The Succession Problem
For any RIA that wants to remain independent, succession is the question that can't be deferred indefinitely. The senior advisors who built the client relationships are, by definition, aging. Their clients have deep trust in them — trust built over decades of shared history, market cycles, and personal milestones. What happens to that trust when the advisor who holds it eventually steps back?
Novare Capital Management decided years ago that it wanted to stay independent. That decision made succession planning not just important but unavoidable. You can't remain independent if there's no one to hand the firm to — and you can't hand a firm to someone who hasn't already earned the trust of the clients they'll serve.
That realization led Novare to approach next-generation advisor development not as a talent initiative but as a succession strategy. The two are inseparable. Developing young advisors isn't just about filling roles — it's about building the relationships that will hold the firm together when the current generation eventually transitions out.
The Pairing Model
"We call it dynamic tension — not the old advisor and the young advisor. The younger advisors don't want to be called young and the older advisors certainly don't want to be called old. So we create this dynamic tension between the two where they're learning from each other."
— Anne McPhail, Managing Director, Novare Capital ManagementNovare's approach to succession starts in the meeting room. Young advisors are paired with senior advisors on shared client accounts — not as observers, but as active participants. In those meetings, it's often the younger advisor who leads the financial planning conversation. They present the plan. They walk through recommendations. They field questions. The senior advisor is present, but the younger advisor is doing the work that builds trust with the client.
This structure is deliberate. Client trust is earned through demonstrated competence over time. It can't be transferred in a single introduction meeting when a senior advisor announces their retirement. By the time a senior advisor steps back, the clients they've served for decades have already been working with the younger advisor — watching them handle complexity, seeing them navigate difficult conversations, experiencing their judgment firsthand.
The transition, when it eventually comes, isn't a handoff of a stranger. It's a natural progression of a relationship that has been building for years. That's the succession model. And it only works if the pairing starts well before it's needed.
Educating the Next Generation of Clients
The same logic that governs advisor succession applies to client succession. The great wealth transfer — an estimated $84 trillion moving from one generation to the next over the coming decades — is the defining opportunity in wealth management. Firms that have already built relationships with their clients' adult children are positioned to capture it. Firms that haven't built those relationships will lose assets when their aging clients pass wealth to heirs who have no reason to stay.
Novare has addressed this directly. Young advisors at the firm don't just work alongside senior advisors on established client accounts — they're also introduced to clients' adult children. McPhail described the approach through her own experience: her daughter Braden graduated from the University of South Carolina and was connected with one of Novare's younger advisors, Alex Dan. He helped her with her 401k enrollment, budgeting for the first time independently, and Roth IRA contributions.
The relationship that followed is instructive. Every time Braden changed jobs — every promotion, every transition — her first call was to Alex, not to her mother. The relationship had its own life, independent of the parent-child dynamic that introduced it. Novare had earned a multi-generational client, not through a pitch, but through genuine service to someone at the beginning of her financial life.
That outcome isn't incidental. It's the result of a deliberate strategy to engage the next generation early, pair them with advisors they can grow with, and give young clients meaningful help with the actual financial questions they're navigating — not just a polite introduction to the firm's capabilities.
The Liberal Arts Foundation
When Anne McPhail considers what makes a young advisor capable of the relationships Novare is building, technical credentials aren't what she leads with. She leads with communication.
McPhail believes strongly in liberal arts education as preparation for this work. The ability to read carefully, write clearly, and articulate complex ideas to clients in plain language — these are the skills that determine whether a young advisor can actually do what the job requires. And in her view, they are exactly what AI cannot replicate.
"AI will not replace the ability to read, write, and articulate your thoughts," McPhail has said. That conviction shapes how Novare thinks about hiring. Technical skills can be taught. Financial planning credentials can be earned over time. The capacity to sit across from a grieving widow and communicate with both clarity and warmth — that requires something different, something developed over years of education and human experience.
McPhail also emphasized the value of early-career training at major institutions. Young people who begin their careers at firms like Schwab, Fidelity, or a large bank get foundational exposure to client service at scale — the systems, the processes, the professional norms of the industry. That foundation, she noted, makes them substantially easier to develop at an independent RIA. Post-pandemic, the importance of in-person interpersonal skills has only grown. Advisors who can communicate well — who can read a room, adapt their style, and build genuine rapport — have a durable advantage that no model can automate away.
What This Means for Your Firm
The principles behind Novare's next-gen development model are accessible to independent firms of any size. They require intention and patience more than scale.
- Pair young and senior advisors on shared accounts now — Don't wait until a senior advisor announces a retirement timeline. The relationship-building that makes succession work takes years. Start the pairing early.
- Let young advisors lead planning conversations — Presence isn't the same as participation. Young advisors build client trust by demonstrating competence. Give them the meeting agenda and let them run it.
- Engage clients' adult children proactively — The great wealth transfer will go to the firms that already have relationships with the inheritors. Introduce your young advisors to your clients' children before the wealth moves.
- Invest in communication skills, not just technical skills — CFP credentials matter. But the advisor who can explain a complicated estate scenario in plain English to a 28-year-old starting her career is rare and valuable. Hire and develop for that.
- Create "dynamic tension" across generations — Young advisors and senior advisors learn different things from each other. Structure the relationship so both are genuinely contributing, not just observing.
The firms that will look strong in twenty years are the ones that are developing their next-generation advisors today — not as a future priority, but as an active practice that's already underway. Succession isn't a moment. It's a process, and it starts long before anyone is ready to retire.