Special Episode: Women in Wealth - Part 1

This month, The Cannon Curve looks a little different. Each year, to celebrate Women's History Month, we put together our Women in Wealth Series - a collection of conversations with women who have paved the way and continue to shape the future for women in the financial industry. We have assembled a powerhouse team this year: Terri Kallsen (Rise Growth Partners), Jenny Franta (Fifth Third Bank), Elizabeth Wagner (Bryn Mawr Trust), and Melissa Holding (Huntington National Bank); each representing a different corner of the industry yet sharing a common goal to evolve the very definition of high-level leadership in finance today.

Resources:

Terri Kallsen: Full Episode Here

Jenny Franta: Full Episode Here

Elizabeth Wagner: Full Episode Here

Melissa Holding: Full Episode Here

Transcript

Each March, the Cannon Curve puts a spotlight on the voices, perspectives, and leadership shaping the future of wealth management. The Women in Wealth series is about more than representation. It's about influence. It's about how women show up for clients, lead teams, and help move the profession forward.

With clarity, empathy, and conviction. As the industry continues to evolve, so does the role women play in defining what great advice is all about how strong leadership sets tone, and how long-term impact really plays out. As we enter the fifth year of this series, this episode invites reflection and momentum.

At the same time, it's a chance to recognize progress. Honor experience and continue the conversation about where the industry is headed and what it takes to build what's next. Alright, so Jenny, for those listeners that don't know Jenny Franta personally, give us a little bit of your, your cv, your background.

How did, how did Jenny Franta become the, the personal trust guru that she is today? You know, I think like many coming out of college, not knowing really much about the trust business or the trust world, or quite honestly even that it existed. I graduated from the University of Notre Dame with a management major.

I love the concept of leading people, managing what motivates people, and so I always. Had this calling to be a leader of some sort, but I also knew that in order to to be a, a strong leader, you really had to kind of build that subject matter expertise in something. I just didn't know what that something was gonna be, and I knew I wanted to come back to Cincinnati.

Family's critically important to me, and so I've got a big extended family here in Cincinnati and had an opportunity. Fifth. Third knew an individual that was actually a portfolio manager and he said, Hey, you know, I think you'd like this entry level trust specialist position. I said, sure, why not? Let's give it a try.

And I just fell in love with it immediately. I mean, I wanted to learn as much about the business as fast as I could and really just enjoyed being able to bring so many different aspects to, to the role. And so that's how I got in the business. You know, for many of us, that's. A very familiar story. You did not, I certainly did not.

At age seven when somebody says, you know, little Jenny, little Phil, what do you want to do when you grow up? I don't, I don't think very many of us said, you know, I think I'd like to be in the, the, the world of trust, personal trust. That, that, that, that sounds to, to be the perfect deal. How is this business explain to you in a way that that really captured your attention?

Well, if I told you how it was explained to me, you'd be like, how did that capture your attention? The question that was asked of me was, Jenny, do you like balancing your checkbook? And I looked at the individual and I said, who doesn't like balancing their checkbook? And that's how it got explained to me.

So stewardship of financial assets was kind of what I took away from it. It is, it is a very good thing that my hiring manager did not use. That phrase or that example I might not have, might not have wound up in this business. Interesting. It, it was very far from the truth and just a small sliver, but it caught my attention.

Yeah. I I, I know that it did. Elizabeth, let me ask you this. You did not come to what? Could be considered traditional financial services in the quote unquote traditional way. You followed your passions, you followed your, your, your, your inner motivations, and it led you to financial services. Unpack that a little bit.

For listeners that may not know the story of Elizabeth Wagner, how did you wind up as a senior vice president, director of endowments, foundations, and, and charitable at at Bren Moore? How did, how did that journey go? Phil, I'm sorry about the long title. We keep trying to get rid of it, and I have to tell you, that's the nicest way anyone's ever said to me, what the heck are you doing here?

Maybe your title just should just be giving guru, but yeah, that's not bad. I'm gonna advocate for it. So I, I studied art history and English in college, which is another way of saying I learned to think and to have opinions and to figure out how to express them in a thoughtful, careful way. And so then I, I went to a job in nonprofit consulting, which was so interesting.

We were headquartered in New York City working with lots of organizations in the five boroughs on strategy management, fundraising, governance kinds of issues. But we were also working with organizations across the country, and I learned two things very fast in my tenure there. One, leadership matters, it matters so much.

