#54 John Dashfield – Transcript

Louis van der Merwe
Welcome to another episode of Financial Planners, South Africa. Today I have with me in the studio, John Dashfield. John is part of the client centered advisors. He is the creator and author of powerful questions, which I have with me, and it’s been sitting on my desk, and it’s prompted me to have better quality conversations with my clients. John, thank you so much for joining me.

John Dashfield
Oh, really appreciate it. Great to be here. And yeah, I’m really looking forward to this conversation. Louis, thank you very much.

Louis van der Merwe
So we get to have this conversation during some challenging times in South Africa, and globally, where I think a lot of clients, you know, they’re approaching financial advisors with the need to have answers about their questions, you know, specifically, are they going to run out of money? Will they be okay, John, what advice do you have to advisors that are in the battlefield struggling with these questions? We do we start to unpack them?

John Dashfield
Yeah, it’s a good question. And now I will, I would, I would take what you might call it an unusual approach. And we might get into it more when, as this conversation goes on. And yet what I would say, I’ll tell you a story about this. So many years ago, I came across a psychologist brilliant psychologists called George pranskey. And George has been called the most important psychologists of the 20th century. So, you know, I found what he shared to be very enlightening. And one of the things that George said was that look, in the world of coaching and therapy and approaches to the mind, up to now all of the emphasis has been on process. So people are taught, if they’re in that field, they’re taught process. And he said, they’re missing the point, the most important aspect of that kind of relationship is the, what he called the health of the helper. So the quality of mind of the coach or the therapist is a far bigger component in the work than is given credit for. Now, when I heard that my thought went to Well, if that’s true, in in my profession, which is a coach, or, you know, if that’s true in any kind of sort of therapeutic kind of environment, why would that not be true in a professional environment. So in other words, what I saw was, if you’re a financial planner, would not the starting point be your own quality of mind, your own state of mind, because that is really the starting point for building relationships, for building rapport, for having connection with a client for being a good listener, to being intuitive to not colluding with your clients in the problems that they have. But collaborating with them in a in a far more, sort of positive, positive way. So that, you know, if I go back 10 or 11 years, that was my working hypothesis, if you like, and I’ve tested that continuously throughout that period, and nothing has changed my mind. And yet, no one’s really sharing this with with advisors, you know, advisors, and planners are really still taught, everything is around process. And where I’m coming from is, well, that’s fine. But what is it that brings a process to life because you can see that there are advisors who have access to exactly the same processes, and some of them do brilliantly and do brilliant client work with it. And there are still many who don’t really have that much impact on their clients. You know, they do, they do, say, a piece of transactional work, but they’re not really impacting that client. So any challenge that you want to face to speak directly to your question, really is, is first and foremost, one of the mind, because the mind and thinking is involved in absolutely everything that we do. So if an advisor is, you know, say, worried or stressed out or tense or preoccupied in their own mind, they’re not going to be a lot of use to their client. John,

Louis van der Merwe
I love how you said that the health of the helper and have often thought about the role of a supervisor in a therapeutic relationship where the therapist would have someone supervising them yet in financial planning, we don’t have that that concept of, you know, there’s someone helping you to be healthy and have healthy quality relationships with your clients. What’s your take on that?

