Personal Benchmark: Integrating Behavioral Finance and Investment Management

Chapter 9Providing an Easy-to-Understand Explanation

Chuck Widger

Lucy, you got some ‘splaining to do!

—Dezi Arnez to his wife Lucy Arnez

By using the bucket framework I am using a type of mental accounting which makes it easy to communicate important behavioral finance concepts, and consequently, I easily connected with two important new clients I had been unable to connect with for years.

—Michelle Curry, Financial Advisor

Up to this point in the book, we have outlined the theory underlying our Personal Benchmark solution, from the reasons we need to look at investing differently (Part 1), to the components of the Personal Benchmark approach (Part 2), and, in Part 3, how we use a goals-based approach and find our personal benchmark.

The remaining two chapters offer advisors practical tools to use with clients. Here, in Chapter 9, we provide an easy-to-understand explanation of Personal Benchmark that advisors and clients may find useful.

Explaining and applying complex investment and behavioral finance concepts or principles is not always easy. Frequently, the art of communicating advice is best done through pictures, graphs and charts, or mathematical proofs. With that in mind, this chapter provides ample charts, graphs, pictures, and descriptions you can use daily. This chapter's content was developed by Brinker Capital's consultants and staff of professionals who help advisors understand and communicate Brinker Capital's investment offerings every day. Let's begin.