Tamara Williams is the Owner and Principal Transition Consultant of The Williams Consulting Group, where she assists financial advisors by managing the process of transitioning their current book of business to another firm. She started her career at Merrill Lynch, eventually becoming the Director of Transitions for an independent broker-dealer, where she learned and experienced the back office piece of how the transitioning process works. Tamara received her formal education from Oakwood University in Huntsville, AL, graduating in 2003 with a bachelor's degree in finance with a minor in accounting.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
Tamara Williams explains how The Williams Consulting Group helps advisors
The challenges advisors face when switching firms
Tamara’s advice for financial advisors
The value of creating strong relationships with clients as an advisor
The Williams Consulting Group process in simplifying the transition experience
People that have positively impacted Tamara’s leadership style
In this episode…
As a financial advisor, are you planning to transition your book of business to another broker-dealer? Where can you get the assistance required to make the shift experience faster, easier, and smoother?
Transferring a book of business to another firm is a very complex and multifaceted process. Tamara Williams recommends hiring transition consultants, experts who help advisors streamline the procedures, identify the challenges, and improve their pain points. She shares her journey developing a go-to resource for transitioning advisors while minimizing any business disruptions.
In this episode of The Customer Wins, Richard Walker sits down with Tamara Williams, Owner and Principal Transition Consultant of The Williams Consulting Group, to discuss how advisors can seamlessly transition to another firm. Tamara explains the challenges advisors face when switching firms, advice for financial advisors thinking of transitioning, the value of creating strong relationships with clients as an advisor, and their process for simplifying the transition experience.
Resources mentioned in this episode:
Tamara Williams’ Email: tamara@thewilliamsconsultinggroup.com
"Connecting Wealth Management Firms and Solution Providers With Chip Kispert" on The Customer Wins
"Transforming a Financial Services Firm Through Technology With Geoff Moore" on The Customer Wins
"Automating and Simplifying the Way Organizations Fill Out Forms With Rick Burgess of Forms Logic" on The Customer Wins
"Have Confidence in Where You Financially Stand With Shabana Nathoo" on The Customer Wins
Sponsor for this episode...
This is brought to you by Quik!
At Quik!, we provide forms automation and management solutions for companies seeking to maximize their potential productivity.
Our vision is to become the leading forms automation company by making paperwork the easiest part of every transaction.
Meanwhile, our mission is to help the top firms in the financial industry raise their bottom line by streamlining the customer experience with automated, convenient solutions.
Go to www.quickforms.com to learn more, or contact us with questions at support@quikforms.com.
Episode Transcript:
Intro 0:02
Welcome to The Customer Wins podcast where business leaders discuss their secrets and techniques for helping their customers succeed and in turn grow their business.
Richard Walker 0:16
Hi, I'm Rich Walker, the host of The Customer Wins where I talked to business leaders about how they help their customers win I have their focus on customer experience leads to growth. Some of our past guests have included Chip Kispert of Beacon Strategies, and Geoff Moore of Valmark Financial Group. Today I'm speaking with Tamra Williams, owner of the Williams Consulting Group, and today's episode is brought to you by Quik! the leader in enterprise forms processing. When the last step to earning your clients business requires processing forms, don't ruin a good relationship with a bad experience. Instead, get Quik Forms to make processing forums a great experience and the easiest part of your transaction. Visit quikforms.com to get started, before introducing today's guest, I want to give a big thank you to Rick Burgess, CEO Forms Logic for introducing me to Tamara. Go check out his website at formslogic.com and see how they make it easy to manage your new account opening processes. And you can even see an episode we did with Rick a couple months ago. Now for today's guest. Tamara Williams is the owner and Principal Consultant at The Williams Consulting Group. She assists financial advisors by managing the process of transitioning their current book of business to another firm. In 2005, she started her finance career at Merrill Lynch and obtained her series seven and 66. And after almost eight years with Merrill Lynch, she joined an independent broker-dealer as the director of advisor transitions. Her work there led to forming The Williams Consulting Group to help other firms with their advisor transitions. Tamara, welcome to The Customer Wins.