John Dashfield
To be fair, I feel quite passionate about that. Because, as you as you may know, and I’ll reference this that there’s a dot there’s There’s a big piece of research that’s done every year by a company called Edelman. And they produce something which they’ve done for over 20 years called the Edelman Trust Barometer. They’re Eagleman are like a PR type firm. And they’re looking at the trust that people have in institutions and organizations, and it’s done globally. They they interview and get responses from over 30,000 people. So it’s a big piece of research. For as long as it’s been produced, the lowest trusted sectors have been banking and financial services. Right. So so, you know, there’s a low level of trust Now, part of get much worse. No, exactly. And I feel passionate about that. Because, you know, money is what what, you know, we’ve universally chosen to be a medium of exchange. And, and so to me, financial services and banking should be at the top, they should be the most trusted institutions. And while there are many, many, many good people, in these sectors, of course, I think part of the reason is that it’s not trusted is that if you take financial planning, for example, it’s an intellectually taught process. So if you want to pass your exams or being a financial planner, it’s all intellectual, none of the training teaches you how to connect with people in a human way. So, you know, a way you could relate that is that the best physicians, the best doctors, are not only brilliant doctors, but they have what you will call a bedside manner. So they’re very good at putting their patients at ease, you know, making them feel good. And that that is a big factor in the outcome of a medical intervention. And see, for me, it’s the same thing in financial planning that the the demeanor, the state of mind, the level of understanding of their own state of mind, for financial planners, is a major component in the outcomes that a client experiences. So I think that it should be recognized as being a far bigger factor than it actually is.

Louis van der Merwe
I think that’s such a valuable piece to maybe unpack a little bit more than in terms of how do we shift that trust? How do we move it up the ranks? Because dealing with clients, almost every client has a very negative story of dealing with a financial planner, and how they call them in South Africa would be brokers, right. So typically, someone that would sell a product, the outcome was, was less ideal than what they expected? How do we start moving up that trust scale? Like what do you what are the things that we can start talking about to work on?

John Dashfield
Well, the primary the primary reason that people would engage, and I’m talking about any, you know, a professional person, or would engage in activities that are, let’s say, more to their advantage than say, the clients advantage, right. So so because that that’s where the trust problem comes in, in the sense that, you know, trust is only an issue, if the right thing is not going to be done by the client. Right? So why would the right thing not be done by the client? Because there is a high level of self orientation with the professional person, and quite often, it’s a wider thing in the in the firm, or the organization that they represent? Why are people insecure? Because they don’t really understand and it’s an innocent misunderstanding, you know, so I’m not finger pointing or blaming anybody I’m saying it’s an innocent misunderstanding that if we think our our personal sense of well being is dependent upon our circumstances, so for instance, if a professional person places their sense of well being on winning the deal, or winning the client’s approval or being liked by the, by the client, or or meeting their target for the month that the company set them, you know, any kind of pressure that is felt like that within a professional person doesn’t necessarily lead to them doing underhand behaviors, but in every case that there is underhand behaviors, that is always 100% The primary reason that there’s a level of insecurity you know, in a professional person, and you can see that operating at the level of culture, you know, in a lot of organizations right, that they have a culture of of putting pressure on their people to meet their numbers and people under the more pressure that someone feels within themselves, the more likely they are to do something that is self serving.

Louis van der Merwe
John, that makes complete sense. And I’m just curious if you had to build a financial planning practice? How would you align the incentives of the of the advisors with the clients? Like, how would you approach this?

