Howard Pressman, CFP®

President’s Message

Hello. I hope you’re all having a great start to your summer and are finding some time to recharge your “batteries” and gear up for the second half of the year.

In June, we had another successful Spring Symposium. I came away with some great ideas that I plan to implement into my practice. Brad Rutan with MFS seemed to be the favorite speaker of the day. Brad talked about business disruptors and how changes in technology, consumer preferences and geopolitics are changing business as we know it. Many large, well-known companies may have trouble competing as these disruptors alter the world around us. In Brad’s opinion, many passive investing strategies are built based on the past and are not positioned to take advantage of the exciting advances the future holds. Mike Fox, founder of advertising agency the Mullingar Group was another crowd favorite. Mike talked to us about the importance of building and communicating your brand and gave us concrete steps on doing both. Starting with emotional benefits, then building a differentiated process and finally rounding out with tangible features can help you create outstanding client experiences. Thank you to Dan Reilly and Thornburg Investment Management for bringing Mike. Jay Mooreland, the Emotional Investor provided a fascinating presentation on coaching and communicating with your clients.

Thank you to those who completed the speaker evaluations. Judging from the responses we received, you all felt good about the day too. We also received some great suggestions on how to improve the event. It is always a challenge to create an all-day event that caters to the diverse needs of our members. Whether it’s location or the number of CE credits offered, there are many differing opinions and, of course, financial constraints. Please know that we hear each of you and will make every attempt to factor these into future events.

Two of our members were recently recognized by Investment News as 40 Under 40 for 2018. Congratulations to Tess Downing and Katie Hammer on your well deserved recognition!

This month’s programing includes a fantastic Happy Hour program with CE! Join us at the University of Virginia’s Falls Church campus to hear from Vanguard’s Tom Galgano, CFA. You’ve no doubt seen white papers on Vanguard’s “Advisor Alpha”. Tom will be building upon Advisor’s Alpha by showing us a model based on seven key factors that will help you stay relevant in an ever changing environment. Afterwards we’ll head up the street to Mad Fox Brewery to unwind and enjoy the company of our peers.

Also in July, our NexGen members will gather in DuPont Circle for their annual NexGen Retreat.

That’s it for me this month! I wish you all a very happy Fourth of July and as always, thank you so much for all that you do to change and improve lives.  

All the best,

Howard

Howard Pressman, CFP®

2018 FPA NCA President

HPressman@EBWLLC.com