool.
What has you the most excitedabout the future, whether it's
just your personal business orthe technology or what you're
seeing happening in the advisoryspace?
Speaker 2 (25:47):
The thing that gets me the most excited.
So I was at a retirement techservices conference speaking
back in September, and anadvisor stopped me in the lobby
of the hotel and I had workedwith him a couple of years ago
and he was like Libby.
I just have to tell you we hadbuilt out his first 100 days
like onboarding clientexperience and he goes.
We changed it and we did all ofthe things that you told us to
(26:07):
do and it's been insane.
We've gotten so many referralsin the first 100 days of our
clients coming on board andpeople are more excited to work
with us than ever before.
And he was like thank you, likewhat you said actually worked.
Those types of moments for mewhen I see other advisors and
that's why I sold my practiceand went into coaching is I knew
that I could impact thefinancial services community in
(26:28):
a much bigger, much moremeaningful way by working with
advisors and showing them how todo what I did, but in their own
way that works for them andtheir goals, and that, instead
of me just serving 285households, if I could help
advisors stay in the business,not burn out better, smarter
ways of doing it, all ships risetogether.
As far as I'm concerned, and ifwe can start helping advisors
(26:50):
root their processes and clientexperience, everybody's going to
see the benefit of that theadvisors, their teams, the
clients.
The quality of planning isgoing to go up and that's the
thing that gets me most excitedis watching advisors have these
very tangible results.
More so than just like morerevenue but more time off than
(27:11):
ever before.
I leave my computer at theoffice at five o'clock.
I have boundaries.
That's the stuff that makes mereally excited to see more
advisors investing in themselvesand doing coaching and not
trying to figure everything outon their own anymore and just
recognizing I can't know all thethings.
Of all the things.
I'm going to join themasterminds and get the coaching
and do the reading and juststart testing and trying and
(27:31):
being more creative in mybusiness.
Speaker 1 (27:33):
So someone listened to this and they're like that
sounds great.
What are some of themisconceptions, or maybe even
limited thinking, that peoplehave before they make that leap
into embracing everything thatwe're talking about?
Speaker 2 (27:44):
I think a lot of people are like I'm not ready
yet.
I should be further along thanI am.
I'm clearly not ready yet.
I need to get past X, y or Z.
If I can just get through this,things will calm down.
For me, it's just like investingin a coaching program or a
mastermind.
You definitely have to be readyto implement whatever you're
going to be receiving, but it'slike having a baby.
(28:05):
There's never actually a goodtime to do it, and so people
kick the can down the road andthey're like oh, you know what?
I really know that I need that.
I'll get that done next year.
I really know that I need that.
I'll get that done.
You know what?
I'm going to work on that insix months and it just stays on
the to-do list forever.
It's just like we tell ourclients if you invest a dollar,
you're going to have $5 at somepoint.
(28:25):
Same thing invest some time andyou can save an hour.
This year can do that multipletimes.
You will start to reduce youroverwhelm, reduce your stress,
make more money per hour.
That's probably the mostlimiting belief is I'm not ready
yet, or I don't have enoughtime, or I have to just get past
this thing or have this oneexperience.
(28:47):
Like I have to hit this certainrevenue, like it's all
nonprofits, like you just needto jump in and do it and
implement the information.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
I love that analogy of compounding.
It seems overwhelming to get tothe point where you're not
overwhelmed, which is ironic,but it's just getting started
and as you get started and youstart getting those small wins,
they start to compound orsnowball.
Is there a resource, a toolthat you have available?
I know on your website you havetons of material for someone
that wants to just dip theirtoes in the water, so to speak.
(29:14):
What would you recommend thatthey look at on your website and
also share with us what yourwebsite is?
Speaker 2 (29:19):
So they could definitely check out the
Efficient Advisor podcast.
It's very tactical.
Every week there's literallysomething that you can do or
implement in your business.
There's lots of downloads thatgo with the episodes.
We really don't gatekeepanything, so if we're talking
about how to develop your idealclient avatar, I'm going to give
you a worksheet to help you dothat.
There's really no secrets.
The website is full of videosand templates and samples and
(29:42):
examples.
We, of course, have ourcoaching programs, which are
just 10 month finite programsthat you get in, you do the
thing, you get out and youimplement it.
And then there's some communityaspect beyond that, where that
we've developed for the alumniof our programs.
We've got the group coaching.
We've got the podcast.
I do a lot of content onLinkedIn.
Because of my new VA that has aexpertise in video editing,
(30:06):
we're going to be doing a lotmore short form content and
stuff coming on LinkedIn.
We also have a free communitywith about 2500 advisors in it
and ops people from advisorypractices on Facebook called the
Efficient Advisor Community andit's just a great place for
people to ask questions, getanswers and it's just really
cool.