Tamara Williams 1:54
Thank you. Thank you, Rich, thank you. I'm excited to be here.
Richard Walker 1:58
Me too. We have a lot to talk about. Now, if you haven't heard this podcast before I talk with business leaders about what they're doing to help their customers win, how they built and deliver a great customer experience and the challenges to grow their own company. Tamara, I want to understand your business a little better. How does your company help people?
Tamara Williams 2:16
So The Williams Consulting Group, as you mentioned, town was developed out of the need in deficiencies, I would see within the transitioning process for advisors. So I pretty much saw that, within the office advisors needed assistance, they needed help at a high level, being the Director of Transitions connected to an independent broker-dealer, I was able to kind of give high-level instructions, you should do this. No, you should do that. Can't see your client data. But this is best practices and things like that. We would definitely run into some challenges if the advisor does not have admin assistants, or if the advisor just isn't tech savvy, whatever the situation was, we always kind of ran into me and it would be great if someone could just be right there in the office with them before they affiliate and help them through this process. So once I noticed that deficiency, and I developed my own best practices, jotting them down in my head, man, if I was that person, this is what I would do. I developed The Williams Consulting Group, and that's what I pretty much do every single day is assist advisors with successfully mapping out the process coming up with a game plan. defining roles and responsibilities, making sure everyone on the team has a role. Everyone on the team has something to do. If they are not good at what they have been assigned to do, we reassign, because transitions can get a little sticky at time. So yes, that's what I do. I definitely make sure everything goes off, as I say it loosely without a hitch. But we know transitions can always come with its own set of challenges. But yes, I make sure that game plan is followed repaper in your accounts, I'm assisting you with gathering client data, taking it from different data sources, I'm putting it into the spreadsheet, things like that. So that way we can easily use whatever that digital reporting tool is. I know a lot of custodians have now developed online tools to where you can get that client data in and open accounts. So I just make sure all of that is mapped out and planned ahead of time. So when you do affiliate, we are hitting the ground running.
Richard Walker 4:49
Sounds like a lot of work, actually have a lot of experience and transitions being in the forms business. And early on one of our very first customers tapped us and said can you help us with transitions. Now my perspective is from a data standpoint, like getting the data, transforming the data, putting it on the forms. And I don't know what else happens really beyond that. I mean, I kind of do. But it sounds like you're choreographing the whole thing. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So tell me some of the constraints that advisors face. If they say, hey, I want to switch firms, what are the major challenges that they face?
Tamara Williams 5:23
So one of the biggest challenges, and I mentioned it all the time, but I have learned recently that this is something that needs to be re-iterated on multiple times, advisors need to understand the current firm they're at? What can you do? And what can you not do?
Richard Walker 5:45
That's important.
Tamara Williams 5:47
That needs to be really understood. Prime example. And I won't drop any names, because we know these are big custodians and all that good stuff. So we're recently working with a transition, and they don't have a great understanding of their contract. And like, always like to say, I can read through it, I understand financial verbiage and things like that, but I'm no attorney. So we always let people know, let advisors know, seek legal counsel to kind of go through these things and understand, because a lot of times advisors will affiliate with firms, or start their own IRA and just kind of sign off because they're excited. I'm starting my own business, and I have office space. I'm excited.
Richard Walker 6:35
So you're talking about the contract, they signed with the firm that they're going to leave. Yes, yes. So they may have said they may have agreed that that firm owns the data, for example, right?
Tamara Williams 6:45
They may have said that that firm owns the data, they may have put some type of restrictions in there to where, yeah, you can leave but you can't talk to your clients for 30 days.
Richard Walker 6:55
How is that possible, how can a firm stop an advisor from talking to their clients? Why?
