Money Matters Episode 295- From Tech to Finance: A Journey into Financial Planning W/ Eric Franklin

ERIC FRANKLIN: Money Matters Podcast Interview

September 19, 2023 . 12:55 PM . ID: 868052941

Transcript

00:01 - 00:04
[speaker unknown]
This conference will now be recorded.

00:05 - 00:08
Chris Hensley
Good, morning, everybody, you're listening to Money, Matters.

00:08 - 00:12
Chris Hensley
I'm Chris Hensley, got a great show lined up for you today.

00:13 - 00:14
Chris Hensley
We've got with us, Eric Franklin.

00:14 - 00:23
Chris Hensley
He is with Prospero Wealth, and this is actually almost a continuation of a conversation we had at the recent future proof.

00:24 - 00:29
Chris Hensley
I want to say convention, but they call it Festival, right, kind of like Lollapalooza, for, for people.

00:30 - 00:42
Chris Hensley
So, that is where I met Eric, we were both at the future proof event and gotten into a conversation, and so we're going to share some of that with you today.

00:42 - 00:52
Chris Hensley
I do want to let listeners know a little bit about you, Eric, you're the managing principal at Prospero, well, you oversee investments and the overall client experience.

00:52 - 01:05
Chris Hensley
You have 23 years of experience in the tech industry, and we'll get into that primarily on Amazon, and now you, you focus really, on helping tech workers and business owners invest.

01:05 - 01:08
Chris Hensley
Eric, thank you for joining me on the show today.

01:09 - 01:11
Eric Franklin
Thank you so much for having me, Chris.

01:11 - 01:12
Eric Franklin
I'm excited.

01:12 - 01:13
Chris Hensley
Absolutely, absolutely.

01:14 - 01:21
Chris Hensley
And so maybe we ought to start a little bit, I wanted to get a little bit of feedback on future proof from you of, what was your experience like there.

01:23 - 01:35
Eric Franklin
I went last year, and this year, I think, it's probably been the most transformational, highest leverage spend I put into my business since going full-time a couple of years ago.

01:35 - 01:51
Eric Franklin
It's just like, you know, it's a target rich environment in terms of talking to other owner operators and really sort of, you know, I'm at a very early stage with, with my company, only working on it full-time for two years now.

01:51 - 02:02
Eric Franklin
It's just been a place where I've been able to learn from a lot of different people with different business models and service models, and many of those people I met last year became mentors to me throughout the year.

02:02 - 02:04
Eric Franklin
So, it was fun, catching up with them again at year two.

02:05 - 02:12
Eric Franklin
Um, no, and then this year, you know, kinda the same, but even amplify, it was a larger conference.

02:12 - 02:18
Eric Franklin
A lot more, lot more owner operators, more vendors, bigger, bigger scene.

02:20 - 02:34
Eric Franklin
But this year is more, now that I have something that's been working, it was more about, how do I, how do I enable, like, build the practice so that other advisors can, can help us reach more tech workers and business owners?

02:34 - 02:36
Eric Franklin
So that, you know, kinda?

02:36 - 02:40
Eric Franklin
That's, that's what future proof's been about for me the last couple of years.

02:41 - 02:41
Chris Hensley
Love it.

02:41 - 02:42
Chris Hensley
I love it.

02:42 - 02:49
Chris Hensley
Well, I'm a newbie to this was my first year there, and I can tell you that, wow, I was really impressed.

02:50 - 02:56
Chris Hensley
You know, it takes a lot to get me out, and you know, I've been doing this for 20 years, and it takes a lot to get me out of the office.

02:56 - 03:02
Chris Hensley
I always consider, like if you need to talk to a wholesaler, that you know, you raise your hand, I don't even necessarily take lunches, right?

03:02 - 03:07
Chris Hensley
Because I'm like, Well, you know, but this has been just the opposite of that.

03:07 - 03:11
Chris Hensley
It was very saying, you know, business casual, everybody was really relaxed.

03:11 - 03:12
Chris Hensley
We were getting a network and stuff.

03:13 - 03:16
Chris Hensley
And so, very good experience.

03:16 - 03:19
Chris Hensley
I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it's in the budget that I can go back next year.

03:20 - 03:24
Chris Hensley
Really, really made a lot of really good context, so I'm glad to hear.

03:24 - 03:26
Chris Hensley
You've given me kinda the year before that.

03:26 - 03:30
Chris Hensley
It's, it's been consistent that it is a good thing there.

03:31 - 03:31
Chris Hensley
So, good.

03:31 - 03:33
Chris Hensley
So thank you for sharing that with our listeners.

03:33 - 03:37
Chris Hensley
We gave them a little look under the hood there, as far as our practice building and stuff like that.

03:38 - 03:40
Chris Hensley
But tell me a little bit about Prospero wealth.