Like someone might post hey,I'm using Redtail and I can't
(30:27):
figure out where to store mynotes and they'll have 30 people
respond and say here's how I doit.
It's just a really cool safeenvironment for advisors and ops
people to be able to askquestions and just get feedback.
Speaker 1 (30:38):
Out of curiosity, are you familiar with a community
called school?
You mentioned a Facebook group.
Do you also have a school groupor are you more concentrated on
Facebook?
Speaker 2 (30:44):
So our free communities on Facebook are
coaching programs run off ofKajabi and that's where our
alumni community is on Kajabi.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
Is there anything that I haven't asked you that
you want to share before weconclude today's episode?
Speaker 2 (30:55):
I think we've covered a lot.
Speaker 1 (30:57):
Perfect, and just one more time.
Where's the best place forpeople to reach out to you?
Speaker 2 (31:00):
You can definitely follow me over on LinkedIn and
you'll find me under Libby Gryweand on the Efficient Advisor
community on Facebook, and thenthe podcast, the Efficient
Advisor.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
Thank you so much for your time today.
The Efficient Advisor.
Thank you so much for your timetoday.
I enjoyed the conversation andI appreciate your time.
Speaker 2 (31:15):
Thanks so much for having me.
If you're like most advisors, I know you're caught
in a familiar trap.
Your business is growing, butso are your working hours.
Every new client means lesstime with your family, less time
for yourself and a constantfeeling that success in your
practice means sacrifice in yourpersonal life.
You probably wondered is thisjust how it has to be?
(00:25):
Our guest today proves there'sa different way.
Libby Grywe has not only builta thriving advisory practice,
but she's done it while workingfewer hours and creating real
freedom in her life.
She's taken what many of usthought was impossible growing a
profitable practice whileactually having a life and
turned it into a reality.
(00:46):
Now she helps other advisors dothe same.
She's also the host of theEfficient Advisor podcast, where
I recently had the pleasure ofbeing a guest.
After a conversation, I knew Ihad to have her share insights
with you all.
Libby, welcome to the show.
I'm excited to unpack yourjourney and show our listeners
that there might be a better waythan what we've all been taught
about building a successfulpractice.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Yeah, ever since we had you on the podcast, I have
been looking forward to thisconversation, because it's
really not that different thanwhat you're doing right Figuring
out an efficient way to write abook and actually get your
product out into the world, anddo it in less time 100%, and
just before we recorded, we werehaving this nice conversation
about AI and it's amazing justthe tools that are being made
(01:30):
available now.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
It's just crazy how efficient you can become.
I found myself just doing thiswith AI and using different
tools, that my own productivityand efficiency is significantly
higher than it was just a fewyears ago.
Thank you for being our guesttoday and before we dive into
the topic, I'd love to have ourcommunity just to get to know
you a little bit better.
So what's your backstory?
(01:51):
How did you go from being afinancial advisor to now helping
advisors create more efficiencyand more freedom, more personal
time in their own practices?
Speaker 2 (02:08):
time in their own practices.
Yeah, absolutely so.
I'll take you back to 2008.
So 2008 was a very scary yearfor me as a financial advisor.
For the previous four years, Ihad been working around the
clock like a crazy person,building my business nights,
weekends, 70, 80 hours a week.
Then came 2008.
And usually when I say that,most people will think, oh,
because the market crashed andI'm like no, something way
scarier happened.
I found out I was pregnant andthis was great because we wanted
(02:30):
a baby.
But this was really scarybecause I had been running
around like building thisbusiness and I just remember
having that moment of gosh.
There is no way I can be themom that I want to be and
operate like this.
So I set out on this mission toand at the same time, I was
really happy with the amount ofmoney I was making.
(02:50):
So I was like, okay, how can Ido both?
And so I set out on thismission to start building more
systems and processes to reallyfigure out okay, how do I
whittle down from 80 hours aweek to my goal of 24?
I realized in that moment that Ididn't really have a business.
I had a Libby, while I had astaff member and I had an office
(03:11):
.
If I didn't show up, stuffwasn't getting done, it wasn't
scalable, it wasn't wash, rinse,repeat.
I was winging it, recreatingthe wheel every single time.
So I really set out on thiscrusade to start actually
stepping out of that advisorrole and into that role of CEO
of my own business and to startthinking strategically right.
(03:32):
How do I cast a vision for thebusiness?
How do I start building systemsand processes?
How do I start taking more offof my plate so that I'm not that
mom that's tethered to herphone during soccer games and
constantly putting out fires onthe weekends and bringing out
the laptop?
And that's really where itstarted so fast forward three or
four years I had quadrupled theamount of money that I was
(03:55):
making per hour worked.
We had scaled to a seven-figurefirm as a solo advisor and I
had dropped my hours down to 24hours a week.