Tamara Williams 7:01
Right, I think that's the biggest thing, even when you're joining a firm, read through those things. Because as an advisor, you're thinking and think about it advisors have been in their business, RA, it's a new space, fairly new space, within the financial industry. So advisors have pretty much been in their business for 30 years. So the contracts on parchment paper, like, saying, like, it's not even like, they can even find it really. So when they go back to read it and realize, I've worked this hard, I've done these things. And I don't even own the client data. That's I mean, to them, a lot of advisors, it's almost hard for them to wrap their minds around it. So they're like, Tamara, what are you talking about? Please. I've known this guy, we played golf together, I known him for 25 years. And it's like, yeah, and that firm says that, that's their client. With all of that, that you've done, you've been to baby showers and all of that good stuff those are still there clients. So in situations like that, custodians can actually pull back on transition support. If you're in a situation to where your firm says, no, we own the client data, you can leave. But either you can take this amount of data, you can take nothing, or you can wait 30 days, most advisors don't want to wait, they want to go hit the ground running and get their accounts open and move over to that new firm. With that, custodians will pull back transition support. And of course, as a third party, I come in and I assist, and I help with what I do within the scope of things that I do. But it can become a very challenging transition, if the custodian is sitting there with their arms folded, saying, yeah, we have 50 more days left before we really dig our heels in and help you. And it's like, okay...
Richard Walker 8:59
So do you mean, the new custodian? They're transitioning to? Yeah, their hands off, right? Because they're not actually appointed to their firm yet, they haven't officially left the old firm, or their hands off, they're not going to do anything until you actually move. Moving without data that's like moving to a new house with no furniture.
Tamara Williams 9:17
Right, right. With no furniture and someone saying you can't buy furniture for the first 30 days. Yeah, right. It's a double whammy of oh my goodness. So and I always like to tell advisors, in situations like that, you're pretty much starting your business from the ground up. You can talk to your friends about anything, but you can't talk to them about, hey, I'm actually starting to RIA and I'm launching a business and you're gonna get paperwork in the mail or you're gonna get a DocuSign you can't say any of that. So, you're starting your business from the ground up. So I said all that stuff to say just to sum it up and put a little bow on it, understand your current firm's contract, know what you can and cannot do, because it will affect the successfulness, the outcome of your transition, the efficiency of it, all of that it will affect it.
Richard Walker 10:16
Yeah, for sure, man. So I want to ask you a question in the sense that if you have customers that vary in how much data they can access, or who owns the client, et cetera, I really have kind of two questions. What is your ideal client look like? Meaning what's going to be the easiest transition? And the corollary to that is, how can you advise somebody who's thinking about it, how to be calm, that best or easiest transition.
Tamara Williams 10:41
So with both questions, you are where you are. So if you are at a firm, say, for instance, you're at an independent firm, you own your client data. Now, granted, we have some firms who kind of hang their hat under the term independence, but we know who those firms aren't aware. You're not we give you space, but you are not independent, we own every piece of you. But even with those, when you're at an independent firm, you own your client data. Generally, there may be nuances there with different firms. But generally, you own your client data. If you're at some of the firms that are part of protocol, protocol, meaning, they will allow you to take that basic client data name, account registration, phone number, email address, things like that. No identifying information, social date of birth, can't take any of that information. When you're at either one of those types of firms. Of course, if you can take everything, I mean, we're filling out every data point in the form. So it's great. I mean, packets can go out, the client doesn't get the packet, and now had to fill in all the information you're not scurrying on the phone first day to, you know, gather client data to finally get them paperwork, all of that can be done ahead of time you on the client data. They one hits you affiliate now, you know, we are definitely hitting the ground running. Even in a situation where it's protocol and you're able to bring, that minimal information, at least we're starting with something, client registration, names, all that good stuff, you have it, you kind of know, you can ask the client for a statement and get mostly everything else that you need. So we're good to go there, when you have nothing. When you have nothing, because