John Dashfield
I would, I would 100%, teach them the what I call the and it’s not my you know, it’s not it’s not, it’s not my creation. But 11 years ago, I came across an understanding, it’s sometimes known as the Inside Out understanding. And what that’s telling us is that the way that we operate as human beings is not the way we think we operate as human beings. So the principle understanding is that our experience, moment by moment, as human beings are, in fact, any creature, but we’re talking about human beings, is that our experiences created by thought in the moment. So we have a thought we experience it, we have another thought we experience that we have another thought we experienced that. So that is our experience is thought in the moment happening in real time. And the big misunderstanding, and it’s completely pervasive in all, in all societies pretty much across the globe, is that is that we don’t have this understanding what we what we believe, and it’s an innocent misunderstanding, as I say is that our inner experience, in other words, how we feel, is being determined by our life circumstances, whether that be our past, our present, or our future. So a lot of people ruminate about the past, and they blame, say, their present set of circumstances on, on on on the past, or they blind themselves, in the sense that, you know, a lot of people have a lot of negative thinking about themselves, like they’re not good enough, or things don’t go their way, or they’re not educated enough for. And again, it’s innocent, or a lot of people worry about the future, you know, my occasionally my Achilles heel is that I don’t really think about the past very much, but I can, if I don’t catch myself, you know, worry, worry about the future. So we all have our own little kind of erroneous ways of thinking, but but the understanding that it’s not my circumstances that are causing that, it’s my thinking in the moment. And the way the mind works is that the mind is a sort of self clearing system. So we’re never stuck in a thought endlessly. What happens is the mind if we let it will return to presence, and clarity of its own accord. So well being is something that’s innate, that we came into the world with, and he’s always there. And the only thing that makes it appear that it’s not there, it’s sometimes we get caught up in our thinking. Now, if we understand that, it does a tremendous amount for our own level of well being and feelings of security. So for me, I would 100% ground, anyone that was working for me, or in a firm that I created, in that understanding, because everything complete, everything is built on that. So rapport with another person, trust, another person, credibility, the ability to listen, the ability to ask intelligent questions, the ability to be intuitive, the ability to really have an impact on the client, all of those have their foundation in, in, in the state of mind that we bring to what we’re doing. So and I’ve, you know, like I say, I have 10 or 11 years of experience of doing this, plus a vast amount of my own development in this, you know, my own coaching, to fall back on as well and I passionately believe in, in coaching, I have my own coach. To me, one of the joys of life is to keep evolving, you know, to keep evolving in ourselves as human beings, you’re never going to get there because there’s always an opportunity to, you know, evolve and understand better. And, you know, that, to me is one of the secrets of keeping life fresh.

Louis van der Merwe
John, it’s wonderful to hear how much time and energy you’ve put into this, right and to change that default, you know, almost saying this, this is not the easy way. It’s not the easy way of showing up. Now, a lot of people might be afraid of engaging with coaches and mentors and, you know, maybe even some, some therapy and just stretching and evolving. How do we start unpacking that as a culture, you know, maybe someone listening might be part of a group or financial planners that are just saying, Hey, this is this is the way we’ve always done it. Why do we need to change?

John Dashfield
Yeah, yeah, well, you know, one of the things that I’ve learned is that familiarity is one of the strongest forces in the human personality. So in other words, the desire to stay with what we know, is, is, you know, has a strong draw to it right? Now, that sort of crazy thing about that is that people will fight tooth and nail to stay with what they know, even if what they know, is painful, because to a lot of people, what’s painful, seems more alluring to them than the unknown. The problem with that is that you’re living your you know, if that’s your approach, you’re living your life at a low level, you know, it’s kind of innocent, but if you want your life to be to be, you know, fresh, and what it can be in it and more engaging. And, again, this will come out in your client work, you know, if you’re going to have a client for a long time, 510 1520 years, you want that relationship to be fresh, and inspiring all of that all of that time. Now, the only way that’s going to happen is if you keep evolving, so that every time you show up to your client, you’re different, you’re, you’re, you’re, you’re fresher, you’re not the same person that was there six months ago, or you’re not the same person that was there a year ago, because you’ve changed, you’ve evolved DC. And I think that’s very powerful in a financial planning relationship, because you want to be the demonstrator of what it is that you want for your clients. So what are human beings? What are human beings like, you know, when they’re at their best? Well, that, you know, it’s, it’s the present, they’re operating from a sense of well being and happiness. So you want to be the one who’s demonstrating that visibly, in your client relationships, you want to be the example of that to your clients.

Louis van der Merwe
While John, this is very powerful. I mean, it reminds me of Seth Godin saying do the work first, you know, take that leap, actually, put put yourself in the shoes and kind of, you know, set that example. And what I’m hearing you say is almost that sense of, of holistic, well being maybe a little bit more than just the money. Like how do we step up those those examples? And is this what clients are expecting? Or is it just a group of financial advisors leading that way? And clients starting to see wow, this is possible from from this profession?

