Many advisors are responsible for building and managing a team of people that will allow their practices to scale up. Trouble is, too many advisors are ill-prepared to lead. That's partly because leadership skills haven't been their area of focus. Most advisors entered this business because of a deep interest in financial services and a strong desire to help investors. So when advisors do add more staff to their operations, they often find themselves in over their heads.

The good news: Some advisors have had major breakthroughs in inspiring their team members to achieve great things individually and as a group, and in retaining these valuable individuals through good times and bad. These advisors have developed and used five leadership skills that have allowed them to build successful teams while maintaining high quality-of-life standards.

HAVE A CLEAR PURPOSE

Advisors are often so busy serving clients that they don't take time to think about where they want to take their businesses. Getting at the heart of "why" defines clarity of purpose. Think about asking yourself the very same clarifying questions you use with clients to identify their goals.

For example: Why are you in business? What is important about your business to you? The most common response is to make enough money to support the quality of life that you and your family desire. But that only scratches the surface. Go deeper in your thinking and you might come to realize, for example, that you do what you do because it satisfies your intellectual curiosity or because of the pleasure you receive by making a positive impact on affluent people in your community.

COME INTO FOCUS

Like you, your team needs to understand clearly whom they serve and the unique value they can bring to that group of investors. This helps ensure that there is no misunderstanding about what you do and whom you do it for. Unfortunately, many advisors don't articulate their value proposition to their teams very well. That damages their ability to build and lead an effective team by sending a mixed message to the organization.

To gain the right focus-or regain it, as the case may be-you've got to determine the most important goals for the business in the short, medium and long terms. Set no more than three major goals in each of those categories. Then communicate your goals and strategy to the team.

You don't need to have an all-encompassing strategy document. But you've got to make sure your team members understand your strategy if you expect them to work together-and with you-toward those goals. All teams need leaders who can spell out the organization's objectives and how each member's work relates to and furthers those objectives. Therefore, you want to know that your team members can state your purpose, strategy and goals in general terms.

This requires you to develop both formal and informal approaches to communicating with your team. Formal approaches can include weekly staff meetings, monthly executive committee meetings and annual corporate retreats. Informal methods can include pre-meeting discussions of ideal outcomes for meetings, debriefing get-togethers after meetings and unstructured lunch meetings.

GET BUY-IN

Your team may comprehend the firm's goals and direction, but getting them to commit to taking the firm in that direction may be more difficult. Knowledge without the motivation to act won't do you much good, so you must work with your team to inspire them toward the desired results. This is especially important in a wealth management firm, where team members want to feel highly involved and know that their work matters.

Gaining buy-in requires you to inspire your team. You have to connect with team members on a personal level through your interactions with them. These interactions can be basic; taking time to say "hi" to your team members during the workday, for example. Or they can be more substantive, like bringing a junior analyst who worked on a client's portfolio into your meeting with the client.

You must also build trust for your team to commit to the focus and direction of your business. One of the best ways to do that is to be up front with staff about what is going on at the company, so they understand how they can help at any given moment. No one likes bad surprises at work, and team members must feel that their leaders are being open, inclusive and honest with them.

You further build trust when you recognize and reward team members for performance. Team members need to know that someone senior to them sees that they are doing a good job. Too often people do great work but feel their efforts go unrecognized. Those team members quickly lose their inspiration-and lose confidence and trust in the organization and its leadership-at which point they either move on or stop working hard.