It’s a Family Affair
“WE’RE DOING A LOT of financial literacy for younger adults and older kids,” Jania Stout notes when asked about the differentiating factors of her firm. “We want to change families, not just change individual participants.”
Stout, managing director and co-founder of Hightower Fiduciary Plan Advisors, then proceeds to tick off a comprehensive (and exhausting) list of education and wellness initiatives developed by the firm.
“We’ve conducted about 400 one-on-one meetings in the last six weeks through our ‘virtual advice days,’” she explains. “We’ve always provided virtual advice, along with in-person, resulting in 1,500 one-on-one sessions in 2019 alone.”
Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, she assigns two “participant success advisors” to individual coaching sessions.
“We recently offered two full days to a particular client, which were filled in 30 minutes. We rolled out two more days and they were filled within an hour, so we rolled out two more days. We had a total of six days filled within two hours of releasing it to their 1,200 employees. It shows both the need and the response rate we’re getting in this environment.”
Making full use of digital media, the firm hired video production company Idea Decanter to create a video that describes who they are, and the reasons one-on-one meetings are so important. It received 600 views in its first week.
“One of the challenges is that people don’t know what they’re signing up for,” she notes. “We clearly explain that it goes beyond just the 401(k)—it also helps prioritize other goals.”
Their one-on-one session feedback revealed some surprises. Lowest on the list of client concerns was market performance despite ongoing volatility as a result of the COVID crisis. Participants were instead raising their deferral amounts, something Stout rightly calls “pretty amazing.”
Yet it’s the programs geared to older kids and younger adults that make her most excited. For example, the firm is about to debut a monthly podcast/Zoom meeting centered on financial literacy.
“Hosted by my teammates Keith and Katherine (who are both in their 20s), it’s called ‘Keith & Kat’s FUNancial Podcast.’ We’ll cover financial literacy topics and have prizes and make it incredibly interactive with the ability for listeners to call in. Our target market is the 15- to 25-year-old, or 17-to-30, demographic.”
They normally do 12 webinars annually, but recently increased it to 18, adding healthcare and career/self-help-oriented topics that touch on simply “how to be happy,” which is actually in the firm’s mission statement: To Help Working America Feel Less Stressed and Be Happy.
“We started to see more and more comments from participants around teaching their children financial literacy. It pushed me to start a series of live educational webinars. We talked about it in committee meetings to test the waters. The response was incredible. The committee members were CFOs and heads of HR who wanted their kids to participate.”
Titled “It’s a Family Affair,” the purpose of the series is to give children the necessary building blocks to be less stressed as they grow.
“We had over 120 young adults and older children dialed in, and it was fantastic!” Stout concludes. “One client, in particular, has two boys ages 14 and 16. She sent a note complimenting the event and noting that sibling rivalry now has the brothers fighting at the dinner table over who will begin saving sooner to have more for retirement.”
Jania Stout is managing director and co-founder of Hightower Fiduciary Plan Advisors in Owings Mills, Maryland.
With more than 20 years serving financial markets, John Sullivan is the former editor-in-chief of Investment Advisor magazine and retirement editor of ThinkAdvisor.com. Sullivan is also the former editor of Boomer Market Advisor and Bank Advisor magazines, and has a background in the insurance and investment industries in addition to his journalism roots.