You hit the target.
Yeah, I hit the target and itwas all through really three
main things.
But advisors started gettingwind of what I was doing and it
wasn't like oh, she's on theEast Coast, where everybody has
(04:17):
lots of money, in the West Coast, where I was this advisor in
Ohio.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
I think the haters would think that's like ah, she
has it lucky, oh, oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Yeah, something special is going on.
I can promise you there's not alot of special stuff going on
here in Cincinnati.
Yeah, I worked with normalclients, right?
I didn't work with ultrawealthy.
I didn't have these like accessto anything that anybody else
had access to, and so advisorsfrom all over the country
started getting wind of what Iwas doing.
We're like, okay, where do Istart?
And that's really where theEfficient Advisor was born.
(04:48):
I started finding that I lovedsharing the behind the scenes.
Here's how we did that.
And here, take my templateDon't create it, Because I used
to absolutely despise going toconferences and these speakers
would come and they'd sharethese life-altering ideas and
I'd have so many ideas swirlingin my head and I'd get back to
my office and be just staring ata blank piece of paper going
(05:09):
okay, but and that's reallywhere it came from is I wanted
to be the how.
I wanted to show people howthey could fast track it and
think about in a way that was somuch more simple.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
I want to follow up with a couple of points that you
made.
So first, I love your humor.
So you're like, yeah, it was2008 and this traumatic thing
happened and everyone's oh, weknow exactly what happened the
markets crashed.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
You're like the baby thing way scarier.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Yeah, that wasn't it.
So, going from 80 hours down to24, but being intentional about
it, I love to unpack that alittle bit, because the saying I
forget which law it is is thatwork expands to meet the time
available, right.
Speaker 2 (05:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
So when you realize that and are intentional about
your goals, it's amazing whatyou can accomplish.
I think a lot of people justthink, whether it's 40 hours or
80 hours a week, eight to fiveor whatever the hours are, I
need to go sit at my desk and dostuff.
But that's just ridiculous.
Can you share a little bit moreabout that?
Because that seems like 80 to24, seems like a real revolution
.
How did you have the confidencethat you could make that happen
(06:07):
, that you could make that work?
Speaker 2 (06:08):
I don't even know if I did.
I think it was like more ofwhen you have to you figure it
out.
If I hadn't gotten pregnant, Iprobably would have just stayed
at that pace, like I reallyneeded that.
I really needed that incentiveto figure it out.
I was doing what most advisorsdo in the beginning, needed that
incentive to figure it out.
I was doing what most advisorsdo in the beginning and I see
(06:29):
this all the time with advisorclients that I work with is you
just go full bore building thisbusiness, whether you get
pregnant or not.
You hit this point where yourealize, whoa, okay, everything
I prayed for now has come true.
I have this business, I havethe revenue, I don't have to
worry about paying my mortgageand putting food on the table.
I'm good.
But, holy crap, I'm overwhelmed, I'm super stressed, I can
barely keep my head above water,and that's that inflection
(06:50):
point where an advisor reallyhas to put on that CEO hat and
say I don't have the time but, I, need to prioritize the time to
actually streamline this thing,or I'm just going to keep
feeling like I'm drowning,playing catch up on nights and
weekends, always feeling likeI'm behind.
(07:11):
That's really for me, like whenpeople hit that moment and they
realize I don't have a business.
I have a Paul or I have a Libby.
I really need to get this quoteunquote figured out.
And the weird part is whenyou're at this three, four years
in and you're maybe at a fewhundred thousand dollars of
revenue, you have this weirdfeeling like I figured it out,
like I'm a good advisor.
I should have this figured outby now.
But the hard part is like yougo into this business so that
you can have your own businessbut nobody teaches you how to
(07:34):
run your business.
You're so engrossed in learninghow to be an advisor and how to
do the tax planning and how tolearn all the things and the
sales we neglect, like thebackend processes and things
that actually help you become aquote-unquote real business.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
So this is back in 2008.
As you're trying to figure thisout, what were your influences?
Can you point to any book orsystem or anything at the time
that helped inform you so thatyou could start developing these
systems for yourself?
Speaker 2 (08:01):
There was one book that I can remember someone
recommending to me, and it wasE-Myth.
Yeah, that classic book, and Iwas like huh, you know what?
Yeah, okay, I'm in.
And that was the first businessbook that I read and that then
catapulted me into the.
What else is out there, whatelse can?
Speaker 1 (08:20):
I read.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Yeah, and it was making investments in myself and
that was really scary for me.
And I don't know if it's justbeing raised as a woman in the
nineties where we poor and wevery rarely invest in ourselves,
or I was vested in my businessand my kids and my husband and
all of the things, but beingable to actually step outside of
that and put money into my owneducation and that's something.