03:40 - 03:49
Chris Hensley
And I know one of the things we talked about is that you help tech workers and business owners with financial planning.

03:49 - 03:53
Chris Hensley
How did you come about getting into that niche?

03:54 - 04:09
Eric Franklin
Well, I think I got into the niche because it was the niche I came from right at 23 years in tech, three different stints at Amazon totaling 18.5 years startups in between and at the very end of that.

04:11 - 04:24
Eric Franklin
So, no, I think it was just very natural to find people, uh, that you share DNA with and share a common language and approach to sort of like how we look at the world.

04:26 - 04:47
Eric Franklin
No, So, I started it on the side of my day job at Amazon seven years ago, Actually, that the announcement came up on LinkedIn the other day, and did it very, very slowly for five years just with friends and family and a few colleagues really learned the space, what it was like to advise people.

04:47 - 04:49
Eric Franklin
Initially just in the investment space.

04:50 - 05:06
Eric Franklin
And, you know, it grew very, You know, organically, and as something where I was spending more and more time on it talking to more vendors, talking to more people about a broader scope of needs, and then, you know, being a product person.

05:06 - 05:18
Eric Franklin
It's been great to sort of like, uh, think about, OK, as I learn these things from my client and I instituted as part of the product or the offering service offering.

05:18 - 05:18
Eric Franklin
We have.

05:19 - 05:20
Eric Franklin
How do we scale that?

05:20 - 05:28
Eric Franklin
How do we keep giving our clients more at the same, you know, more for the fees they're paying, right?

05:28 - 05:35
Eric Franklin
So, try and keep the costs low, but try to continuously offer more, and as we scale up, I hope to be doing that even more and more.

05:37 - 05:37
Eric Franklin
Yeah.

05:37 - 05:38
Eric Franklin
That's, that's the niche.

05:39 - 05:42
Eric Franklin
It just that's that's proven to be our natural.

05:44 - 05:46
Eric Franklin
You know, where we work well with clients.

05:46 - 05:54
Eric Franklin
We find that a lot of them are in the tech space, especially very averse to financial salespeople.

05:54 - 05:59
Eric Franklin
So having people that speak their language and can help them with that with the things they're dealing with this.

06:00 - 06:02
Eric Franklin
This is where we operate.

06:03 - 06:04
Chris Hensley
Love it.

06:04 - 06:04
Chris Hensley
I love it.

06:04 - 06:17
Chris Hensley
I think we can go deeper with that because I know we we talked a little bit about, you know, the different personality types that you work with them OK, this is a generalization, but I teach people, right?

06:17 - 06:21
Chris Hensley
Tech people, they, Tim, you see a lot of them that are considered high analytics, right?

06:22 - 06:28
Chris Hensley
How do you tailor your advice to fit, you know, different personality tests?

06:30 - 06:32
Eric Franklin
Yeah, Yeah.

06:32 - 06:42
Eric Franklin
I'd say, in general, our clientele, both in the tech worker space and the business owners space, they tend to be highly educated, Kind of upwardly mobile go getters.

06:42 - 06:47
Eric Franklin
A lot of do it yourself, kind of identity and approach.

06:47 - 07:00
Eric Franklin
And so, really, I think, the way we, Taylor, R approaches, first of all, we try and keep things as light as possible when they start working with us.

07:00 - 07:08
Eric Franklin
So, you know, are our planning isn't this wrote a router experience that takes months and months, and goes through every aspect?

07:08 - 07:13
Eric Franklin
What we try and do is do a broad survey, kind of a gap analysis.

07:13 - 07:23
Eric Franklin
What you have in place, what you don't have in place, identify the biggest, you know, 3 or 4 opportunities every quarter, as opposed to trying to do it all at once.

07:23 - 07:38
Eric Franklin
So, try and keep all these people have no demands on their time, so we try and keep that as light as possible and, and sort of keep that initial engagement to a few hours.

07:39 - 07:50
Eric Franklin
Then we go off, We start implementing against it and then we try and have ongoing conversations sort of every quarter to sort of refine the approach, identify with the next biggest target that they need to knock down it.

07:50 - 07:52
Eric Franklin
So, that's, that's one thing.

07:53 - 08:10
Eric Franklin
Then, on the other side, I'd just say that, that the products we use in the investment space and, you know, insurance, planning, and financial planning, all of these, they're, they're very tech forward products, you know?

08:11 - 08:15
Eric Franklin
So, our clients kind of know, kinda demand that.

08:15 - 08:19
Eric Franklin
They don't want somebody doing this on in, like, and just producing a PDF.

08:20 - 08:30
Eric Franklin
We try and use the best tech, we can find the best investment approaches that are the most quantifiable, or with long track records and reputable histories.