you always want to stay within the guidelines of what you can and cannot do, because there's some firms who are like, oh, man, you know, small Joe left, and, man, just let them go. But then you have some firms that are like small Joe, let's bring that forensic scientist in here to figure out, his keystrokes, and what did he download? So you always want to be careful as it relates to that. But I would say the best way to start prepping for those types of transitions is getting together those scripts, marketing, materials, announcements, things like that. The biggest thing is, know your clients, you should not be an advisor that's two years in your book was handed off to you from someone else as a succession planning, you hardly know the clients, and you're like, hey, I'm moving. That's fine. Because the clients do not know you. They're staying with the bull. They don't know you. They're like, oh, that's great Rich Walker, he's leaving, I'm saying. I don't even really know him. So I would say in those situations, number one, know your clients, know that they're going to have such a deep-rooted relationship with you to where you can move into a parking lot. And they would still be like, okay, well, I guess, now under 10. Like, they have that deep of a relationship when you don't own your client data, two make sure you're able to reach them in some kind of way, such as, if your clients are that close to you, you have their numbers in your cell phone. You can have announcements to where you may post something on LinkedIn saying, hey, guys, I started a new firm, because you can't give any calls to action, no calls to action. Just hey, I started a new firm. If these people are connected to you in that way, they're gonna reach out and say, Rich, wait a minute, you started a new firm, what are you talking about? Ding, ding, ding. Hey, we can talk about this paperwork that's coming your way actually.
Richard Walker 14:54
What's nice about what you're saying, Tamara is that number one, you're really talking about having such a great relation. finish up with your clients that are the ones who are going to call you, they're your a clients are your top clients, and probably the best relationship, therefore the most valuable clients to your business. And I know in a transition, that's a good time to get rid of your see clients, and not take everybody with you, but the ones that cause you the most work and the least amount of Joy. The second thing is I think about other people in this industry who say, hey, as an advisor, you would benefit greatly from having a very strong niche or niche. And having an identity and a group, like, maybe I don't even know what it is, but maybe you only serve dentists. So then it becomes easier if you switch because you're in that community. And everybody's going to talk about it, the word will spread faster even loves the clients, you don't have the best relationship, whether the deepest relationship with Have you seen that with some of the advisors you've worked with,
Tamara Williams 15:54
I will say and I'll give a great example to a huge population is female divorcees, and as an advisor, they work with an advisor last year, and that was her niche. When I tell you, she couldn't even leave fast enough before. Because especially when you connect with people in such a emotional time, they're connected to you for life, it's almost delivering someone's baby, I still remember the doctor's name and everything. And I have a true connection with her that deliver my child. So with that, when you help someone through tough times, whatever it is, whatever that divorce may have looked like, that advisor struck gold by just creating, that's my target market. And when these women are trying to figure out their finances, or whatever it is, even if it's a great divorce, I mean, oxymoron, but whenever you hope you want is a great divorce and you're, getting whatever you're supposed to get whatever it is, if you've never been the person to handle the finances, and now you're getting finances to handle, any advisor that comes in with that target market, she was at an extreme success, extreme success. And those women were like, hey, wherever you go, I'm going because I was here at one point in my life, and now I'm at a different level, and they may even be remarried, but they're like, hey, you're my advisor for life. So, yes, that plays a huge role along with knowing your clients.
Richard Walker 17:39
Yeah,, I have to give a big shout-out to one of my previous guests, Shabana Nathoo of Navigo Wealth, she's a certified divorce financial analyst, like that is her niche. And it's so cool. And I didn't even know that until I met her like a month ago, I interviewed her. And it's such an interesting niche, a very important one. Very common for one of the spouses to not be the financial person in the relationship. And they're like, what do I do? So that's really, really great. I'm gonna go back to something else about how you help the experience of transitions go faster, easier, smoother. Is it purely just coordination and knowing all the moving parts? Or are there other things like bringing in outside help? Or technology? What are some of the tools or your trade?