(08:41):
No, you can lose your businessand you can lose money in the
market and all the things that.
This is something nobody couldever take away from me.
I wish I would have done thatsooner.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
I listened to the audio book E-Myth probably
multiple times.
Michael Gerber, I think hisname, and he has a wonderful
voice.
It's almost hypnotic when youlisten to it.
You feel like you're listeningto wisdom and you feel at peace
and he's just a greatstoryteller.
What I found in myself?
Because at that time I wasrunning a larger business and I
loved the ideas, but I found itdifficult to translate those
(09:11):
ideas into day-to-day operations.
In terms of efficiency, I hadsome wins, but overall it just
seemed overwhelming.
So I'd love to dive into, like,how do you help advisors
actually implement these things?
Everyone, I would imagine, hasthe idea sure I'd love to work
fewer hours or I'd love to getpaid more per hour, whatever it
is sounds great, but the realityis that there's a lot of
behavior change that has tohappen.
(09:31):
Just maybe tell some stories,or just who's that typical
advisor that comes to you, whatare the typical challenges and
what's that transformation thatyou help them achieve?
Speaker 2 (09:39):
So the typical advisor is that advisor who's at
that inflection point, right,where they're like I have this
really great business, I'm superexcited about it, but it's
running me instead of me runningit.
And the commonality amongstthose advisors is they're really
good people, right, they'rereally good at sales, they're
really entertaining.
They might be really good atthe analysis and analytics, but
(10:02):
they're so used to doing all ofthe things that sometimes it's
hard to see the forest throughthe analysis and analytics.
But they're so used to doingall of the things that sometimes
it's hard to see the forestthrough the trees and really
figuring out where do I actuallyneed to spend my time.
So the first thing that wealways do is we start to look at
there's really eight coreprocesses that every financial
advisory practice has and westart to look at them through
the lens of what can I automate,what can I delegate.
(10:23):
Look at them through the lensof what can I automate, what can
I delegate, what can I deleteand what can I streamline?
So automate, obviously beinglike what tools, resources exist
out there that we can make thishappen automatically Workflows,
calendaring, all the littlethings.
Delegating what are the thingsthat are in this upper
right-hand quadrant of what'steachable and what's templatable
(10:43):
, and how can I start to givethat away?
Then the most underutilized oneis delete, right?
There's a lot of things thatadvisors do because we think we
should be doing them, becauseDave in the cubicle next to me
does them.
I was trained by my brokerdealer that I should do these
things.
Often they don't actually haveany impact.
So we're really picking apartevery single thing that an
advisor is doing, every littletask, and saying is it even
(11:06):
necessary?
Does this enhance your clientexperience or is it just neutral
?
And if it's neutral, if it'snot adding to the client
experience, we take it away.
And so then, of course,streamlining being, can we
create a template for that?
Can we build something thatallows you to do it better,
faster, smarter, cheaper, easier?
Right, instead of retyping thesame email 37 times?
(11:28):
Can we make a template?
Then it's getting all of thatorganized, and that's the
hardest part for most advisorsis we're not naturally organized
people.
When I started sharing that Ihave ADHD, I always called it
advisor ADD.
I'm ADHD.
I always called it advisor ADD.
I'm like I don't know.
Maybe it just started when Ibecame an advisor because there
were so many hats Now that Iknow more about the diagnosis.
Like I understand, I've had itmy whole life and that's my
superpower.
(11:49):
But a lot of advisors havestarted sharing oh my gosh,
that's me too.
I have a hard time focusing, I'mscattered all over the place
and it's really helping themmanage themselves so that they
can better manage people, andreally starting to build some of
those things where they canjust start the process and
somebody else can actuallyfollow it through, recognizing
(12:09):
where our strengths are andwhere our weaknesses are,
scaling ourselves first beforewe just jump to hire somebody.
But really looking at everysingle thing that we're doing in
a process and saying is thisactually impactful?
Does it make a difference?
Do the clients care?
Or am I doing this because it'ssomething that I think I should
be doing, because I was onlineand I saw so-and-so does this,
(12:31):
or I listened to this podcastand such is doing this.
But if you're serving adifferent demographic or a
different ideal client, thosethings might not be necessary or
they might actually be takingaway from the client experience
as opposed to enhancing it.
Speaker 1 (12:46):
One thing that I see and I'm interested to get your
take is that and I struggle withthis that you had a very
specific goal of wanting to getdown to 24 hours because you
were a new mom and you haddifferent responsibilities, and
so you had a very tight budgetof time that you wanted to do it
specifically.
You had differentresponsibilities and so you had
a very tight budget of time thatyou wanted to do it
specifically.
I think for men perhaps,because typically they're not in
that role.
