The 5 Configurations of Collaboration

Long past team work, you’ll find the productive (and sometimes dangerous) world of Collaboration.

When people talk about collaboration, it’s usually said in some sort of loose term of “working together.” The reality, however, is much more daunting than that. The challenge is that it’s easy to miss some of the cues and clues that can tip you off when things are going sideways, or are about to have a breakthrough.

In this session Chris helped us take a look at the definition and structure of collaboration, and the 5 Configurations of Collaboration (did you know there were 5?). We explored what the configurations are, how to recognize them and how to work with them to the service and advantage of your client, your co-collaborators and yourself.

The Dark Side of Collaboration

Collaboration is easy, right? Every advisor you’ve had the opportunity of working with gets it and plays along, right? Ok, time to stop laughing. The reality is collaboration is tough. Collaborating can create potential challenges on a number of different levels.

In this session, Todd showed us where collaboration can go dark and what you can do to get things back on track or even avoid it from happening in the first place. We looked at how to handle challenging conversations, because as we all know, like it or not, they happen.

Enhancing your Listening

50% of communication is listening; but if you’re not prepared to listen, what kind of communication partner are you going to be? What kind of listening does your job require? What is the relevance to client retention and client acquisition?

No matter the situation, enhancing your listening habits will positively improve your decisions, relationships, and success. During this session, Courtney Pullen [Legacy faculty and owner of Pullen Consulting Group] shared how to identify what you and others filter as a listener, and took us through a pretty cool assessment that identified our personal listening strengths and challenges.

Courtney also helped us explore several listening habits [typically bad ones] that we commonly develop over our lifetime.

Kolbe Synergy

Synergy doesn’t just happen by chance. It takes the right mix of instinctive talents in the right roles. Rob Falvey took us on a cool dive into how to use Kolbe to identify a winning formula for success with an extraordinary level of accuracy and detail. True leaders give people the freedom to be themselves. Kolbe, used at all levels of an organization or team, is a powerful way to develop leaders, maximize people’s strengths and improve performance. We discussed building synergistic teams that open the doors to effective collaboration. It was great.

A Collaborative Team Model Designed to Drive Results for Clients and Advisors

Have you ever been in a win/lose situation?

Winning is always better than losing, but sometimes winning doesn’t always feel great, as funny as that may sound. Now apply this to your business. You’re engaged with a client and another advisor is involved that can impact the ultimate decision. Now there is a greater probability of several win/lose situations. Feelings, relationships, and your business are all at stake.

The reality is, true collaboration that is designed to create a win, win, win is rare if non-existent. During this session, Todd helped us explore a true collaborative team model. We looked at how to talk about collaboration to prospects and clients, as well as other advisors. The model he shared was designed to create a winning atmosphere and most importantly, drive the best results for your clients.

Member Panel Discussion

This session is hard to summarize. It was a tremendous sharing of insights, experiences [good and bad] and wisdom from peers who have ridden the highs and lows of collaboration. Our thanks to all who participated.

Legacy Wealth Coach System

The two greatest costs associated with planning are (1) indecision and (2) bad decision. An incompetent team of advisors will likely produce a poor decision. A competent team lacking clarity or management will likely produce a poor decision at a very high cost. By articulating the client’s mission, vision, values and goals, a Strategy Design Team and Virtual Team Network will work towards providing a clear, unified result. If team members are connected to each other with the same information and effective communication, you will achieve synergy that is exponentially greater than the sum of its parts.

In this session, we dove into the evolution of the Wealth Coach system and how it creates a powerful framework for your business and serves your clients for a lifetime.