Tamara Williams 18:26
So yes, overall piece is, of course, coordinating everything, building out timelines, and game plans and things like that. That's great. But one of the biggest things and once again, I've given an example. Last year, one of my biggest pain points was the digital technology piece. Of course, you come in as this transition consultant, and I have all of this knowledge, I can tell everyone what to do. And this is great. So my responsibility is making sure that client data ends up in a form and you're able to get that form to your clients, whether it's paper, or DocuSign whatever it is, so everyone's doing what they're supposed to do, but I'm losing hair and staying up till three o'clock in the morning because I have no technology. I just woke up and said, hey, I'm gonna do transition consulting, and this is what I'm gonna do. But then when I sat down, granted, I was successful got through each one of them, but I was doing everything manual. So I will say the number one thing away from coordinating everything, so it can be a well-oiled machine is definitely technology, companies like yourself, you mentioned Forms Logic, I've currently have a partnership with them to where, using their tool to put client data into I didn't one transition firsthand. decision I did with their team back in May. And it was the first time I use a digital tool on my own to get that client data into those forms, the efficiency, the speed, all of that, it just kind of blew my mind because, last year I'm coming from, you know, okay, you have 500 accounts. Okay, so I'll go to bid in three months, that'd be great. And three months, I'm gonna go to pay it, that's great. So with that, being able to, you know, easily offer one of my clients like, hey, you know, we could have a new set of client data, or we didn't give you all the information, or whatever it is being able to have that backing of, hey, just give me a spreadsheet, and I'll get it into the paperwork, just give me the social security numbers. So just give me the date of birth, whatever it is, and I can get it into the format in the forms that you need. All of the required forms that you need. So yeah, technology, I would say, number one, I mentioned it, you know, at a conference earlier this year, my heart doesn't beat his fans, when people come to me with transitions, because now that technology has, you know, ease that pain point for me, definitely.
Richard Walker 21:24
I love something that you're bringing up, which is the entrepreneurs journey. And that is you jump into something that you have this great background in, do the actual work as a founder, as an owner, you do the hands-on work of filling out the forms, which is how I started my business, because I had to fill out forms, right, then you realize how it works. And then you seek out efficiencies to make it better for you and your client, right? I mean, because isn't a transition time sensitive?
Tamara Williams 21:53
Oh, yeah. Yeah. And that's, so that's a whole another piece of transitions. They are extremely time sensitive. So I'll go back to what I mentioned, if there is a clause in your contract that says, yeah, you can leave and all that good stuff, but you cannot touch client data in that way for 30 days, whatever the clause is, to an advisor, they don't have 30 days. Because when you leave a firm, and I'm pretty sure advisors know this, when you leave a firm, that firm jumps all over your clients, their right to say, hey, Rich left, but don't you worry, we have your back. Tamara's here, she's a new advisor, she's gonna come in, she's great. She's whatever the selling tool, whatever the selling pitch is, now I come in, I'm talking to your clients, you can easily pick up that phone 20 days later and say, Miss Johnson, took me a little time, but I have your paperwork ready. They can easily be like, you know what, Rich, I spoke with Tamara and I feel really comfortable with her. And I already know the systems. I know how to log in. So I'm just gonna stay. And so yes, they are extremely time sensitive. I always like to tell advisors, prep work, I like to work with your team at least four to six weeks before you affiliate, once you affiliate that first week, sometimes it goes into about 10 days, being able to push out all of your paperwork, that's always the focus that those first couple that push out that paperwork, so that way, it's in the clients hands or email boxes. So now, those last two weeks, or those last four to six weeks, we're just following up, hey, it's already in your inbox, because now you're trying to fend off all of those biases that now wants your clients. So yes. Very timely.
Richard Walker 23:55
Do you have a sense of what percentage of clients typically follow the advisor?