Myself, for example, I'm alwayslooking for ways to get more
(13:06):
efficient, but it's not so muchso that I have more time to do
other stuff, it's simply so Ican grow my revenue.
It's simply so I can make moreper hour.
I'm just curious Do you seethat dynamic in terms of if I
had more free time, I wouldn'tknow what to do with it?
Speaker 2 (13:19):
I would spend it poorly.
Yeah, every time I speak at aconference, I include this now
in my talk, right?
So I do my opening and I talkabout how I went from 80 hours
to 24 and how I quadrupled theamount of money that I was
making per hour.
And I always will have somebodycome at me and go.
It's not work.
If you do what you love and Iwant to work 40 hours a week or
I love the grind, I love working60, 70, 80 hours they say, okay
(13:42):
, great.
Well, if you're going to dothat great, you do you right.
I'm not saying workingpart-time is for everybody, but
you might as well be making fourtimes as much as you are right
now.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
I think that's the person who I've been.
I'm not sure if you know thisperson.
His name is John Cutton.
He has his own podcast calledthe Quantum Growth for Financial
Advisors podcast, and I'vegotten to know him over the past
, I want to say a year and ahalf or so.
During that time, when I methim, he was already doing 9
billion AUM.
Since then he's now at 14billion AUM and I'm helping him
write some books and so I justget like a bird's eye view of
(14:11):
him and he's probably thebusiest person I know.
He just grinds and it's becausehe just has this passion and
desire to grow his enterprise atthis time and he's just
increasing his value.
It's not about, in his case,having more time to allocate
elsewhere.
It's simply how do you get muchmore efficient in growing your
business?
Speaker 2 (14:30):
That's interesting because even when I was down to
three days a week, I still hadmassive growth goals.
My husband at the time wouldalways go what's the big deal
with a million dollars?
And this sounds like the most?
I am fully aware of how firstworld this sounds.
But what's the difference?
If you make a million dollars ayear or $800,000 a year, is it
really going to change yourhappiness levels?
(14:51):
And I'd say it's not about themoney, it's because I know I can
and that was always it right,like it was just that way that I
was wired was like okay, so now, if I can make a million
dollars in 24 hours, can I make1.2?
How about 1.4?
Right, and it wasn't even aboutwhat that dollar could do for
me, it was more just because Ithink I can.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
So you're very goal oriented in terms of time.
But what I like about what Ilike about what you're saying is
that it's also you still havethose growth goals and now and I
heard you say it earlier justreally more measuring it by the
hour, almost right.
So it's a little bit differentmeasurement but it's more
precise.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
And not to take it totally off topic, but I always
say there's a huge differencebetween contentment and
complacency For me.
There are advisors who want toscale, scale and 10X their 10X
with no end in sight and hireand have these big mega
practices and that's beautiful.
And then there were people likeme who were like, hey, that's
not my jam.
Maybe it would have been orcould have been if I hadn't done
my business, but I just want tomake as much as I possibly can
(15:46):
in these in this time constraint.
I'm not complacent because Istill want to grow, but I also
just have this ability to becontent and for advisors
listening that, I think there'salways this pressure that you
have to form these multi-advisorteams and bring in juniors and
more and more.
And that's not the only way togrow a business and it doesn't
mean you're complacent, You'rejust happy making a million
(16:08):
dollars working part-time.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
As we're talking, I wanted to go a little bit into
processes In today's world.
Here we are in 2024, andthere's so many different ways
to do the things that you said,whether it's to automate,
delegate, delete or streamline,and just some of the things that
I've done myself or I've seenis you can hire a virtual
assistant, and there'stechnologies like Zapier, online
(16:32):
automation processes and, ofcourse, the big one nowadays is
AI.
So maybe, starting with thefirst one, about getting,
perhaps, a virtual assistant,what are your thoughts about
virtual assistants?
Speaker 2 (16:42):
I always tell people, before you even think about
hiring, you really need toanalyze how you're spending your
own time first, because I knowwhen I started I remember them
being like oh, you need to hirea phone call.
So there's two things right.
Like first, I actually reallyneeded.
Before I could bring anybodyelse in and lead them, I had to
lead myself better.
Am I really actually maximizingevery minute that I'm spending
here in my office?
(17:03):
Am I being effective?
Do I really need to jump tohiring somebody else and do I
have my stuff together so thatif I hire somebody, I can
actually give them a track torun on?
So if I'm over here justwinging it every time, how am I
going to train somebody else towing every time?
The other thing with that is Iremember there being like this
very distinct pecking order ofhere's what you do you hire a
phone caller, then you hire anadministrative assistant and
then you bring in someone who'slicensed, and it was the road
(17:25):
that you followed.
What I realized is that I hiredthe phone caller and I had this
phone caller for about threemonths.
I realized she's not that greatof a phone.
