early in his financial advisor career jeffrey fratarcangeli assumed the big producers in the business were somehow disreputable then he got to know them “they’re not bad people they’re just working harder than everyone” says barron’s 28thranked advisor nationwide who heads a 3 billion 18person team based in bloomfield hills mich in a wideranging interview with barron’s advisor fratarcangeli describes how his own hard work and a move to wells fargo ‘s independent channel laid the groundwork for 600plus asset growth over the past eight years he reveals how he managed to slash his air travel by 90 even as he grew the business and he explains how unapologetically seeking out mentors early on helped propel his career where are you from and how did you get into the wealth management business i was a student athlete and played soccer at a division one school in michigan called eastern michigan back in the early ‘90s i think having an identity as a student athlete was important—having the ability to compete at a higher level having challenges come your way having to overcome adversity i did internships in the corporate finance world for automotive companies i also did internships at merrill and first of michigan and some others very quickly i knew where my next passion lay back in the early and mid‘90s the oldschool pension plans were being replaced or layered on top of new plans like 401ks and 403bs all of a sudden instead of just the wealthy investing in the market it became everybody’s game everyone had the opportunity to selfdirect their retirement firms were really motivated and bringing in folks to help grow the education of retirement plans and grow assets so i took a position at dean witter in 1995 and started work in downtown detroit once we got through some tests they shot us to new york for a period of training and coming across the folks that i’d be competing with for the next two years to keep my job what do you mean back then you competed based on revenues assets types of accounts etc if you were in the bottom quintile at the end of any quarter you didn’t have a job the next day so fear of failure was critical to my making sure that didn’t happen i worked 8 to 8 or longer every day i also figured out who was the best in the company locally and i got under their wing there were some people who were very kind and gracious in allowing me to learn from them at the end of two years i was left standing i think i was second or third in the class they would take the top five back and have them present to the next training class and i leveraged that i said “can i get an office can i sit next to the no 1 team” thankfully he agreed and next thing i’m in the flagship office learning from the best of the best like in sports you rise to the level of talent that’s around you by 2008 you were with smith barney and that year probably wasn’t a lot of fun it was pretty scary i had friends at bear stearns who’d showed up for work and the doors were locked i was really nervous about that happening and so i jumped ship and landed at merrill lynch looking for solid footing everybody that hired me was let go within three months it was a pretty weird experience in 2014 you moved again to wells fargo’s independent channel finet why did that move make sense there’s just no chance if i was still on the employment side of things at any of these wirehouse firms including merrill that i would have had the capability of becoming more of an entrepreneur what i figured out was that finet gave you the autonomy of running your own pl and practice but still operating in many ways similar to a corner office at a branch and it’s really focused on bringing in talent that can play the role that’s necessary to allow the client to feel the whiteglove treatment that we provide i also have the access to the compliance the technology the platform the vetting the kicking of the tires the research that a big organization like wells can provide i was managing a little north of 400 million and now we’re managing north of 3 billion we had maybe four or five people on the team and now we’re 18 deep not counting interns what does your client breakdown look like i would say it’s at 8020 or 7525 between corporate executives and then athletes and entertainers what is your competitive advantage in vying for large accounts i think it includes the processes we have in place for assessing a client’s financial picture assessing their goals understanding what their pain points are and really facilitating solutions it’s being cognizant of what they keep not necessarily what they make understanding their tax implications their estate plan being cognizant of the whole holistic plan are you the rainmaker of the team i’m the only one who brings in assets i’ve offered my team the opportunity to bring assets and it’s just not necessarily where their strengths are so i have the engineers and the statistical team behind me running a lot of the analysis and so forth—it’s a doctornurse model it’s a little bit different than some of the larger practices that i’ve run into where they have four or five different practitioners in a line and a team below that this is truly myself running a team how decisive do you think the rainmaker’s charisma is in landing clients i try not to take myself too seriously we’re just humans i don’t know what the markets are going to do tomorrow but the one thing you can’t replace is experience i wouldn’t have bought into that 15 or 20 years ago but i do today because i’ve seen everything three times there’s always something unique to it but experience is critical and then when you have a brand that has a reputation