Tamara Williams 24:00
I can normally because I've been in the industry for a while I can normally talk with an advisor at some baiting questions, um, you know, just to see, listen to them have their conversations with their clients, and I can normally tell like, okay, this might gonna be a good transition, because he had to say his name three times before his client was like, yeah, now he's like, oh, what is that? You got to know like, okay, he doesn't have that relationship. And every advisor is going to tell you like, all my clients loved me. But you always know during the transition, you know, whether that so yeah, I can definitely tell. And for the most part, let's be completely fair. I know I joke around with it. But to be completely fair, most advisors are smart enough to make that move, knowing that they have those strong bonds. So normally I do see at least about 80 90% of their book of business come over within the first 30 45 days of the transition.
Richard Walker 25:07
But you're also making the case for any advisor who thinks in the sometime in the future that they may want to switch firms that their number one goal should be build and deepen that relationship with their clients, they want to keep, they should be wrapping up their messaging, their communication, their events, whatever it is, that builds those relationships.
Tamara Williams 25:25
Right, and especially if you're at those big, big firms, because a lot of those firms, they have succession plans to where you inherit these books of business and things like that. And to you there see clients, and which is fine. But during the transition, when you're just trying to get that asset level up, you may need to dig into those VC clients to get that money moving. So, I'm in situations like that, I would definitely say a lot of those clients. And I use Merrill Lynch, because I've worked there and seen this a lot. A lot of clients stay with the ball, they'll stay there with the ball, no pun intended. So they will stay with the big names, because that's who they know, they don't know you. They don't know you.
Richard Walker 26:17
So I want to illustrate some of the problems I've seen in transitions and kind of get your take on it. Number one is getting the data which you talked about, like whether you can access existing data or not two cleansing the data, because sometimes they put fields on the wrong values in the wrong fields. I've seen social put in the date of birth field and vice versa. Oh, yeah. So bad data creates bad outcomes. Yeah. And you have to massage that data. Second, is getting all the account level data to because it's not just people, it's not just removing your clients are moving their accounts, they may have two to five accounts each. Another piece is the forms, I mean, you're going to a new firm, and you don't know their forms. So this is a really complex problem, in my view, because of all the data gathering data manipulation, and then transforming that data to forms, you don't even know which ones you need. And you can get this rejected. So I'm curious, how do you attack these problems? How do you make it easier for your advisor? And I have another question to follow up after that.
Tamara Williams 27:17
Okay. Well, for me, it's two parts of it. I'm being in the industry, I'm doing transitions, as long as I have, I'm familiar with pretty much every custodians farms, they all kind of asked for the same data, like you said, but the required forms, you talk about the big custodians, I can tell you probably off the top of my head which forms you need for what.
Richard Walker 27:42
You already figured out, you can pretty much tell them what they're going to need for any kind of account they're gonna open. Oh, my god, yeah, you're interested.
Tamara Williams 27:49
Thank you. I try. But definitely, yeah, all the way down to supporting documents, hey, this fine, you don't need to send the whole trust agreement, will slow down the process only seen the first last pages. So I definitely know all of, you know, the requirements there. If it's a new firm, to where, and I will back up just a little bit, say, friends, we are working with a custodian that we all know all the requirements, things like that. Once I started transition, whoever their touch point person is on that custodians team, I make sure I build that rapport with them to make sure I know the forms. That's what you hired me for, because I'm very knowledgeable. But Has anything changed. Last time I did a transition, you know, this was not accepted for DocuSign. But now is it. So I tried to make sure all of those things are covered when I started transition, but in a situation to where I am not familiar with the forum's because, we have new custodians popping up every day seems like now, like I say, I go back to making sure I connect with someone on their team. First question out of my mouth, hey, can you send me a grid, a registration grid, whatever it is required forms that's needed for your firm. Granted, it's not many, many firms out there that I'm not familiar with. But if I do run across one or two, that's my process. But like you said, and I'll call myself that as well. I'm a walking brain in childhood.
