Advisory Leadership: Using the Seven Steps of Heart Culture to Create Lasting Success for Any Wealth Management Firm

Chapter 6 Encouragement Rewarding Firm-Wide Collaboration and a Team Mentality

A company with a strong sense of teamwork and collaboration can move mountains together. Culture plays a key role in establishing that one-for-all mentality, so it’s up to you to set up parameters that encourage people to want to work together.

How does a leader encourage collaboration in a heart culture? By following these five key steps:

1. Reiterating company values
2. Creating individual opportunities
3. Rewarding teamwork through the compensation structure
4. Keeping people accountable—even yourself
5. Holding a biannual company retreat

Reiterating Company Values

In my experience it’s fairly common for a company to give the mission-and-philosophy speech just once—during the required orientation session that new hires go through in their first week of employment. Besides that, they’re lucky to get a handout in the employee manual that glosses over the company’s beliefs, which they can hang in their work spaces.

I don’t consider that approach terribly inspiring or effective if you’re trying to build and nurture a culture based on respect, open communication, collegiality, and hard work. Words on paper mean very little unless they are backed up by actions.

Hiring the right people is part of the solution: Positive, inspiring, hardworking people who believe in the company’s values are powerful messengers. ...