And two, after that. Diversification of your revenues, right? Really looking at different revenue streams, building them up thoughtfully, carefully is the second most important predictor of success. And I took all of that to a community foundation that I got to help run for eight years. Loved it. We built assets.

We tripled the size of the asset base. In the eight years I was there, we spent a hundred million dollars in investing in the community. It was the kind of thing where I thought. I'm never gonna leave this place. This is such heady stuff. We're making such an impact. And then sort of almost by accident, I got an opportunity to go build something very similar, but inside Bryn Mawr Trust.

And it was one of those moments where someone who would become a mentor, Jen Fox, said to me, do you wanna build something new? And I love building things. I couldn't figure out how to say no. I sort of wrestled with it because how do you go from the nonprofit side? Over to the financial services side and continue to do the same work.

And here she was giving me the freedom to build something just the way I wanted to. That I thought would be really helpful to nonprofits seeking the kinds of financial services that I'd seen over the course of my career they really needed. And so it was the opportunity to build something fun. New and that I thought was purpose built for the, this sector that lured me over to the other side and, and seven years in, I can say it was a great decision.

I've been able to do exactly that and to have that freedom in this sector is a beautiful thing. Melissa, if you had the opportunity to go back and have a conversation with 22-year-old. Melissa Holding. She's, she's got the world in front of her. You know, she's, she's starting out, she's energetic, she's passionate.

But if you could go back today, knowing what you know now, all of these experiences of almost 30 years in the business, what one or two pieces of advice would you offer that young lady? I would say take more risk early in your career as, as you. Move up the ranks, it becomes harder to, to move into other parts of an organization and gain experience.

And when I started in the business, it was almost as if you picked a path and it was a linear path. If you, if you stayed in an organization and there were, if you're the leadership track, there are these natural milestones, checkpoints, opportunities, and I look at people that I have deep respect. For that I think are able to, to just provide thought leadership in, in ways way bigger than their area that they focus on.

And you look at their background and they moved around more. They did. They did roles that were maybe meant to be short term stretch assignments. And I think if I could go back in time, I would have raised my hand and been really intentional about giving myself more varied experiences in the business.

So that's, that's the big, the biggest piece. And, and then the other. And I naturally did this, but I would have been more intentional on the depth of relationship building and, and really focus there and on the development of the power skills as we talked about, and found more mentor sponsors earlier in my career.

But, but that's the big thing I tell take risk. Love it. What's the worst thing that happens to you if it doesn't work out? You, you're not gonna get better because you succeed at everything you're, you're going to do. And in fact, I think that limits people. I think it's almost better if you have a failure because it makes you work harder.

It makes you think about things differently and you know, so what if it doesn't work out? It's not the end of the world. Pick a new path, pick a new opportunity. And but that just wasn't my mindset when I was 22 years old. Right? Yeah. I think about the, the, the great story of somebody that went to a, a mountain climber and said, will, will you teach me to, to be a mountain climber?

And the very first lesson was they went out and, and climbed a mountain and it, it, the, the individual was, you know, bright nervous, e, et cetera, et cetera, and said, I didn't expect this. The, the mountain climber said the only way you can learn to climb a mountain is by climbing a mountain. And so the only way that we can grow is to get outside that comfort zone, to, to take those risks.

And I, I think that is such a great, great piece of advice. Terry Kason, who is board chair for the College of Financial Planning Board, a seasoned veteran in the world of. Wealth management. Somebody that lives to the standards to which she holds herself accountable and makes a tremendous impact on the industry Flexibility.

That word comes to, to my mind. You have, you have always shown a, a flexibility about how you think about opportunities, how you think about the industry. You, you have never struck me as someone married to. There is only a way to do things. There are, there are multiple ways to do that. You've gotta, you gotta.

Kind of a long-term view, but the ability to pivot right there. Was that something that was, was inculcated in you as a young child? Is that, is that something that you've had to learn to develop along the way? How, where does that come from? Well, I mean, it really comes down to the word agility. It's been one of my favorite words throughout my career.

I consistently believe the employees, the teams, the organizations who are most agile will be the most successful. And that means for an organization or for myself personally, I really know and I can distinguish in my life what I'm tight on, like what are my values? What's most important to me, what is really tight, and one of those things for me has always been.