Richard Walker 29:34
I like it. I like it. So my follow-up question is about artificial intelligence. And I'm wondering, given the complexity of the process of transition, do you think artificial intelligence can help you do this better or help the adviser do it better? Do you see what kind of impact it might have on the long run?
Tamara Williams 29:52
So I guess for me, because I have not dug deep into what that would even look like as early needs to transitions. I mean, just let me remind you last year I was doing yoga or vice versa. This is manually this year, I'm using technology next year, maybe AI, right baby steps for me. I'm at this point, I'm not sure, I have used a couple of AI tools as it relates to marketing within my own company. But other than that, I can't see the impact just yet not saying that it's not there. But I do think it takes a little bit more research on my end to give it a fair shot.
Richard Walker 30:40
AI needs brain power, it needs data, maybe we can just transfer your data from your brain. And we can build an AI together.
Tamara Williams 30:49
Let's Do It. Let's Do It. Let's Do It. If it means more efficiency, I'm willing to do it.
Richard Walker 30:56
Yeah, it's an interesting response, because so many people I talked to are so enamored with AI, but at the reality, and when you talk about getting things done, there's so many moving parts to what you're doing. It's actually kind of hard. I mean, maybe if you use AI to manipulate some of the data or cleanse the data or identify bad missing information, right, maybe you could do some of those things. But to actually fill out the right forms at the right time. That's still a really hard question.
Tamara Williams 31:26
Right? I think it's still gonna take these hands, actual person to, like you say, walk through some of those parts. But like I say, I do believe that there could be an impact at some point. I just haven't, like I say, last year, I was doing data by hand.
Richard Walker 31:48
Yeah, well, I feel your pain.
Tamara Williams 31:51
Yeah. Oh, my gosh.
Richard Walker 31:53
Man. Tamara, you shared so many really great insights on the transition process. And as we wrap up, I have another question for you. But I want to help people find and connect with you. Because I think there's gonna be some people want to hire you. So how should people find you?
Tamara Williams 32:06
Well, awesome, awesome, awesome. So you can always visit my website. It's kind of long, but it's pretty easy, thewilliamsconsultinggroup.com, click on there, I have a contact page where you can fill out a quick little form, it'll route directly to me. And I'll reach out to you schedule a meeting. Actually, I made some changes, you can schedule a meeting from that form. So yeah, so you could do it straight from there. Or you can always send me a quick email tamara@thewilliamsconsultinggroup.com. And those are probably the best two ways, phones can kind of get bogged down text messages and things like that. But definitely email me, get on my website, fill out that contact form, and we'll get something on the calendar.
Richard Walker 32:57
And it's a free consultation if somebody wants to just talk and figure.
Tamara Williams 33:01
Yeah, free consultation. 30 minutes, sometimes they take a little bit longer, of course, depending on the complexities of your book of business. But yeah, free consultation, just to kind of map out what your transition would look like. And then we just kind of take it from there scheduled follow up calls. If there's anybody else on your team that needs to be a part of those conversations, we make sure that happens.
Richard Walker 33:25
Okay, so I just thought of a couple other questions before I ask my last question now. There's a whole process and advisors gonna go through and thinking about this before they might contact you. There's from the point where they're on the runway before they've taken off, and they're saying, should I move to another firm? There's where they're taking off when they're interviewing firms. There's where they're going to come down to the landing, and they've decided on the firm, and then there's the execution of landing, where they're doing the transition, where in that phase, do you want to talk to somebody?
Tamara Williams 33:52
Normally when you have decided now, general, normally when you've decided where you're going to go, because then now allows me to put that game plan together. Now, if you're in the process of and don't get me wrong, I have a lot of different connections, and I know people and things like that. So if you're in the process of like, hey, I'm trying to find a farm to land, I've worked with some great firms, recruiting RIAs and things like that. So I can definitely help with that process as well. But most times when it comes to the re-papering, and getting that game plan together, um, once you've decided where you're going to go, because that's the biggest thing now we know so we know what paperwork is required. So once you've decided where you're going to go, not saying that you have to sign contracts or anything like that, but once you've decided where you're going to go, custodian-wise, that's when you want to incorporate.