John Dashfield
Yeah, well, I’m not sure it’s what clients are expecting. You know, partly because the industry, if we want to call them that, call it that has really trained people to focus on products and investments, and, you know, the financial problems. And yet, where I would come from on that is to say, well, aren’t financial products and anything else of that sort of more technical nature, these things aren’t the end, they’re the means to the end. So to me, the question from a financial planner to an advisor is what’s the end? What, what what, you know, what do you want, and see, I would take it out to the level where, to me, what financial planning is, is, is not just about the future, you know, it’s not just about planning for certain goals or outcomes in the future, it really is about helping a client live, live well now to live the life that they want right now. So in terms of, so the outcomes for the client are a good quality of life, you know, sense of well being, you know, doing the things that they want to do in life, having a future to look forward to, but really, the most value is in the here. And now why would I say that? I would say that, because not everyone’s gonna make it for starters, are they not everyone’s gonna see the next 510 1520 years. So if you’re the financial planner of a client that doesn’t make it and they’re in life’s waiting room waiting for, you know, the things that they plan for, and they don’t make it well, that that’s not a great outcome to me, you know, to me, it’s about it’s about the present and the future, not just the future. And so to earn the right to talk to a client on that level, you have to be living it yourself. And it doesn’t mean your life’s perfect because no one’s is but it means that you are striving if you want or putting your consciousness on how you’re living your own life. And so your your own evolution and your own growth is a significant element of doing business. You know, it’s an important element of show showing up as the professional person that is able to inspire your client,

Louis van der Merwe
John, in our business, we have a tagline that says live life fully now, and that resonates so much with me what you’re saying it’s having that balance between, yes, planning for the future, but also enjoying your assets, you know, enjoying the fruits of what you’ve worked for. Obviously, there are some risks where people take it to the extreme, either neglecting their current self or robbing from their current self, how do we create a space where clients have that balance between the two?

John Dashfield
I think what’s behind that is is is first and foremost as the professional person, we have to have that balance for ourselves, because you can’t give away what you don’t have. So if I was a stressed out, Coach, you know, clearly not in my well being, I’d say my clients would smell a rat, they’re going to be able to tell right, so. So as I say, it doesn’t mean my life’s perfect, you’d have to say broken as everyone else. But it’s George’s idea of the health of the helper really was a powerful one for me. And so I know that the highest level of service that I can bring to my clients, is to what I call show up fully right to show up fully in the relationship. And because, first of all, like I say, you can’t give away what you don’t have. And when you’re coming from that place in yourself, you can challenge your clients, and they will and, and most of them will listen to you. So if they’ve got, you know, a lot of the time, clients are gonna have bad ideas. Now, they might have picked them up from the media, they might have picked them up from their family, they might have picked them up from friends, or, you know, the person up the pub that they go drinking with, you know, you know, there’s loads of so called experts about who think they know a lot about something and they don’t, and especially where money is concerned. So, you know, if clients have got bad ideas, it’s the level of rapport and trust you have with the client that allows you to say to them, hold on a minute, you know, Can I can I share something that I just have observed about what you’ve just said? Would that be okay? So, you know, with the permission from the client, and then the report, you can then share with them, perhaps why their current thinking is not in alignment with what they really want, you know, and that’s coaching. I mean, that that’s, that’s an important aspect. So again, you know, that allows you to have that relationship with the client, where you are a guide, you know, you’re a coach, you’re a guide, your your, your, you’re not people pleasing, you know, there’s too much people pleasing that goes on, in professional relationships. And to me, that’s a weak thing. And people pleasing is all about not upsetting the applecart in a relationship, because you’ll focus in on what you want out of it. And there’s a fear of upsetting the client. And yet, when you’re a powerful person, who knows that you do not need anything from the client, you’re there to serve the client 100%, you can call your client out. That’s what

Louis van der Merwe
he’s saying. They absolutely. I’m reflecting on my own conversations with clients where it is very difficult to call those clients out, partly because there’s maybe an imbalance in terms of, of, of the power to that relationship, someone paying your fee. It’s the it’s the fear of how will they react? You know, you mentioned this concept of holding up the mirror in the coaching and kind of just reflecting it. I’m really curious about the work that you’re doing in client centered advisors. Can you tell us a little bit more about that? Yeah,