Like I'm better on the phoneand meanwhile I'm over here
filling out paperwork andgetting not in good orders like
it was my job because I suck atdetails.
I was great on the phone, sowhen I flip-flopped us and had
(17:45):
her doing the paperwork, I wasmaking the phone calls.
We were so much more effective.
So it's not just about beingefficient, right, being
efficient is great, but it hasto be effective.
You have to be efficient andeffective and it has to be
enjoyable for everybody.
So what I learned through thatprocess was is that everybody
has different needs in theirbusiness based on their
skillsets, who they're serving,how they're serving them, right.
(18:06):
So if you're running a virtualRIA where you don't have a
physical office space, you'renot meeting clients in person,
your business needs differentthings than a 10 advisor office
in Boise, idaho, where everybodycomes in face to face.
Every business is not built thesame.
So if your business is one, avirtual administrative assistant
(18:26):
is huge and I have no problemwith where.
It's interesting because I justhired a VA outside of the US.
It's funny because when I tellthat to my friends, everyone
immediately assumes that you'regoing to have very low quality
work because it's low cost.
I'm like there are brilliantpeople all over the world that
are very good at what they do.
I am not great at buildingfunnels and editing video.
(18:50):
That is not my sweet spot.
I could find somebody here todo it.
It doesn't matter to me wherethey are, as long as they're
trained and good at what I needfor my business.
So I would say it depends onwhat your business needs and
what you need help with.
If you need a physical personin the office to greet clients
and seat them and make themcoffee and deliver experience,
(19:11):
or if you need someone overseas,now I will say and I'll
probably get shade for this butif you have someone calling your
clients, there still is amisconception or a preconceived
notion about how people feelabout talking to somebody and
not being able to understandthem if they have a really thick
or heavy accent.
If you have something that isclient facing the world in which
(19:31):
we live, it's probably helpfulto have someone with a very
clear English tone right, likeit doesn't matter if they have
an accent or not, but they haveto be easy to understand.
I hope we're moving as asociety away from that a little
bit, recognizing that there arevery intelligent people all over
the world.
I think hiring help in general,whether it's virtual, in-person
, overseas, here, is going togive you the best leverage for
(19:54):
your business.
Speaker 1 (19:54):
I've had an online business location free since
2015.
And I've experimented withhiring American contractors,
hiring contractors from thePhilippines, hiring from Latin
America and, interestingly, Ifound that my preference is
Latin America.
Some of the reasons is thatthey're in the same time zone.
The accent to your point if youhire the right people, it can
(20:16):
be indistinguishable.
I have two contractors rightnow that are virtual assistants
in Latin America and you can'ttell the difference.
They can be on client meetingsand unless I say hey, so-and-so
is in Brazil, no one knows thedifference.
But the benefit to it is thatthe cost per hour is
significantly less than hiringan American contractor.
So for me, as a small businessowner, that can make a huge
(20:37):
difference.
But to your other point youfirst have to lead yourself,
because I've recommended this toa lot of people.
It's hey, you need a virtualassistant, and I think the
mindset that people mistakenlycome to it is that hey, I'm just
going to hire someone and I'mgoing to say go, do all these
things for me and now my life iseasy.
So they want to dump theirworkload on them and magically
think that they know whatthey're doing and they don't.
And so if you don't have thesethings templated.
(20:57):
You don't have SOPs.
If you don't have a process,it's just not going to work out,
and you know that better thananybody.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
Yeah, no, absolutely.
At the end of the day, it allcomes down to processes.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
I want to jump to a couple other things.
Now there's automation.
I don't know how much you getinto this, but there's tools
like Zapier and different thingsthat are remarkable once you
understand how they work.
Of course, email automation,things of that nature but I
think maybe what's even moreinteresting today, in 2024, is
AI.
How involved in AI are you interms of your own business, in
terms of tools and processesthat you are recommending to
(21:30):
your clients?
Speaker 2 (21:30):
I think back to when I started my business in 2004
and we had paper files.
And now I think about wherewe're at today and just the
amount of tech change that hashappened in the last 20 years.
It's only going to continue atthat pace, if not faster.
Speaker 1 (21:45):
It's faster, literally, with AI.
I can expect the next bigupdate a month from now.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
And it's unbelievable .
So we're very heavily utilizingAI inside of the business and I
have an AI partner that he andI are building out some stuff.
It's really just to startteaching advisors at a basic
level.
Yeah, how do you Zapier?
How do you create zaps betweenRedtail and your Outlook?
How do you start just makingthese simple bridges using AI?
Because it is such a big thingfor advisors.
(22:12):
When I was speaking at XYPN lastweek, every advisor, when we
talked about AI, mentionednote-taking.
That's literally where we're atright, like it's like
note-taking and it's so muchbigger than that, and so that's
where.