Richard Walker 34:55
And how much lead time would be ideal for that advisor. 30 days, 90 days?
Tamara Williams 34:59
So I normally like four to six weeks, because it allows us to kind of start with that initial data. And then like you say, go through the whole cleansing part of it. And that normally takes from what I've seen about four to six weeks, I've had some situations that it's under 30 days, you can lose a little bit more sleep to get through that process. But I do like to have four to six weeks, so that way we can just take our time and make sure everything's in good order.
Richard Walker 35:30
Perfect. No, that's great. Okay, so here's my last question, who has had the biggest impact on your leadership style, or how you approach your role today?
Tamara Williams 35:38
So I would definitely have to start off, because there's like four people that popped in my head, I would definitely have to start off with my parents, and that's to them right there, my dad and my mom, just watching them how they maneuver in life. My dad, he was a pastor, he passed away in 2021. So things that he left with us as a whole, as a family was great, just how to conduct yourself and how you always want to be perceived and things like that, and not in a fake way to where they someone see you on the street, and it's like, and it's not even the same person, but in a way of being authentic to who you are, and always kind of carrying that spiritual aspect of things with you knowing that there's a bigger purpose for all of this and things like that. So my parents definitely. Next, my husband, he is probably the biggest encourager of everything that I do, especially when it comes to leadership and giving me that confidence of hey, now, you know what you're talking about, hey, you know, what you're doing? You know, even when I kind of be like, oh, my gosh, are you sure you know exactly what you're doing, you know exactly what you're talking about. So he's a extreme encouragement, you know, source in my life. And then the fourth person, I promise you Rich, that's it. Fourth person, I would have to say, Miss Diana Builder, she is someone who I reported to when I worked at a RA firm, here in Houston. And when it came to just the knowledge base that she had as a leader, I'm also how we connected. And it taught me how to connect with the people that you're working with. And it makes things a lot easier on a personal level. Of course, we know, we know business, I know how to transition a book of business, I know how to do all of that I can follow the book, but if someone is talking to me, and an advisor is talking to me, and their eyes are glazed over or talking to me, and you can kind of feel Hey, something is off here, let's put the transition conversation aside. And let's kind of dig into what you're really feeling. And a lot of times with advisors, you do feel that, you become a psychologist or psychiatrist as well, going through the transition because you have to have a very high emotional intelligence, um, you know, to go through that process, and she's the one who taught me that how to be firm and what you can do as a leader, but also knowing when to kind of pull back and have those personal conversations, if needed, so I would have to thank her for that.
Richard Walker 38:46
No, that's awesome to have a mentor and a leader that you've been around to help you see how to set boundaries like that, especially when it's so obvious. You value deep relationships and strong connections with people. And oftentimes, when you have those great relationships and connections, you'll do way more than perhaps you should.
Tamara Williams 39:05
Yes. But a couple of times, but yes, you do, you do. But you always feel better on the back end. Because you kind of cater to the whole person. And that's what I always say, even to like children, like you're a whole person, like, I just want to cater to every part of that person, not just the academics, academics and the creative side, so that's me.
Richard Walker 39:29
That's awesome. Oh, man, it's been so good talking to you. So, I have to wrap this up. I want to thank Tamara Williams, founder of The Williams Consulting Group for being on this episode of The Customer Wins. Go check out Tamara's website at thewilliamsconsultinggroup.com, one long word and don't forget to check out Quik at quikforms.com where we make processing forms easy. I hope you enjoyed this discussion will click the like button share this with someone and subscribe to our channels for future episodes of The Customer Wins. Tamara, thank you so much for joining me today.
Tamara Williams 40:04
Thank you. Thank you for having me. I really enjoyed it.
Outro 40:09
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