John Dashfield
sure. So let me kind of go back in time a bit. So I spent close on 15 years as as a financial advisor, self employed with my own firm, and I sold that at the end of 2006. And for some years prior to that, I’d been coaching people as well. Some financial advisors, so I had two businesses, and then I sold the financial practice and at the beginning of 2006, I, my financial coaching or my coaching practice, became my full time focus. And since then, I’ve worked with a lot of financial professionals, financial planners, people in the financial services, businesses, business, I’ve worked with a lot of CEOs, MDS, people who own businesses, most of them what you might call small businesses, and when I say small, up to 25 30 million Sterling in turnover A year, and some of them a lot smaller than that. But I’ve enjoyed, and do enjoy working with the owners, the people who make the decisions. And around, I guess 11 years ago, I came across, as I’ve already mentioned this inside out understanding. And that really answered a lot of questions for me, because prior to that, if you look in the business world, particularly the help for business people, whether that be books, or audios or courses, or live training or coaching, it’s very prescriptive in nature. So what I mean by prescriptive is, that is a lot of how tos. So, you know, there’s loads of information on how to become a better salesperson, or how to engage clients better, or, you know, how to build a successful practice. I mean, there’s tons of that information about, you can fill a library of books with it. And I began to notice, and the question for me was, okay, so I’m noticing some inconsistencies here, in my own life, and in the work that I’m doing, in the sense that if all this information is available to people, why are people not not more successful than than they are? Why are they not as successful as they want to be? Right? Because there’s a lot of that about, and really, the missing component? Is that our state of mind, our thinking is involved in everything that we do. And really, I know, a lot of people talk about mindset, but they don’t really understand it, you know, it’s, it’s yes, we all know, you know, we can all understand mindset, if someone puts it to us, but do we have an understanding of what creates our mindset, you know, what is creating this experience that we’re having moment by moment, and when I came across the Inside Out understanding, it really answered a lot of questions for me. So the insider understanding is not a methodology, it’s not a prescription. It’s not, it’s not something that is, you know, how to be happy, or it’s just telling us very specifically, at the most fundamental level, the most irreducible level, what is creating our moment to moment experience. And what I’ve discovered, is that once people begin to grasp that for themselves, and it’s not an intellectual understanding, it’s something that has to be realized from within. But once we begin to realize that for ourselves, the byproduct is that it tends to take a hell of a lot of unnecessary thinking off people’s minds. And if you look into performance, human performance, whether that be in any field, if it’s you know, you look at sports performance, you look at performance in business, you look at performance of someone in a relationship, or as a parent, when are people at their very best people are at their very best, when their mind is free, present and clear. They’re not at their best when their mind is full of erroneous thinking. They’re anxious, they’re worried, you know, they’re thinking about the future. They’re thinking about the past, or they’re, you know, they’re experiencing fear in some way. So, where I would always begin these days, always 100% of the time is really pointing out the nature of the mind. Because I know the problem with not doing that. And taking a prescriptive approach to success is that a lot of the time, it’s like shutting the door after the horses bolted. So you can teach people all the techniques in the world. But if they’ve got an over encumbered mind, they’re not going to be effective. Kind of getting to that

Louis van der Merwe
root of the of the problem. Yeah. So tell me a little bit more about the client centered advisors. Thank you, you’re on your way to get there.