Client comes first, right? Call it fiduciary. Call it client centered. But client always comes first. And I do, and I not only say it, but I always try to facilitate that behavior. So for example, Phil, this is a very important podcast, but if a client would call me right now, I'd have to say, hold on. Client always comes first, right?

Like clients really are the lifeblood of our work together. We always do what's right for them. So that's number one. I'm very tight on that. There are many values in my life that I will not, you know, be flexible or agile on, but there are many things in my life as well as in the organizations that we can grow and learn and change.

And one of the best books I've ever read is by Carolyn's Wick called The Growth Mindset. And it's always about continuous learning, continuous process, and being agile enough to be curious to learn and grow and admit your mistakes. I have a great quote that I try to share, that the end goal is not about perfection.

The end goal is about humility and the role that humility plays in our life, and recognizing maybe when we didn't make the right decision or we had the wrong information, and being able to move on from there and lift myself up and lift others up as a result of that. So I would like to say that it was a well thought out plan, but it's a learning process as I go along.

I would also say, Phil, I've had some tremendous role models and leaders as I've gone through my career that have exhibited very, very tight on values and the client and much more open to the adventure and, and failing fast. If you're gonna take a risk. I, I, I will tell you, even though it wasn't financial services, there is no better company to learn very early in your career.

What innovation means and being flexible, and that's at 3M in St. Paul, Minnesota, a global company, but always trying new things and recognizing there are things that fail, but we move forward, we learn and we do better. You, you're so right in that change is, is a constant. And you know, we, we constantly hear, you know, things are changing so much.

It, it is changing so fast and I just don't like change. But, you know, the, the human existence is, is built on change. You know, we, we all change our, our lives change our, our businesses change. Is it the speed of change that is impacting people or is it. Just a is something else. What, what's happening there?

Because it, it sounds like that you're, you're handling, that, you're, you're managing, that you embrace, that, you revel in it, it sounds like while others struggle with it. What's, what's happening there? No, I've had this conversation with a number of team members because I think that, you know, you kind of do fall into a couple of different camps.

You've got those that, that revel in it and enjoy it and embrace it and run. You've got those that are like, okay, let me wait and see what happens. I, I might be on board. And then you've got those that are just like, please don't make me do anything different today. And I think, I think the human nature is fear of the unknown.

What is this gonna look like, right? If I don't do this thing. What does my day look like tomorrow and how do I make sure that I deliver? And I think at the end of the day it's, it's really all about the client and individuals making sure that they wanna be able to provide the same advice and the same service to their client that they did year over year over year.

And when things are changing around them, how do they make sure that that is consistent? So I think there's a little bit of that. And I also think that, that the pace is just. I mean, it's exponentially faster than it's ever been before, and I think that's just our overall world in general. Yeah, I think you're right.

And, you know, I, perhaps it's that, that pace of change and, you know, the fact that every day is not the same anymore, makes this industry more and more professionally attractive to, to younger people who are looking for, again, a, a, a pace of change, an ability to, you know, come in and learn and grow and, and make an impact.

In your recruiting efforts, you know, what are you telling? We, we know what, what your hiring manager said to you? What, what are you telling young people about this industry today? Absolutely not what my hiring manager said to me at the time. That's for sure. You know, I, what I talk to folks about is, you know, many people, unless they're in the estate planning industry, looking for a change or, or they've been in the financial services industry, again, aren't as familiar with trust, and so I really try and bring to them the, the fact that it is analytical.

It's problem solving and it's human psychology all wrapped into one. And so you get to use so many different parts of your brain on a regular basis. We can teach you the ins and outs of the fiduciary expertise, but if you can use your brain in a way that flexes amongst. Analytics, problem solving. And quite honestly, like human empathy, you're gonna really succeed in this industry.

Yeah. And that's what we look for. And that's hard. 'cause I mean, back to our earlier comments, I'm not sure you can teach that. I think that's more of something, you know, you got it or you don't. Or you nurture it and you grow it. So that's, that's really what I try and get from recruits. And I think those are kind of some of the things that we've seen most successful.

People sometimes ask me where I come up with examples, stories and metaphors, and I do it by watching people. Right? And, and I listen to the stories that they share. And the first time you and I met, I watched you have at least three different conversations where in the, the course of those conversations, you made reference to other individuals that, that individual either.