of being very detailed and taking care of the client the way you would want to be i think that brand and that culture resonate when i started in the business someone told me that you get to a point in your career where it’s just a snowball and it’s the most amazing thing what we’ve done in the past couple years in our growth of assets and revenues has just been unbelievable name a belief that’s changed over the course of your career i remember when i started in the business everyone talked bad about the best producers and i kind of bought into it i was like “oh they must be bad people” and then i got to know them they’re not bad people they’re just working harder than everyone and they’re working more focused than everyone and they’re not taking lunches for three hours and they’re not disappearing on friday describe a key decision that you’re now really glad you made when wells fargo sold their 401k trust division a couple of years ago i handpicked the employees that i thought were the best at what they did in that role and i brought them on people say ”fake it till you make it” but you can’t fake it you can’t say you’re a pro at 401ks and then give it two hours of attention a week it just doesn’t work so having strong individuals on the team that are accountable to that has been critical and really targeting your goals every one of our team members every single year writes down the business goals that they have for the year and we as a team align to what we want to achieve for our clients and for our growth so everyone knows what we’re trying to achieve and everybody’s aligned everyone every day knows why we’re doing the details needed to meet those goals rather than sort of just chasing our tails hoping to get that next new client you have offices in michigan new york florida and indiana as the sole rainmaker how do you manage all the travel technology today has allowed us to not have to travel to these offices to run meetings via zoom while having someone on the ground next to clients and prospects for example today i have a meeting in florida a meeting in michigan a meeting in california and a meeting in chicago i do still find myself on planes even in this environment but it’s probably about onetenth of what i used to travel when i didn’t have as deep of a team and technological capabilities were far different and its lifework balance i want to be home for dinner most nights and i want to be at my kids’ games i’ll give you a story it was four or five years ago and i had a couple of really big meetings in detroit one was with a guy that owned a professional sports team one with a new client that was selling his business and a third with another prospect it was february and i was flying up to michigan from south florida and somewhere around the second hour i felt the plane turn around simultaneously i got a text from my no 2 saying “hey they just shut the airport down” there was an ice storm and we ended up back in miami after a fourhour flight to nowhere but we ended up running meetings with zoom just like we do now i had people next to the client and we did everything we said we were going to do without me physically being in the branch and at that moment i realized i don’t need to be physically in a room with clients i could be there in other ways and have someone on the ground next to them and from that moment on we adjusted how we operated of course there were some clients who were like “wow when are you here” then covid hit now no one questions that what’s your market outlook i’m very data driven and the data are pretty compelling we’re trading at multiples as of last week in the high teens with a 10year treasury still hovering around 18 sure we have a more hawkish fed but there’s certainly a long way to go before i believe we’ll be at a tipping point the m1 and m2 supply of liquidity is just off the charts and we can’t lose sight of that we also have to weigh the fact that this is an election year and historically election years have brought more volatility than even a normal volatile environment and i do think that the markets are really watching this new vice chair lael brainard being appointed i think her more progressive views don’t align well to the monetary policy vision of a capitalist and i do think that the market has had more reaction to that than anything else that’s going on right now earnings and valuations eventually will become paramount and of course the fed is going to play a big role in that if they raise rates two to four times and quantitative ease and maybe don’t go as aggressive on the relinquishing of the balance sheet i think it’ll be business as normal and i do think the market’s not going to have as robust a return as we’ve seen the past couple years but i don’t think this economic expansion is at an end how do you recharge my family is paramount i have three boys at home ages 3 9 and 4 being with family allows me to clear my mind and focus in a different way four or five times a week at six o’clock in the morning i’m getting a good cardiovascular workout and then i love any type of competitive activity or going to a competitive sporting event i also teach at michigan business school and have gotten integral in their sports programs and mentoring some of their student athletes with this new nil these kids are starting to get into the world of making money before they get into the world outside of college i enjoy just being a mentor to them having had a little bit of experience there and being able to share some of the headwinds that they’ll be facing and get them mentally prepared i get a sense of pride from being a part of that next chapter