John Dashfield
You’re right, or went off on a sidetrack and that’s okay. That’s the beauty of these conversations. To delve into it. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So so what happened was that I, several years ago, this is probably eight or nine years ago, I got the inclination or the inspiration to write a book, which became the client centered financial advisor, which has been out for that seven years, I think now. And when I wrote that book, I thought, oh, I should set up a website to go alongside the book. So I called the website, client centered advisors.com. So essentially, I’ve got two brands. I’ve got client centered advisors, which is primarily serving the financial services business. And then I’ve got Ashfield coaching and development. The work is exactly the site. So the work is Do with a, say a CEO, outside of financial services would be the same as I would do with a CEO inside financial services. Now, the work I’ve been doing with client centered advisors, is really around client engagement, around how to get clients and around the personal performance of the individual advisors. So really to kind of encapsulate all of that, you could say that, in the training to become a financial planner, as we said earlier, it’s all intellectual, none of it is on the human element. So what I’m focusing on is the is 100%, the human element, Louis, right. So I don’t get into the technicalities of markets and products and any of that don’t go don’t go anywhere there. What I’m looking at is and helping advisors with is, is the human side, because to me, you know, you need to know what you’re talking about, technically, you know, that’s obviously important. And yet, if you want to thrive, as a as a, as a business person, that’s got just as much, if not a lot more to do with how you show up, you know, how you show up in your own life, how you show up in the lives of your clients. So that’s really been the focus of my attention for as long as I’ve had my business.

Louis van der Merwe
John, I’m mindful that a lot of the training in the human side of financial planning is around the clients mindset, it’s about being aware of the client’s emotions and and of what they thinking and feeling. And your approach is very different. It’s like, how are you showing up? What are you bringing to the table? Why why are we do we find that so difficult? You know, that it’s easier to, to almost point it at the client and say, oh, let’s understand you. And let’s dissect your inner workings, then doing the work on ourselves.

John Dashfield
Yeah. Because Because, quite simply, without doing the work on yourself, or without fully showing up, you cannot be effective at focusing on the client. So to put that into a context, how do you how do you intuitively get a sense of where a client is at emotionally, for example, now, you’re only going to be able to get a sense of that if you’re fully present, right, fully present, meaning that you’re full, that your quality of attention, and your quality of presence is fully available for the client. So if I’m the professional person, and I have layers of my own thinking going on, then I’m simply not going to notice what’s going on with the client, because I’m preoccupied with myself. See, now, to give you an idea of how much a problem that is in society. Bruce Lipton, the scientists, brilliant scientist, creative epigenetics, author of a brilliant book called The Biology of Belief. Now, Bruce’s research which I came across discovered that, on average, most people when he’s talking about most people spend at least 95% of their time, lost in their own thinking. So only 5% of the time people are even present in their own lives. Right. So, so we live in a society where people’s preoccupation with their own thinking is at an all time high, you know, we have unbelievable levels of poor mental health, in Western societies, you know, unbelievable amount of medication, you know, like tranquilizers and sleeping pills, and unbelievable amount of self medication that people do, you know, through drink, or whatever. And we live in a society that’s never had so much convenience, so much wealth, so much opportunity, and yet, our mental health and well being is at an all time low. And the reason for that is because of the outside in misunderstanding that people believe that their circumstances are the creator of their inner experience and that and that alone, is the fundamental reason why so many people are dissatisfied, disengaged, you know, not living the life that they they really wanted to. So, as a financial professional, like I’ve said before, you have to focus on yourself first not not because it’s a selfish thing to do. It’s the complete opposite. It’s, it’s the most appropriate thing to do because if if you’re not able to show up fully for your client, you can go and learn all the techniques in the world. Jim guy learned all about emotional intelligence and, you know, questioning techniques and being a better listener. But if you’re preoccupied in your own mind, it will be a waste of time.

Louis van der Merwe
So it’s all about kind of shifting that, that presence just a little bit higher, with least maybe being part of that 5% And not the 95%. As I’m saying that I can also imagine that this, it can be a big burden, you know, it can be quite a high expectation to assume that you will always be present in your client meetings, do you find that there’s kind of an ebb and flow to say, well, I need to structure my client meeting so that I can actually be present that I set myself up for success.