New should have known, or you were going to make an introduction to them. You have used the phrase connector to kind of define a, a motivation that you have in life. Is that that connector role that you play and play so well, is that an innate talent? Is that something you developed throughout your career?

You do it exceptionally well. And, you know, I always tell people the, the, the skill of giving gives back to you over your life. And I'll, I'll ask the kind of the follow-up question, the original question, how has being a great connector impacted your life? So first question is, are you a natural connector?

Is that a learned skill? And how does that come back to you? You know, Phil, I love the term connector. In my mind it starts with being a little nosy. I'm so curious about people and that it to me is the innate piece. And everyone's got a story. And if you can get it out of them, you learn so much. Not just about that person, but about the world.

Right? Back to my 14-year-old trying to school me on electrical wiring at the dining room table, you just never know what you're gonna learn. And I love to learn. So that piece probably like came with however my brain is wired. But I figured out really early on in my career that there's no magical wand for any of this work, right?

It's all done by people. Mm-hmm. We can't snap our fingers. AI's not gonna replace the nonprofit sector. So early in my consulting career, here's in years ago now, I got the sense this values driven leadership thing. It's irreplaceable organizations that had that, a really great leader and nothing else. No other resources tended to thrive.

Organizations that had a lot of resources, but leadership they couldn't see beyond the end of their noses, right? Not strategic, not thoughtful, not values driven. Really didn't thrive over time. And as I started to put the pieces together, I thought, I wonder how we bring all these visionary leaders together to do bigger things because I see them each in their sectors.

Doing their separate work, but how do we make that work bigger? How do we get to the impact that we seek? You know, in the nonprofit sector, the biggest issue is everybody else has walked out on these big social issues. Right? You know, government largely struggles to address them, right? The private sector's kind of doing something else.

The nonprofit sector sort of off on their own, trying to figure it out. And so I thought. It seems like there's nothing more powerful than bringing these key leaders together, helping them find each other when they have overlapping values and priorities. Letting them dream together a little bit, and then setting them loose in a direction that's central to both of their paths, knowing they can do more together than they ever could do separately.

And so that's kind of the, the genesis of the connector idea. And once you start putting people together, it feels so great to watch them go off and do big things that you just wanna keep. Doing it. And so for me, if I get to do nothing else in a day, that's a really good feeling to bring two leaders together who can make a bigger difference together than they could separately.

You have been able to shape a rising generation of, of leaders that you've inculcated them with, with your thought processes. You have helped them to grow and develop their skills. Why? Why is that, that that nature of leadership so important that you, you don't have to be abrasive, you don't have to be aggressive, you have to, I a term that you use is help people feel valued, help people to grow to their full potential.

Why, why is that so important in your opinion? Yeah, I, I was very fortunate. Early in my career, I worked for an organization that invested heavily in leadership development. As I've grown in my career, I realized how rare that is to, to have that opportunity. But one of the sessions, and I remember this so clearly, it was not just with people from the bank.

It was with people from many different industries and back. Backgrounds and the, the, the push of the facilitator was you have to develop what is your leadership purpose. Leadership is sometimes lonely. It is very challenging, and you need to make sure you have that center of, at the end of the day, whatever the noise is, whatever the priorities are.

What is it that you're trying to do as a leader? And, and, and, you know, there's, there's a lot of, there's a lot to unpack with that, but really narrowing it down and, and you hit on this where I came down to, how will I go home at the end of the day and know I made a difference today from just a pure leadership standpoint.

And it is every day striving to help others feel valued and grow to their full potential. I don't know anyone in any relationship of their life where they're investing time and energy where they don't hope to feel valued and appreciated. And, you know, from a, from an organizational standpoint, if I feel valued, that that helps create a, a culture of mutual supportiveness.

It creates psychological safety. When there's periods of intense pressure, intense change, it will make me. More likely to take risk or, or put a differing opinion into the room, which gets us to better outcomes. So I think from, from my standpoint as a leader trying to be full. Fully present in the meeting I'm in or who I'm talking to because you know, with the phones going, the watch is going all these, all these competing priorities, but make sure that they know that that moment matters.

It matters to me. It matters to them. I care about what they have to say and I think that is very important. But also as a leader, I want to help people continue to grow. As you were going through that, my mind went to the great movie Jerry McGuire and the, the great tagline from that movie is you had me at Hello, and I will tell you, you had me at, they aren't soft skills, they're power skills.

