OneDigital and Cetera tell plan advisers to build multi-adviser teams

OneDigital Retirement + Wealth assigns four roles to every client relationship, Chad Wilson, its market principal for wealth services, said Tuesday at the PLANADVISER 360 conference in Orlando, Florida.

Clients engage with a senior consultant, a supporting consultant, an education specialist and an investment specialist, Wilson said. The arrangement helps the firm withstand employee departures and gives it a more scalable business model, he said. "You can't have a single point of failure in a practice, if you're going to build something that's going to last beyond you," Wilson said.

For a plan adviser, the model means paying for four named roles per client before the next plan is won, rather than building the practice around a single adviser. That depth is the operational cost of making each relationship less dependent on any one adviser.

Wilson said some of his strongest employees entered through internships the firm treats as extended auditions. Interns are paired with a senior adviser and get exposure to wealth management, investment consulting and retirement plan consulting, he said.

Jon Anderson, head of workplace and retirement at Cetera Financial Group, said the industry's fastest-growing firms had two things in common: retirement plan business and repeatable processes that reduce friction.

Standardizing workflows and outsourcing where it fits lets advisers spend their time on business development and client relationships, Anderson said. He tied the same discipline to what a buyer will pay: firms that standardize and outsource are more attractive to acquirers, he said, because the revenue stream is easier to replicate.

DeVoe reported RIA deal volume down 17% while broker-dealers pushed into M&A, as Private Wealth Daily previously reported. Anderson said documented processes make revenue easier for a buyer to replicate than revenue that depends on the founder's relationships.