08:30 - 08:40
Eric Franklin
So there's kind of this like curation element to the products we use and and the investment, you know, families, we use that that really service our market.

08:40 - 08:43
Eric Franklin
So, a lot of our value is in just filtering down.

08:43 - 08:52
Eric Franklin
The universe of possibilities down, the things that, that makes sense, and that we can explain really well.

08:54 - 08:54
Chris Hensley
I love it.

08:54 - 08:54
Chris Hensley
I love it.

08:54 - 09:02
Chris Hensley
And that's actually that ties right nicely right into the future proof conferences we went to, because that's a, you know, a good bit of that conference.

09:02 - 09:08
Chris Hensley
Or some or festival seminar, or whatever you wanna call it, you know, that that had to do with fintech, right?

09:08 - 09:09
Chris Hensley
It had to do with what's that?

09:09 - 09:11
Chris Hensley
The biggest And the best thing that's out there?

09:11 - 09:14
Chris Hensley
There was a lot of questions going on about AI, and that sort of stuff.

09:14 - 09:25
Chris Hensley
So, just, you know, keeping, you know, part of it is us, as advisors, keeping our finger on the pulse of what's the best platform to use when we're when we're, you know, helping them.

09:25 - 09:27
Chris Hensley
So that that's, that's huge.

09:27 - 09:35
Chris Hensley
Anything else about working with tech employees, that you would consider unique, did you'd like to share with us?

09:37 - 09:53
Eric Franklin
Um, trying to think, You know, I'd say that the only other thing I think that's really unique about our approach is kind of the growth model for our company, as is, is bringing in other tech workers to support tech workers.

09:53 - 10:05
Eric Franklin
So, you know, kinda, I have a lot of Amazon clients, those Amazon clients have gone on, in some cases, to work at other big tech companies, but we brought in another full-time advisor.

10:06 - 10:16
Eric Franklin
Right at the beginning of this year, that employee came out of Stripe and was able to help a lot of stripe employees that were, you know, dealing with a tender offer.

10:16 - 10:18
Eric Franklin
I think it was May, of this year.

10:19 - 10:25
Eric Franklin
So, he's helping them navigate the tax repercussions doing a lot of financial planning, just a lot of general advising.

10:26 - 10:44
Eric Franklin
So, I just, you know, I think it is important to find, beyond just somebody who can serve the broad space, you know, somebody who has very specific knowledge of those employee compensation plans can help you navigate the types of equity compensation you're dealing with.

10:44 - 10:52
Eric Franklin
I mean, I know, you know, everything about the Amazon benefits plan and everything about the Amazon 401 K plan.

10:53 - 11:05
Eric Franklin
And so, people are often surprised by, know, what it's like to work with an advisor that actually knows the ***** and dials on their specific plans that are private to the rest of the world, right?

11:05 - 11:27
Eric Franklin
So, I think that's kinda, that's, that's something we're looking to build more of a expertise, and as we go forward, is just like company by company, as we have more expertise and work, in video chats, video meetings, with people, screen shares, we're learning a lot about these plans.

11:27 - 11:30
Eric Franklin
And we're, we're taking a lot of notes so that we can help the next person.

11:32 - 11:33
Chris Hensley
I love it, I love it.

11:33 - 11:45
Chris Hensley
I mean, I have a very similar approach is that some of the state pension here in Texas And What I find is that because I'm seeing that same type of client over and over?

11:46 - 11:50
Chris Hensley
One, You become an expert just like you guys have with the Amazon plan, right?

11:50 - 12:01
Chris Hensley
But then, if there's any problems that bubble up, you're able to turn around, and if I think, I'm hearing you say, this, you're able to turn around and use that with the next client that you have.

12:01 - 12:22
Chris Hensley
If you're gonna kinda, or cross those, those bridges, they are, and, and you're, you're, they're able to benefit From the, from where you've already been down those plans, And that's just getting better, as you're bringing in more of those, those tech companies, and you added partners the year that had experience with different companies and stuff.

12:22 - 12:23
Chris Hensley
That's, that sounds fantastic.

12:23 - 12:25
Chris Hensley
I know the client benefits from that.

12:26 - 12:31
Chris Hensley
I'm gonna pivot a little bit, because one of the things we talked about was art in finance.

12:31 - 12:36
Chris Hensley
I know you're interested in art, Do you think there's a connection between art and financial plan?

12:39 - 12:44
Eric Franklin
Yeah, I actually saw that, art space super special to me.

12:44 - 12:52
Eric Franklin
I, I, was a literature major in college, you know, coming up here, in Seattle, sort, of, in the nineties, early.

12:52 - 12:53
Eric Franklin
Two thousands.

12:53 - 12:57
Eric Franklin
We had a very big roadblock seeing every month.