And what you were just talking right about right there, many people dismiss as well. That's, that's the soft skills side of the business. But you, you framed them as power skills and, and, and I do as well. And that's why it, it connected so much with me. Un unpack that just a little bit. The, and you did a, did a great summary right there, but on, on power skills specifically, if you're looking.

For that next leader. Yes. All the, all the technical nuance and all that stuff has to be there, but what are the one or two things that really separate a very high potential leader in your mind? Yeah. That, that's, that's a great one. And there, there are, there's so many places where I think we, we could take this, but Phil, I, I'm sure you've seen this as well.

You're in a meeting and there are, you know, a million dollars worth of investment. There's a million of investment dollars and $10 million of competing priorities, and everybody. Wants their priority to be, to be the one that wins. And I look at people that they're able to influence a room and, and sometimes it's a quiet confidence, which is where, where you were talking about soft skill versus power skill, somebody might say, well, that's a soft skill.

The sort of quiet confidence or being able to. Influence the conversation and shift it in a way to kind of bring it back to what you're trying to achieve. Or even oftentimes if you're gaining support and you know, the meeting before the meeting where you make sure that you, you have sponsors and advocates of you personally and your idea, that is, you have to be very intentional.

You have to be an exceptional communicator. You have to not only build relationships, but leverage those relationships. And there is nothing soft about people that when you watch that happen and you walk out of a meeting and you just realize they just made a couple of comments. Clearly they had done some work maybe behind the scenes.

But change the entire dynamic of where the room was going or the thought process, and that is a power skill. Well, you know, something interesting in, in a, in a world where there's a lot of movement and there certainly has been a lot of movement over the last five, six years in the, in the, the world of trust, you've spent more than two decades with Fifth, third, you've seen a lot of industry change.

You were drawn to. Leadership opportunities as, as you look back on, on the last two plus decades in, in your evolving roles and, you know, now in, in a very senior leadership role, what are the, what are the things that have kind of shaped your, your decision making? What, what have been the influences that have, have led you during that period of time?

Early on, you know, I started my parenting journey about the same time I started really getting the opportunity to be in some leadership roles. And so when my kids were very young, my husband and I kind of adopted this parenting mo motto that said, Hey, no matter how good or how bad something is at the time, don't worry about it.

Don't get too comfortable with it because it's going to change, right? Like, kids aren't gonna sleep through the night, don't worry about it. It's gonna change. Hey, we're really rocking the, the early morning routine before school. Great. Enjoy it, but don't get too comfortable. It's gonna change. And, and I really adopted that in the workplace too because the industry was, you know, it's moving at warp speed.

We've seen more change over the last, you know, 15, 10 years than we've seen in, in the previous decades before. And I think a lot of peoples. Talk about the disruption in the industry, but we've had some really cool innovations in the business, and when you take kind of the regulatory landscape that's evolved, our client's expectations have changed.

I mean, back in the day, you'd send a letter and have two weeks to wait for a response. Right now you've got instant communication. We're constantly trying to stay ahead of the next best thing and these unknowns and constants. Are kind of really what energize me every day. The change, the variety in our industry.

I think the trust professionals that can get comfortable with the uncomfortable and, and kind of live in that gray area are the ones that are really gonna thrive because we are constantly evolving. At the same time, oh, real quick. I think it's always fascinating when I, you know, pull up a document that was drafted in 1920, right, a hundred years ago, and I reflect on what's transpired since that grantor wrote their intentions on that piece of paper.

So many things have changed, like financial markets. We talked about communication, technology, yet the core tenants of what that grantor was trying to accomplish remain the same. And we as trust professionals. In today's world, get to navigate that for them. And I just think that's just a really incredible privilege.

I look at the firms that are very successful in the, the sector that you oversee. And you know, there, there seemed to be a lot of what I'm gonna call competing priorities, right? So you've got the, the, the mission and the vision of whatever the philanthropic cause is, right? Mm-hmm. You've got the tax issues, you've got the, the families that want to support this.

What is driving the, the industry today? Is it. Clients who want to contribute? Is it the mission or, or issue? Is it taxes? I I'm sure it's a combination thereof, but if, if you had to put your finger on the pulse and say, you know, this vein is, is, is popping at a pretty high pressure level right now. What, what, what's driving the industry right now?