But we have to do it likestep-by-step.
Okay, the first thing I can dowith AI is get my notes off my
desk.
Okay, now, what else can I do?
Now, ben and I are starting tobuild some programs for advisors
(22:34):
that kind of show them likestep-by-step, like here's
something else.
Even if you're at a brokerdealer and you can't control
your tech stack, there's stillso many ways that you can use AI
in a way that's compliant toreally support your business,
and I will share that.
If you're not using it, youwill get left in the dust.
You have to stay ahead of it.
You have to stay on top of it.
You don't have to be coding andyou need to be integrating AI
(22:57):
into your business in order tocontinue to be successful.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
What you're saying is that this isn't just a fad like
the internet?
Speaker 2 (23:02):
Yeah, that's exactly and we think about if you use
the internet as a great example.
Back when that thing came out,it was like an email.
People were like, is thisreally like email?
Is this really going to takeoff?
And we all learned it andthat's the hard part is
resistance of I don't havecapacity.
Our clients aren't going to beable to learn how to use a
portal to upload their docs.
We are always putting thesebarriers in place.
(23:22):
We look back and, like mygrandmother was born when they
still had a carriage that sherode around in and the ice man
stopped by and dropped offblocks of ice.
When she was 95, she was usinga smartphone.
So anybody can learn anything.
It's just a matter of beingintentional and building time
into your calendar to learn itand to have your team learn it
(23:44):
and to be the best at it.
Speaker 1 (23:45):
I would agree, and I would add to that that it's just
becoming easier and easier.
The AI, in my case, is morewhat's the use case, and you
said this before.
Right, it's everyone has thenote taker.
And I was thinking the otherday I was on a zoom meeting and
suddenly it was with one advisorand before he showed up, he had
three AI note takers on thecall with me and I'm just like
sitting there a little bitnervous, thinking, okay, what's
going on here?
Then he showed up.
(24:05):
I'm like, do you realize?
You have three AI note takers,like the best I definitely
noticed on these Zoom callseveryone has their note taker,
whether or not what they'redoing with it's a different
matter.
There's a couple of tools thatI've come across, so I'm big
into AI.
I got into AI, I think in 2022,just before chat GPT became
popular, and this was two yearsago.
(24:26):
But back in the days of I thinkit's called Jasper, and Jasper
was like the one that went fromlike a startup to a billion
dollar company over the courseof a year and I went to their
conference in the beginning of2023.
I'm like, okay, I'm sold, Ijust need to build my business
around AI and I've been doingthat ever since.
I found some really specificuse cases where I can't work
without it at this point.
But there's so many cool tools.
Just throw out a couple.
(24:46):
There's Claude.
So if you're doing any writing,claude is the best, in my view,
for writing, whether it's blogposts or for note taking.
An organization it's calledNotebook LM.
It's a product by Google andit's remarkable the capabilities
that it has and it's free, andso there's so many different
things that you can do Just inyour own business.
Curious what tools are youusing personally to help your
(25:07):
workflows?
Speaker 2 (25:07):
Yeah, we use a ton of Zapier, so we have lots of zaps
that zap back and forth.
Between all the things we douse transcripting and
note-taking, ai.
We use a lot of chat, gpt tohelp build content, calendars to
create different SOPs.
We use a company called Scribeto create SOPs.
There's so many cool tools.
Speaker 1 (25:26):
So, as we start to wrap up, what has you personally
most excited about the future?
So you're running this fabulouspart-time business making, I
think you said, a milliondollars, pretty cool.
What has you the most excitedabout the future, whether it's
just your personal business orthe technology or what you're
seeing happening in the advisoryspace?
Speaker 2 (25:47):
The thing that gets me the most excited.
So I was at a retirement techservices conference speaking
back in September, and anadvisor stopped me in the lobby
of the hotel and I had workedwith him a couple of years ago
and he was like Libby.
I just have to tell you we hadbuilt out his first 100 days
like onboarding clientexperience and he goes.
We changed it and we did all ofthe things that you told us to
(26:07):
do and it's been insane.
We've gotten so many referralsin the first 100 days of our
clients coming on board andpeople are more excited to work
with us than ever before.
And he was like thank you, likewhat you said actually worked.
Those types of moments for mewhen I see other advisors and
that's why I sold my practiceand went into coaching is I knew
that I could impact thefinancial services community in
(26:28):
a much bigger, much moremeaningful way by working with
advisors and showing them how todo what I did, but in their own
way that works for them andtheir goals, and that, instead
of me just serving 285households, if I could help
advisors stay in the business,not burn out better, smarter
ways of doing it, all ships risetogether.
As far as I'm concerned, and ifwe can start helping advisors
(26:50):
root their processes and clientexperience, everybody's going to
see the benefit of that theadvisors, their teams, the
clients.
