Is it Time to Negotiate With Your Financial Advisor? Obviously I agree with your whole life statement, but as for annuities..you’re completely wrong. Click to learn more! Wow, this is the first time I’ve read an insider view of what really goes on inside the whole life mills. They really feel they are doing good by helping even a financial professional understand our products and how the products can “help” their clients. Is it possible that both parties can win. Haha, you’d be surprised! It was very hard to make a living selling term insurance. I have found success with letting people come to me after I present them the plan. Medicine isn’t a bastion of morality in this regard. Making a Living: Whole Life Sales Quotas. Can a man cheat? Definition of a sales job. Yes, you can in any business. Our advisor helped us get life insurance and we opened Roth IRAs. Especially for young guys in the business. Yeah, a couple months ago I got new quotes to see if anything was cheaper. Since I retired I get letters monthly from my clients thanking me for what I did for them and if it were not for me they would have no retirement to live on. I think your estimate of who needs whole life insurance is way too high. What do you think? It is hard work like everything else in this industry. Great company to work for. And I agree that one of the main issues is that the consumer often isn’t clear on how the advisor is getting compensated. I think I’ve had zero doctors as new clients in the past 5 years. Finally, you know how doctors can get irritated when a patient looks up your diagnosis (or self-diagnoses prior to a visit) on WebMD and based on that information, is absolutely convinced you’re wrong? More and more people are aware of their. If we didn’t do so, we could be fined, or even lose our job. If you can get the number of calls made, meetings set, and deals closed, you'll be golden and on you way to a great career. Medicine is hardly immune from this phenomenon. Let’s assume that it is the only job available and it must be taken. The comparison to an Ally savings account (which I personally absolutely love) is not even remotely comparable. I bought single premium annuities I could add to, if I chose. That business is good for the security sales man on the team who gets all the leads for the difference when whole life is cashed in. I have never met an honest buy term and invest difference agent. I know WCI has done posts in the past on annuities so some of this has been covered in the past posts. Most people working in it do not think they are scammers either. I saw it work for people who had parents that were already multimillionaires and had a wide network of wealthy friends to take advantage of but other than that it was only lots of people going broke. Financial firms complain all the time about how much “gray hair” is in the industry. Because Northwestern Mutual financial advisors can sell non-Northwestern Mutual insurance products, we often used this as a way to persuade clients as to why we were recommending Northwestern Mutual in the first place. I always was able to beat their term with cheaper term or better whole life. In the meantime, I had become disenchanted with teaching and after a few opportunities that didn’t work out, my wife suggested that I reach out to our financial advisor to see if I might like his job. I have never worked in an environment that watches the big fish get bigger by swallowing all the small fish. Not once, not one single time did we end that call with them still feeling that same way. I’ve always been skeptical of insurance companies. Only those representatives with "Advisor" in their title or who otherwise disclose their status as an advisor of NMWMC are credentialed as NMWMC representatives to provide investment advisory services. If so it explains a lot of the conversations I’ve had with representatives of certain companies. Your email address will not be published. This isn’t just insurance agents. Donovan sounds like a really great guy, client-focused and sharp, and I hope he gets some new doc clients after his post here! Sound crazy? Minor edits made to eliminate potentially libelous statements. My career as a “financial advisor” was off to a good start. Initially, I felt irritated at Dr. Dahle’s antagonism of financial advisors like me. However, I found that advisors often wanted to tout secondary features instead of its true nature as an insurance product. My personal conclusions—many of them formed or inspired by, This realization led me to form a financial planning firm based on a, For avid readers of this blog, maybe this feels like old news. If someone wants a “guarantee” or these products then I suppose that’s up to them. Ask a question about working or interviewing at Northwestern Mutual. I called his manager and explained what he had done, how rude he was, they then asked “well are you taking your account elsewhere”. Whenever we think annuities are getting a bad rap in the media (and we’re well aware of the reputation that is out there), I find it very interesting that the language I hear at our company is that what we need to do to fix this is to do a better job at “informing” or “educating” people on what annuities really are. Not sure why you’re unique but hey, take what you can get. Having people in the company sell you training to find trigger words/sales speech shows that most of this is designed to get a Pavlovian type reaction. They ostensibly have a lot of money and therefore would make an ideal client. That’s someone else’s niche. I could not give security advise but they can on radio; They also can tell people to drop their insurance and buy term. I’ll only open an account with someone who comes as a referral from an existing client, or a tax or legal professional, and even then it’s only after a fairly in-depth vetting process. Keep in mind that most of the general population in the United States is not well versed in financial planning — much less an even more complex topic such as annuities and whole life insurance! I didn’t forget my doctor friend who told me that he was following the White Coat Investor blog. If I repeatedly went to an advisor and did not take their advice and told them they were just a shill to the insurance companies and then sued them when I had an issue that their advice could have prevented it would be similar to the Statin “nonbeliever” who has a stroke. I didn’t end up asking him to refer me to anyone. you can not read very well. There are plenty of bad products out there and unfortunately they have a bad name due to those products (most often “bonus” annuities) and the misuse due to lack of advisor’s doing their jobs and making sure their clients use these products as designed (turning on income riders at the right time is one massive issue in this space). But it’s not just to protect young doctors. So your perspective of advisors might be skewed toward advisors that frankly aren’t very good. Let job seekers know what it's like to work at your company. Some pros of working at Northwestern Mutual include their top training program, amazing mentors, and the way the managing partners of each firm allow you to make your own schedule. Its fun to see you bash on Whole Life Insurance. I agree with you–it seems to me that if one is to be called an “advisor,” there should be a certain amount of independence to the professional opinion they offer. Imagine going to a surgeon for an operation, or to an attorney to argue your case before a judge, and they only had a peripheral understanding of their trade. My firm encouraged us to not sell to those who don’t fit the product (yes I would tell advisors Im not recommending anything to them. I felt belittled and degraded by the things that he wrote, in particular about Northwestern Mutual advisors (apparently stemming from an experience he had with a friend who sold him a whole life insurance policy). The average industry insider believes whole life insurance and annuities help guarantee income in retirement. However, I will say that cash value life insurance is a great defensive investment against the market; I learned this at school, not through company culture. I did not say I only met 2 or 3 honest whole life agents. If I don’t know who it is, I don’t call them back. So everyone is CLEAR about the conflict fiduciary or not. As I’m in marketing, I am asked how marketing contributed to the business. We did not sell insurance and annuities. tough job to get started in. Think about that. Sales experience is not necessary, nor is a clean drug test. I once “advised” clients to buy annuities. They really mean “how much additional policy premium did you bring into the business that we wouldn’t have had if there hadn’t been a marketing campaign?” It’s a common term in business called ROI-return on investment. The people there are very friendly, helpful and motivated individuals. Everyone is very helpful and gives their time and resources to welcome you into their culture. When you’re young and inexperienced the prospect of getting a doctor as a client seems really appealing. Northwestern Mutual has a very large margin because we are low cost leaders. How do we adequately educate young advisors, but also pay them well enough on a flat fee to attract smart talented people? 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