John Dashfield
I think what you’re saying is one of the things that’s astute that what you’ve just said is that, of course of thinking will fluctuate, you know, that’s what that is the human condition, right. And we have no control over that. So for instance, everyone knows that their mood fluctuates, right. And it can fluctuate from minute by minute, you know, hour by hour, day by day. So we can have times during the day when we feel lower, and times when we feel clearer. And we can have days, when we feel low, right? So that’s what you might call moods. Now, what most people do innocently, is ascribe the reason for their moods to an external source. So say I feel low, because right, because I didn’t get that piece of business from the client or I had a had a disagreement with my partner this morning, or you know, my kids not in trouble at school. So people ascribe their kind of moods to external circumstances. So you have to kind of break that link. And that’s the power in the insider understanding and learning that for yourself. It’s not prescriptive in the sense that it’s not a happy pill. It’s understanding. So if you’re in a low mood, and you understand that, that’s where your thinking is gone in the moment, see that, that is very enlightening for people compared to blaming your circumstances for a low mood, right. So what I found in my own work is that I am able to show up fully for my client meetings, but they do vary, right? Sometimes, you know, sometimes I will be a little bit preoccupied. But I’m, I’m, I’ve never been as low as to have to say to a client, look, I’m so low, I can’t speak to you. You know, and what, what I tend to find is that the very best antidote to clear your mind is to is to listen to people, you know, if you get into a meeting, and just put all your attention on your client, and to listen to them, you know, listen to them fully. without judgment, you’re just listening. Because when your quality of attention is fully on your client, what you’ll find with no effort is that your mind will naturally clear itself, Louis. And I’ve had that many occasions, you know, when I’ve had a busier mind, maybe I’ve gone into a client meeting, and I started to engage with the client. And what happens is that you soon get into a flow and a rapport with the client quite naturally. Because you’re you’re, you’re just allowing the mind to do what it will do. And it will clear itself if you if you allow it to.

Louis van der Merwe
And I’m guessing, John, that most of the clients have never really experienced someone completely listening to them

John Dashfield
out, you know what I mean? It, it’s a revelation. I can tell you a story. One of my clients, actually to it to any listeners, I’ve done I’ve done a interview with with with this guy. His name’s Dominic Baldwin, and he’s got financial planning company in the north of England called called centum. And I have done an interview with Dom And he, he’s, he’s very, very good. He’s exceptional, with clients and listening to clients. And I remember, he told me that he’d been referred to a very wealthy divorce lady, and he met with her. And she said, she’d got a, you know, a private bank, looking after a money. She’d got one of the big top four accountants that were looking after a mani and Dom had a meeting with her for a couple of hours. And she said at the end of the meeting, she said, In all my years, no one, no one has ever listened to me like you just did. She said, I get the feeling that everyone who meets with me apart from you, that is everyone who’s met with me. They’re all interested only really in getting my money. See and listening with nothing. On your mind listening to just understand someone listening from a place of what I will call loving kindness is one of the most powerful things that you could ever do for another human being, it’s one of the greatest acts of service that you could do for another human being. And that’s not just for your clients, that’s for anybody, you know, your husband, your wife, your partner, your children, you know, your family, your friends, you know, just listening to people without judgment, with a respect for their reality. And understanding them is incredibly powerful. And it’s so little practice, if you were to just be calm, and exceptional listener, that alone, you could build a business on that.

Louis van der Merwe
I’m smiling. Now, John, because I’m busy reading a book by Katherine Mannix, who’s a End of Life Consultant or Palliative Care Consultant, and the title of the book is listen. And she shares stories where she has dealt with family members or clients, where there is this complete sense of listening, allowing them to share the things that are on their mind that they’re worried about, but didn’t feel comfortable enough to share. And so I’m curious when when you’re working with advisors, and sometimes they come across things that clients would share that maybe falls outside of what they would deal with or outside of what they expect? How do you help them to kind of be ready for that be able to, to take that in and not go into a state of panic?