When I think about the charitable work we do and the charitable families that we work with. All of us as advisors have been watching these studies of high net worth and ultra high net worth families. Now, for decades. We've had years and years and years of these studies, and all along those studies have been telling us that 70, then 80, then 90% of families are looking for someone to help them figure out.

How to have some kind of legacy that gives them meaning and purpose. And I think as advisors sometimes it's been too easy not to listen to that voice. And it's funny, I talk a lot to our teams about the continuum between interest and demand. So when I'm interested in something, I'm not gonna buy it. I wanna learn about it, but I'm not gonna go out of my way to get it.

By the time I get to demand, I want it so much that even if I love working with you, if you don't have it, I'm gonna go buy it from someone else. And so when our clients are on this side, on the interest side of that equation, we almost don't recognize how powerful that interest will become. But by the time they get to the demand side, it's too late.

And so I think for the industry, we're right in the middle. Of that spectrum right now. And so what I see is families pushing and it's interesting 'cause a lot of times it's the multi-generational family groups that push us the hardest. And the reason they're pushing us so hard is that they've got a ton of help in other parts of their lives, right?

They've got a lot of help with the estate plan. There's someone explaining the estate plan to two or three generations of heirs, but they don't have a lot of help with the philanthropy. Interestingly enough, the conversation I have the most often today is a baby boomer, often a female baby boomer who's saying, I just figured out exactly how much my estate plan leaves the kids and the grandkids, and I'm scared it's going to have negative consequences for them.

And so I wanna figure out how to mitigate that. I know that means, you know, I can leave assets to heirs, I can pay taxes, or I can leave assets to charity, but I don't have a lot of other options at the end of my life. So what do you three? Right? What do I do? And that conversation and the success of the baby boom generation, and frankly, their urgency.

The youngest baby boomer turned 62 this year, which is crazy when you think about it. And so their urgency around, what am I going to do? I've seen that money hasn't necessarily been. A positive factor in the lives of all my family members, but I don't know what to do with what I've accumulated, and I've worked really hard to accumulate it.

Help me. That's what's driving the industry, and it's mostly women pushing you as a thought leader. You're a prolific speaker writer. I, I can't help but bring this article up and it, it delves in a little bit into technology, but your article, and I, I wanna make sure I got the title right. If chat GPT were an employee.

It would get fired. Did, did I, did I nail that right? That's exactly right. Okay. Alright. That, that, that, that struck a nerve with me, with, with our team here. I think with a lot of people in the industry un unpack that a little bit. Where, where were you going and, and how do you see technology, whether it's artificial intelligence or other forms positively impacting our industry?

Everybody has these fears of how things will, will go wrong and go awry. Where do you see us heading and tell us a little bit about your article. Well, I, I wrote that article, it was based on a real life experience, but about, I think it was about eight months ago, I was working on a, a project for the CFP board and they had asked me to write about what a certified financial planner needs to do in, in light of a divorce because divorces are very, very, they're very, very common, but they can really change for a family and they can really change for an advisor.

70% of the non-financial spouse end up leaving their advisor. After a divorce. So these impact on clients, impact on firm and impact on advisor are at the high range here. And so I was working on some advice through chat GPT that I could pull together based on my experience. And I, I really learned a lot.

I, I, I think we have to be really honest, as I wrote the article, what AI is. What it isn't, and in this case, you know, it was chat GPT at the time. There's even better versions now in Claude and so on, but it kept telling me it was going to give me this graph that I was looking for. I put in all the data, I put in everything.

And this was just eight months ago, and it kept saying, yep, I'll have your report later on this afternoon. I'm pulling it up. And I said, okay. They're, they're so friendly, they're so kind. And I said, great, no problem. So I went and did something else. I came back in the afternoon, I said, where's my report?

And they said, oh no, I'm, I'm still pulling it together. It'll be ready tomorrow. And I thought, well, that's odd. I thought this thing was smarter than me. So then it just, it's just, and then two days later I realized this report is not coming and it's just trying to fool me. Like when I was a kid and I didn't finish my homework, I kept saying, it's coming.

It's coming. And it wasn't coming. And so it was true. I would've, if that was an employee and that's what I was waiting for, I would've fired that employee or at least put it on a serious performance review. Now, I think things are better now, but I, that gives you an idea. And here's, here's what I think is so important is AI is a very powerful tool that we have at our fingertips, but it is not accountable, like it is not accountable for anything.

