Cheryl Holland, CFP, President of Abacus Planning Group in Columbia, S.C., lives by the mantra, "10,000 hours equals wisdom." Finding staff with this much experience is tough, so Holland has transformed her practice into a mini-university. She has logged 10,000-plus hours in several positions.

Newly graduated from Bryn Mawr College with an economics degree, Holland began her career doing econometric research. Later, as a stockbroker at Merrill Lynch, she heard that the future of financial planning was in the fee-only arena. The idea made sense to her, so she took a job as a legal secretary, cramming for her CFP at night.

Holland credits her years as a legal secretary for the insight she utilizes in managing her own practice, which she started in 1998. Though her firm has plenty of technical firepower, she believes her "soft skills"—managing, recruiting, educating, compensating—helped her build a practice with $520 million in assets in just over a decade.

PEOPLE SKILLS

Holland laments that the CFP course does little to prepare advisors to be anything but a sole practitioner or an expert in a technical silo. "Most advisors have little formal management training and either return to school for an executive MBA or stay solo and outsource to avoid headaches," Holland says.

To beef up her own management skills, Holland partnered with Kathleen Bollerud, a leadership and organizational consultant. She finds Bollerud's adage, "It's the soft skills that are the hard skills," to be prescient.

Bollerud works with Holland and her staff on issues ranging from delegation and running a meeting to change agility and critical feedback. "It's not just about praising or criticizing, but about showing employees paths to improvement."

Keeping with her 10,000-hour mantra, Holland created the Abacus Planning Group University every Monday at 1:00 p.m. Employees take turns teaching weekly seminars covering everything from using irrevocable life insurance trusts to making good first impressions.

CLIENTS AND FEES

Each of Holland's 160 clients is teamed with a financial advisor and an investment advisor. New clients must have at least $5 million in investable assets, although Holland makes exceptions. For example, her newest client has over $40 million in privately held real estate, but only $200,000 in investable assets. This client proves Holland's rule: "We lead with financial planning and follow with money management." Clients seeking only asset management are referred elsewhere.

Abacus fees tend to follow this focus. The minimum financial planning fee for a client is $6,000 a year. However, the highest fee charged to date was $75,000 for a family. Fees reflect the complexity of a client's financial situation and the number of meetings required to put a plan in place. Holland's asset management fees are 60 basis points for the first $2 million; 50 bps for the next $2 million; and 40 bps for over $4 million.

REWARDING EMPLOYEES

Holland offers employees a competitive compensation package. Her goal is to be in the top quartile of compensation for years of service and job description, based on Moss Adams studies. She lifted the firm's compensation philosophy directly from Mark Tibergien and Rebecca Pomering's Practice Made Perfect: The Discipline of Business Management for Financial Advisers.

Abacus perks include a sabbatical month off for every five years of service and a 12.5% company contribution to the firm's profit-sharing plan. Employees can also buy into the firm's equity ownership and can participate in the firm's incentive plan. Holland doesn't want employees working more than 45 hours a week, and "even 45 is too much." One secret to what she learned over the years: "I want my employees to have a life," she says.

Jim Grote, CFP, contributes regularly to Financial Planning.