John Dashfield
Yeah, that’s a good question. So this is this is actually quite a big subject that you’re touching on, because I think the reason that a lot of advisors are reluctant to ask more searching questions of their clients is because they’re concerned or afraid that they won’t be able to handle the response of the client. Right? So it so they avoid doing it. This is why again, I teach the insider understanding, because when you’re truly present with somebody, then if you need to think for a few moments about your response, then you’re quite willing to do that. See, and one of the, one of the fundamental facts of the insider understanding is that we have an intelligence available to us as human beings at speed that’s beyond our intellect. So getting worried about how we might handle a particular response from a client, really the worry of that comes through looking backwards to do I have a suit, you know, and that question, in your own mind, if Do I have a suitable response? for that? Well, you’re never going to have a suitable response for everything that comes up in your life. So what’s the you know? How do you deal with that, be present, be present with somebody you know, and understand that, you know, if you if you do panic for a moment, in your mind, you know, that’s okay. Because if you have enough awareness, to see that, that’s just a thought, you know, it’s a thought that comes into your mind, you don’t need to engage with that thought you don’t need to, you know, kind of embellish it at all, that if you just understand, understand it at that level, and again, momentarily, let your mind settle, you’ll get another thought. And the next thought might be more useful, right? So this is, this is how I work 100% of the time. So I never go into meetings with a pre prepared plan. I never do that. Because that is limiting what can happen. See, so for me, and I would say any financial advisor, that the way that you can run, the most powerful, engaging, magical meetings for your client are really going to come from your quality of presence, rather than having some sort of predetermined process. Because that gets in the way, you know, that gets in the way. And the reason it gets in the way is because it’s it’s, it’s in your mind, you’re thinking about it. And if you’re, if it’s in your mind, and you’re thinking about it, that’s a distraction. Right. And there’s a lot of advice out there about, oh, you got to control the meeting, right? Now. That’s really bad advice, right? You haven’t got a control meetings you’ve got you just want to be present in the meeting, and responsive to where the client is. And actually, if you don’t know, you don’t have a response for the client. Right? What’s wrong with it? Meaning that you know, I mean, I’ve actually said, Oh, man, you know, a number of times in coaching sessions with clients, where it’s fallen into a silence, and nothing’s coming to me. And I’ve said to the client, I say look, do you mind if I say something? They go? Well, no, I say, I don’t know what to say. Now. I’ve got nothing in my mind. Where should we go next with the conversation? You know, and the thing is they appreciate that. And it’s powerful. Because it’s authentic, it’s honest, you know, it’s not trying to fill a gap with something that doesn’t make sense. It’s like, and, you know, that’s never been a problem. It’s never been a problem. So, so just be comfortable with where you are in it. You know, if the client says something, or does something, and you don’t know how to handle it, just be honest about it. So I don’t know, I don’t have a response. For that at the moment. I I don’t know. I honestly don’t know. But if you let me reflect on it, or take it away with me, I will think about it and see what I can come back with, if that’s appropriate. Or, you know, you, you respond in the moment.

Louis van der Merwe
Thank you for that, John, it’s such a lovely way of reducing that expectation of you showing up as the expert with all the answers, and that you’re going to fix it and it’s really just showing up in your presence is helping that client already kind of navigate this, I have a friend that says, These thoughts or these emotions are just visitors, you know, they’ll the whole pause the game and they’ll know move along. And there’ll be different thoughts and different different visitors, you have referenced so many wonderful things. Today, we’re gonna add them on the show notes. It feels like we would need to do multiple episodes to to unpack all these issues and interesting topics. John, for people that want to know a little bit more or want to subscribe to your weekly newsletter. Where should we point them? What’s the best place to get ahold of you?

John Dashfield
Yeah, thanks. If people go to www dot client centered advisors.com, then they’ll find me there and they can subscribe to my blog. And there’s some free stuff on the on the I think there’s a report out to have magical client meetings every time they can get that. And there’s loads of blog posts on there. And yeah, so that’s the place.

Louis van der Merwe
Thank you very much, John. I look forward to engaging with you in the future and and all the best.

John Dashfield
Appreciate that. Thanks, Louis.