It's in a very highly regulated industry in the financial services. And in this type of industry, accountability is everything. So if that were the case, why would we tolerate an error rate without supervision, right? Like we all think it's wonderful, but it does have a pretty relatively high error rate and, and very complex things.

So to leaders and how I think about AI is, it's helpful. It certainly is a time saver, but you would never deploy this without some form of oversight, including advisors. If they're using it for planning or for trust services or back office or anything. They've got a supervisor. 'cause at the end of the day, it's the human that's responsible, not, we cannot blame.

Claude or Chat BCPT or Grok or whoever, like the client doesn't care. They wanna make sure their reports are consistently accurate. So it strengthens our processes, but I wanna clarify, it does not replace human judgment and those leaders that understand that and can embed it in workflows where humans are still responsible for outcomes, I think then it will really provide leverage in your business.

Your organization in the midst of a lot of growth. Right now, you all have last year announced a, a great merger with cadence and you know, one of the things that I used to hear a lot about, I don't hear it as much anymore, and I'm interested in your perspective on this. It used to be, well, how are we gonna assimilate them into our.

Quote unquote culture. Mm-hmm. And I think today there is more of a focus on defining our new culture because, you know, anytime you, you merge two businesses, anytime you bring together a, a new family, perhaps it, you know, a a a husband brings children from a prior relationship, wife brings children from Arie relationship.

You don't force everybody to assimilate into. Your family's culture, you're, you're developing a new culture. How have you thought about that in, in leading this, this new organization of the combined groups and you know, what, what have been some key learnings you've taken away from that? Yeah. The, and that's incredibly important.

It, it does not matter how it looks on paper if, if the culture doesn't align you and you won't get those, those synergies. But I, I would say, Phil, it's, it starts. Even before we get into the due diligence process, how, how we think about it at Huntington and, and our CEO when he is meeting with other CEOs that are looking for these opportunities.

So we start with like-minded culture. And for us that is to say it very simply, it's all about people. We have a welcome culture. We have a people first making people feel valued. You can see one of the reasons that Huntington kind of drew me in, very similar to how I think about it, but from the very beginning, we did two partnerships last year, vertex, which gave us a, a, a entry into Texas in a big way.

And then Cadence was, was really a fast follower. I would say the first thing is we're intentional about how we frame it. It we, we think of it as a partnership. We don't, we don't frame it as an acquisition because to your point, that won't work. It has to be a partnership and I. We do a lot of listening and a lot of, within two weeks after we had announced cadence, we had as a leadership team been in front of about 85% of their colleagues.

And so getting out right away, you were, you were on the road a lot. We've been trying to do this, this podcast for months. I know. And you, you were, you were all over the map. Th This was not a series of Zoom meetings. This was th This was in person breaking bread. Exactly. You know, one on one. It was, so we had town halls and we, you know, always had time for, for mixers, whether it was lunch or dinner or coffee.

Some, sometimes we have, you know, we would start 'em at 7:00 AM and finish up at night, nine at night and do three or four of those a day. Of course you give context on why we think the partnership makes sense, how the, how the CEOs thought about it. Talk a little bit about, you know, who is Huntington? We're, we're Midwest.

What does that mean? You know, what have we been focused on? But, but that's probably 20% of the meeting. The rest of the meeting is. Hey, nothing's off the table. I like to say we're not afraid of the truth. What are the questions that are on your mind? What are you worried about? Don't be afraid to ask and, and put those things on the table.

And a lot of the questions. First, you'll get some softball questions, and then it, it really gets into it. People ask it in different ways, but they're trying to get to the heart of. What is this culture really about? And how do we execute on it? And you know, how we think about it. And how I think about it is, you know, I certainly help set the, set the tone, but the culture is everybody's responsibility.

It's collectively at its core how we work with each other, what are the acceptable practices and how we support each other. And so we spent. A lot of time doing that, and we're, and, and you can't just do that one time. We're continuing to do that. So we're doing a series of town halls again. We have, we call it well, wealth Summit for Wealth, where our leadership team comes down and, and engages with the team, has some smaller settings where we're able to, to really have active listening sessions on.

