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  • Thursday, 16 January 2025

The Go-To Problem Solver

Meet Paul Bednarczyk, Operations Director for the Oklahoma, Missouri, Houston and Dallas/Fort Worth firms at 1847Financial. His unique experience provides invaluable support for advisors looking to grow their practices or bring on junior advisors to ensure seamless transitions during the succession process. Let’s explore Paul’s journey, his passion for the industry, and how he’s making a lasting impact on financial professionals and their clients.


How long have you been in financial services?
I got into financial services as a graduate student intern in 2006. I had some time off in between roles, so that I guess that puts me at about 16-17 years.

What made you decide to join the industry?
Two major reasons: #1: It's one of the industries that can impact people's lives on a daily basis. Money and finances is something that people worry about constantly. It’s not THE thing in life, but it's very important. To be able to have an impact and influence on people's lives in a meaningful way is fantastic. 

#2: It’s a complicated, complex business. Whether it's a broker-dealer or insurance carrier, because of the regulations, we have all kinds of methods and structures of how we help serve clients both with insurance and investments. That complexity makes it a fun and interesting place to be, because we have a lot of things that we just can't do. It's not Nike/Reebok, where they can develop products and compete on price, style, and quality. In our industry, we have to compete within the same rules in a very commoditized market. That makes it fun and exciting to bring new methods and strategies for bringing products and services to clients.

What roles have you had along the way?
I was with Thrivent Financial for 13 years. For the first half of that time, I was a Director in Corporate Strategy that focused on distribution strategies, building compensation plans, and leadership structures. In that role, I worked with many financial professional practices, delivering and implementing many programs to help them grow.  

The second role I had was with Thrivent's insurance broker/agency. I was a director who helped build out third party independent distribution of our insurance products. Within that, we developed a mergers and acquisitions arm as well. We acquired a couple of companies, the first two acquisitions in Thrivent’s 120-year history.

Later I moved to Ameriprise, where I worked as the operations leader of a financial planning practice, a merger of two practices. I came in and managed all the staff, revamped the processes, standard operating procedures, what tools to use to build it, and discovered more efficient ways to do business so that we could go acquire other practices. While there, we acquired two additional practices. We went from four advisors to 11 when I left, so we experienced phenomenal growth! I applied what I did at Thrivent but within an individual practice, and did a lot of work with clients as well.

I aligned with 1847Financial in January 2024 and am now the Operations leader for 2 firms - Ken Kolosso in Oklahoma/Kansas, along with Paul Rodden in Kansas City, Houston and Dallas/Fort Worth.

In my current role, I do a mix of both roles I’ve previously done in the field – working with our existing financial professionals to help them grow and resolving issues to make them more efficient. I’m fully involved with both firms’ strategic visions – helping translate goals, mission, and vision to help us grow, which includes helping with recruiting and bringing on new financial professionals.

Why would someone join your organization?
#1 - Because we care. We care about financial professionals, their practice, their success, and their clients. We get to know them, their goals, and work with them to build tactical plans to help make that happen. 

#2 - We always begin with yes. A financial professional may have a broker-dealer where they dread asking questions or feel they don’t want to push the envelope or ask something that might be unconventional. Well, we want to get to the yes – it might be an uphill battle, but we have built a culture of “how do we get to yes?” It may not be exactly how you want to get there, but we are committed to getting you the yes.

#3: Our culture of community. We understand that you have your own business and your own practice, and you want to run it your way. But you can learn so much by talking with other financial professionals in the same field that you are in the same community that you are in, and the tide rises all boats. We have a mentality of abundance, not of scarcity, and so the more that we can help one another, the more that we can help 1847 as a firm grow, the more firms we have, and the more professionals we have, the better we are all going to be.

Give me an example of how you've helped a financial professional grow their business.
The phase of a financial professional’s practice in which I’ve made the most impact is succession planning, which is typically a senior advisor looking for a junior advisor to eventually take over and buy the practice. I help them navigate the entire process – having the right contract laid out, finding the right person to sell the book to, and helping them through that transition, which might take 2-4 years. One key task is analyzing the book to identify what products/concepts the junior advisor may need training on and planning out how they’ll be brought into the practice so they can seamlessly take over - so there’s no “shock to the system” and the senior advisor can peacefully retire. I've done that with 2 or 3 practices – starting with 1 or 2 advisors who are willing to hire additional staff and take the 1st leap into creating a true business. 

Before we even start, I help them get over the mental hurdle of paying another employee and letting go. My wife and I owned a small business for 10 years, so I know the feeling of taking money out of your own pocket and giving it to somebody else. You must have the confidence, a structure in place, clearly defined roles, very specific duties for employees, and you've got to manage them.

Many financial professionals don’t naturally have the skillset to go from meeting with clients to managing people, because they're different skills. Being able to help get them over the mental hurdle of letting go and taking them through the practical steps of growing their business - from job descriptions to interviewing to performance management – to how to measure employee performance, we have to get tactical on helping them through that. If we accomplish that, the financial professional will take non-revenue-generating tasks off their plate, will become more profitable and will be more likely to succeed. 

Tell me how you support financial professionals.
First and foremost, I am the go-to person for any problems that arise. Situations will come up with clients, or within an FP’s practice, on how they want to run their business, that either 1) They don't know the answer to or 2) They want to do something bigger/better, but it doesn't seem like it's possible. I am the first call they make and the connector to Home Office, the broker-dealer, to carriers, and to 1847Financial.  I'm also responsible to making sure that the firm itself is profitable. A lot of financial professionals think firm performance doesn’t apply to them. I remind them that if we’re not profitable, we’re shrinking, which means, we can’t provide the resources to support you on a daily basis. I always ask, “You want to take more off of your plate, right?” I remind them my job is to make sure not only am I helping individual practices grow, but to help add more financial professionals, so we can grow as a firm. Just like you want business continuity as a financial professional practice, we need business continuity as a firm as well.

Lastly, I assist the Managing Principals in continuing to build the culture and recruit the financial professionals that would fit well within a protection first, comprehensive financial services firm like 1847Financial and HTK. Not every financial professional is there today, but I’m here to help our current financial professionals get there, while also recruiting the best financial professionals that fit with our culture.

 

What advice would you give a financial professional, who's looking to change firms?
The best advice I can give is it's not all about a spreadsheet. I talk to financial planners and professionals all the time focused on “What are my fees? What's the compensation level? Where am I in the GDC Grid? What are my fixed expenses?” 

I’m not saying those things aren't important, but there are probably a lot of things that frustrate you about where you're at, that have nothing to do with money. It’s our job to eliminate those. You want to find a place where you’re happy, where top line revenue is the most, and expenses are the least. Generally other companies have to sacrifice a major factor to get FPs to either the highest payout or the lowest expenses. The second is to search for great cultural fit, where you feel connected and a sense of community. You don't want to be on a deserted island where you’re just a number, and there are already a lot of places like that. What we strive for is making financial professionals feel connected, supported, and a sense of community, but with a great balance between payout and expenses. But it's not just about a spreadsheet and numbers. 

What do you do for fun in your free time?
Most of my free time is spent with my family and dogs, Stogie and Peso. Additionally, cooking, playing hockey, and doing yard work also consume my time.  
Ready to dig deeper with Paul? Consider reaching out to him on LinkedIn or pbednarczyk@1847financial.com 

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