The quality of planning isgoing to go up and that's the
thing that gets me most excitedis watching advisors have these
very tangible results.
More so than just like morerevenue but more time off than
(27:11):
ever before.
I leave my computer at theoffice at five o'clock.
I have boundaries.
That's the stuff that makes mereally excited to see more
advisors investing in themselvesand doing coaching and not
trying to figure everything outon their own anymore and just
recognizing I can't know all thethings.
Of all the things.
I'm going to join themasterminds and get the coaching
and do the reading and juststart testing and trying and
(27:31):
being more creative in mybusiness.
Speaker 1 (27:33):
So someone listened to this and they're like that
sounds great.
What are some of themisconceptions, or maybe even
limited thinking, that peoplehave before they make that leap
into embracing everything thatwe're talking about?
Speaker 2 (27:44):
I think a lot of people are like I'm not ready
yet.
I should be further along thanI am.
I'm clearly not ready yet.
I need to get past X, y or Z.
If I can just get through this,things will calm down.
For me, it's just like investingin a coaching program or a
mastermind.
You definitely have to be readyto implement whatever you're
going to be receiving, but it'slike having a baby.
(28:05):
There's never actually a goodtime to do it, and so people
kick the can down the road andthey're like oh, you know what?
I really know that I need that.
I'll get that done next year.
I really know that I need that.
I'll get that done.
You know what?
I'm going to work on that insix months and it just stays on
the to-do list forever.
It's just like we tell ourclients if you invest a dollar,
you're going to have $5 at somepoint.
(28:25):
Same thing invest some time andyou can save an hour.
This year can do that multipletimes.
You will start to reduce youroverwhelm, reduce your stress,
make more money per hour.
That's probably the mostlimiting belief is I'm not ready
yet, or I don't have enoughtime, or I have to just get past
this thing or have this oneexperience.
(28:47):
Like I have to hit this certainrevenue, like it's all
nonprofits, like you just needto jump in and do it and
implement the information.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
I love that analogy of compounding.
It seems overwhelming to get tothe point where you're not
overwhelmed, which is ironic,but it's just getting started
and as you get started and youstart getting those small wins,
they start to compound orsnowball.
Is there a resource, a toolthat you have available?
I know on your website you havetons of material for someone
that wants to just dip theirtoes in the water, so to speak.
(29:14):
What would you recommend thatthey look at on your website and
also share with us what yourwebsite is?
Speaker 2 (29:19):
So they could definitely check out the
Efficient Advisor podcast.
It's very tactical.
Every week there's literallysomething that you can do or
implement in your business.
There's lots of downloads thatgo with the episodes.
We really don't gatekeepanything, so if we're talking
about how to develop your idealclient avatar, I'm going to give
you a worksheet to help you dothat.
There's really no secrets.
The website is full of videosand templates and samples and
(29:42):
examples.
We, of course, have ourcoaching programs, which are
just 10 month finite programsthat you get in, you do the
thing, you get out and youimplement it.
And then there's some communityaspect beyond that, where that
we've developed for the alumniof our programs.
We've got the group coaching.
We've got the podcast.
I do a lot of content onLinkedIn.
Because of my new VA that has aexpertise in video editing,
(30:06):
we're going to be doing a lotmore short form content and
stuff coming on LinkedIn.
We also have a free communitywith about 2500 advisors in it
and ops people from advisorypractices on Facebook called the
Efficient Advisor Community andit's just a great place for
people to ask questions, getanswers and it's just really
cool.
Like someone might post hey,I'm using Redtail and I can't
(30:27):
figure out where to store mynotes and they'll have 30 people
respond and say here's how I doit.
It's just a really cool safeenvironment for advisors and ops
people to be able to askquestions and just get feedback.
Speaker 1 (30:38):
Out of curiosity, are you familiar with a community
called school?
You mentioned a Facebook group.
Do you also have a school groupor are you more concentrated on
Facebook?
Speaker 2 (30:44):
So our free communities on Facebook are
coaching programs run off ofKajabi and that's where our
alumni community is on Kajabi.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
Is there anything that I haven't asked you that
you want to share before weconclude today's episode?
Speaker 2 (30:55):
I think we've covered a lot.
Speaker 1 (30:57):
Perfect, and just one more time.
Where's the best place forpeople to reach out to you?
Speaker 2 (31:00):
You can definitely follow me over on LinkedIn and
you'll find me under Libby Gryweand on the Efficient Advisor
community on Facebook, and thenthe podcast, the Efficient
Advisor.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
Thank you so much for your time today.
The Efficient Advisor.
Thank you so much for your timetoday.
I enjoyed the conversation andI appreciate your time.
Speaker 2 (31:15):
Thanks so much for having me.
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