What are our clients telling us? How are the colleagues feeling? And then we roll that into our fantastic training that you may have helped us build that is doing a fantastic things for our organization. So. It's important that you don't think about, okay, we've talked about culture and checking a box because that is also part of the culture.

Continuing to have an opportunity where leadership is accessible and we are open to feedback. We have a form for people to give feedback and then, then we're, this is the most important thing. We are communicating back how we fixed. Those friction points, how we've, you know, helped help their feedback to give us better decision making.

'cause you know, there are no shortage of decisions that have to be made as we're working down the conversion path, but. It is honestly the most fun part of the journey because you're, you're meeting people and you realize different bank, but we all, we all are looking for the same things. We all wanna help our clients.

We all wanna help our communities be better. And, and selfishly, I, I joke with the cadence and Veritex teams. It's so nice. I'm coming to a town hall. Everybody sounds just like me, so I'm not having to explain where I'm from. So we've, we've had a lot of jokes about that too. But, but it's really fun. 'cause at the end of the day, it's all about people.

And people want to work and contribute in a place where, what they feel like they'll be valued and they'll have opportunities to grow. So it's part of my, it's one of my favorite parts of the, of the role that I have the honor to serve in. So the work that you do, I am reminded of a great quote from Thomas Jefferson who wanted to plant as, as I recall the story, some black walnut trees on, on his property.

And one of the crew that was helping, he said, you know, Mr. Jefferson, these things don't mature until like 75 or 80 years from now. He said, oh my gosh. Well, we better get started today. And I, I, I love, I I I love that narrative. I love that story. The work that you are doing has that type of, of multi-generational impact, right?

So. For a lot of us, you know, we, we want certain things for our family long term. But you, you talked about mission and purpose earlier. Do we want our kids to have a hundred million dollars? Well, sure. Great. I mean, that's that nice. But I think when you talk to most matriarchs and patriarchs. There's that, that connectivity of purpose that, that keeps the family together.

A hundred million dollars is not gonna keep a family together, but mission and purpose is going to do that. Talk about that, that that concept, that, that long view, that stewardship, that, that dynamic, that, that keeps families connected. How do you, how do you frame that up when you're in conversations with clients?

This is one of the places, Phil, where I think we're growing by leaps and bounds as an industry and as advisors, because it used to be that we thought the philanthropy would be the soft side, keeping the family together, right? And so many family philanthropies have proved us wrong. By the time they get to the third generation, we have cousins who really don't have a relationship with each other, who've grown up maybe on different sides of the globe, can't agree on values, can't really work together.

And so what I see from families today is this yearning for something to create that purpose, that sense of shared values. And so we do a lot of learning together. All the data about how our brains build relationships suggest that learning together is a really good place to invest when we wanna bring families closer.

So one of the trends I see right now, especially in the philanthropic work, is helping families learn. But it's tricky because words are tricky. So when you have grandma and grandchild in the same room, a lot of the words we use in philanthropy don't even mean the same thing to these two generations anymore.

Loyalty, community, charity, those words don't have the same meaning. If you're 72 and 17 today, and so what do you do about that? We do a lot of exploring using images. We do a lot of storytelling. We spend a lot of time helping families tell their stories to each other. What's important to me? What's important to you?

What spend a lot of time encouraging families to talk youngest to oldest. That is if the oldest speaks first, everybody else is conditioned to fall in line. If the youngest speaks first, there's a real freedom. To the conversation. And so we're trying to teach families those skills to invest in relationships using their philanthropic work as a tool, but really what we're doing is building skills to be a family.

And so once they're successful in that space, the philanthropy is successful because they have the skills. Used to be, we thought it was the other way around, the philanthropy itself was gonna keep them together. Now that we know that's not true, we're investing in relationship building. We're reading books together, we're doing values-based exercises together.

Even more than the exercises, which you can only do a little bit at a time, right? We're telling stories about who we are. Where we come from, what has influenced us? You know, when grandma and grandpa can talk about what was my life like when I was young? Who were the people who influenced me? How did that shape my choices?

How did that shape my wealth creation story? That's when we get to the root of what being a family is about, and so we try to build those skills. In the canon curve is the production of Canon Financial Institute. Executive producer of the Canon Curve is Sarah Jones. Editing and mixing is done by Danny Brunner.

Until next month, I'm Phil Buchanan thanking each of you for staying ahead of the curve.