Young advisers face their first major downturn

The news, the people we speak to and social media are consumed by COVID-19, while all other distractions have been removed from our lives.

As a 25-year-old adviser, I’ve never experienced anything like this.

I’ve faced my fair share of difficult topics, healthy debates and hard times with clients, and not always about investments. Truth be told, I find these conversations adrenaline-boosting. But up until the global pandemic of COVID-19, discussing performance and investments with clients was relatively low stress. Since I started my career, markets have been up and investors have been making money across most asset classes.

Now, here we sit after weeks of working quarantined, amid dramatic market swings and growing fears of a global recession. The conversations and the industrywide stress level are much different. As each week worsened, from both an investment standpoint and a global health standpoint, so did client concerns. Within days, whole cities were quarantined, international travel bans were established, sporting events were cancelled and we were working from our couches.

This is a chance to make an impact on our clients’ long-term future, and help guide them in a direction that, had they not had an adviser, they might not have pursued.

A novice outlook

Hour after hour, day after day, the same conversation is repeated across multiple clients, and sometimes with the same client multiple times; it can wear you down. By the end of a workday, it can feel physically and mentally draining to have such intense conversations — even though we haven’t left our homes. The fear that builds from the client who's about to retire, or the client who may get laid off, both of whom are trusting you to help buckle their seat on the roller coaster — that stress is absorbed by the adviser, too. And yet being able to calm the fear people feel about their financial future with something as simple as a conversation can make it all feel worth it.

How will young advisers cope with the first potential sustained downturn we’ve seen in our career? At an introspective level, I wonder what keeps me in this profession during the good times, but especially the hard times.

I can’t shake the compulsive desire to help the people I work with succeed, regardless of the pushback, repetitiveness or stress that come my way. It’s a major reason why I, and other advisers, got into this profession in the first place. We all knew coming in that there are both good and bad market cycles.

On the other hand, I do wonder whether nature versus nurture has a role to play in how young advisers will come out on the other side. We are all in this profession to help our clients, we were all born with an analytical and empathetic mind. But is that enough?

While we all love helping our clients, the people I work with also like to help each other. During this bizarre time, the people above me have made it their goal to understand how I’m feeling and how they can help – even though they are just as mentally and physically drained, if not more so.

At a time where we are physically alone, it helps to feel support from the people you respect and look up to. I think that for other young advisers during this time, culture and support may be critical factors in whether they stay or go.

Young advisers could leave the industry due to stress of the current environment, or maybe they stay in the industry, but switch firms because they've experienced a lack of support. In my opinion, the latter will be more common than the former. Firm culture could be a key differentiator in the outcome of an advisor’s decision.

[More: Steering your firm through the crisis]

Katharine George is a senior analyst with Wealthstream Advisors.