FROM THE BLOG

What is scarier than riding in a car with a 15-year-old who is behind the wheel for the first time?

Maybe nothing. Probably nothing.

If anything is more fear-inducing, I’d say it’s the realization that every single kid you’ve watched grow up alongside your own is ALSO 15 years old now. The kid that somehow trapped themself in their locker just two years ago? Yep, driving now. The one that went to the emergency room because a LEGO was stuck in their nose? That’s right… They, too, are potentially operating a motor vehicle right now on a highway near you!

Those first few drives are not for the faint of heart. The moment they mistake the accelerator for the brake is pretty much a rite of passage. You’ll not quickly forget that feeling of riding through an intersection, noticing that your driver didn’t ignore the stop sign, but that they never even saw it.

For parents, this quickly becomes a “beside-the-wheel” driving course. At some point, you can keep your eyes open for the entire ride, and a few weeks later you are perhaps willing to get in the car without your rosary beads. Eventually, a period of time, measured in close calls and near-misses, passes and you reach a point of feeling more like a passenger than a hostage.

In many ways, this driving education process is akin to that of many client-advisor relationships in their infancy. Initial financial consultations and discovery sessions can be awkward and vulnerable. Few adults like to talk freely about their spending habits, at least not candidly. No investor seeking professional advice for the first time likes explaining why their hand-crafted “moderate growth & income” portfolio holds more pink sheets than Barbie’s Malibu Mansion.

But young drivers and inexperienced investors can quickly absorb similar lessons from encounters with their own proverbial rumble strips; most importantly to stay in the middle of your lane you are best served by looking further down the road.

Driving and financial planning both benefit from expanding one’s field of view. When you look at the road directly in front of your vehicle, you will constantly be surprised by each and every obstacle. Stop signs and pedestrians both seem to materialize out of thin air. When you adjust your behavior to look 200 feet ahead, even if you are surprised by what you see, you have time to course-correct (rather than over-correct) before you get there. That mentality of looking forward, and the time to adjust it affords, creates peace of mind.

This is how financial planning can often benefit investors most. It’s not the 20-page planning document itself, but the fuel to drive conversations toward those goals and objectives that are well down the road that encourages the client to focus on what’s most important. In the absence of that logically organized plan, they will revert to looking directly in front of them… Where the quote screen or monthly account statement resides.

As I told my own 15-year-old driver-in-training, “If you only look at the ditch, that is eventually where you are going to end up. Spend more time looking at where you intend to go. Also, please use the rectangular peddle on the left when you see a large red octagon!”

Buckle up,

Paul Keeton
Managing Director, Investments & Advisory Solutions

Posted by Prospera Financial