12:57 - 13:02
Eric Franklin
So I started going into all these art walks, I had some friends who are artists in introducing me around.

13:04 - 13:06
Eric Franklin
I just fell in love with the space.

13:06 - 13:17
Eric Franklin
I started writing a local blog that that featured our local artists who was getting sort of interviews with them out there, you know for for a number of years.

13:19 - 13:21
Eric Franklin
So I love this space.

13:21 - 13:24
Eric Franklin
I'd say that, you know, data driven approaches.

13:24 - 13:28
Eric Franklin
You know, you can have the best data driven products, but.

13:30 - 13:30
Eric Franklin
No.

13:30 - 13:39
Eric Franklin
It only takes you so far, There's a lot of people in the quant space that are competing for a vanishingly small margin.

13:40 - 13:45
Eric Franklin
And a lot of what I think a lot of this comes down to storytelling, which is, which is a type of art.

13:45 - 13:54
Eric Franklin
Like, how do you put the pieces together in a financial plan and give somebody a comprehensive picture that resonates with them?

13:54 - 13:56
Eric Franklin
And that they know, like, this is my financial plan.

13:56 - 13:59
Eric Franklin
It's different than everybody else's financial plan.

14:00 - 14:02
Eric Franklin
And it's, it's different in the following ways.

14:02 - 14:12
Eric Franklin
I'd say that's like, That was probably the biggest shock to me when I moved into financial planning, from just investment management several years ago.

14:13 - 14:28
Eric Franklin
Was, I really thought looking at the tools that, know, and my client told that a lot of people would come in and look very similar, and what I was shocked by was that everybody, she's different, everybody is different from externally.

14:28 - 14:41
Eric Franklin
You might think that they, they, they look similar, they're similar age group, they have a similar job or income, but the demands that, they know, if they have from their family or, or their goals, they're also different.

14:41 - 14:54
Eric Franklin
And when you put this into a plan, even with that relatively common set of tools, What comes out is, is super unique, and I think that's the really fun part here, is you're working with real people.

14:55 - 14:58
Eric Franklin
And developing something unique, that speaks to that.

15:00 - 15:02
Chris Hensley
Hundred percent, I agree, 100%.

15:02 - 15:03
Chris Hensley
I love that.

15:04 - 15:07
Chris Hensley
You know, this philosophy and English before I went the finance, so.

15:07 - 15:08
Eric Franklin
Sorry, I'm.

15:08 - 15:08
Chris Hensley
With you.

15:09 - 15:09
Chris Hensley
And I love that.

15:09 - 15:17
Chris Hensley
I think, you know, once we tilt and we're in the weeds, especially when the investment management piece, it can become all about the numbers.

15:17 - 15:19
Chris Hensley
And that's what's great, is this job.

15:19 - 15:23
Chris Hensley
It's not, it's like you said, there's as many different stories as there are people.

15:24 - 15:32
Chris Hensley
Everybody stories is going to be different and so that, you know, the artist sightedness likes to create and that fulfills that that piece of us.

15:32 - 15:35
Chris Hensley
And I think that that resonates with the, with the clients as well.

15:36 - 15:46
Chris Hensley
We are bumping towards the end of the show, but I want to also talk to you about estate planning, because one of the we started talking about that.

15:46 - 15:54
Chris Hensley
I was really excited about some of the new software, and in the programs that came out, for the estate planning that advisors are using.

15:54 - 16:02
Chris Hensley
But we ended up having a conversation about a story that you shared about your father, and how that tied into estate planning.

16:02 - 16:04
Chris Hensley
Could you maybe share that with us for the listeners?

16:05 - 16:06
Eric Franklin
Yeah, sure.

16:06 - 16:10
Eric Franklin
So, it's a sad story upfront.

16:10 - 16:18
Eric Franklin
So my dad passed away a little over 20 years ago, very unexpectedly at the age of 49.

16:18 - 16:21
Eric Franklin
He was a healthy guy, golf several times a week.

16:22 - 16:26
Eric Franklin
You know, we went surfing every summer, no.

16:26 - 16:29
Eric Franklin
So, it was just very unexpected.

16:30 - 16:44
Eric Franklin
But, you know, though, he had divorced from my mother when I was a late teen, I think driving age or so, and a couple of weeks prior to his passing, he had actually finished paying off the divorce settlement.

16:45 - 16:51
Eric Franklin
Um, and had just gone back in and refreshed all of his estate planning documents.

16:53 - 17:06
Eric Franklin
None of us expected to make use of it as quickly as it did, but having that clean estate plan, there were no doubts about his wishes and the way he wanted things to operate, um.

17:09 - 17:11
Eric Franklin
As bad as things were as terrible as things were.

17:12 - 17:17
Eric Franklin
Having that clarity, you know, as a child and for my for my stepmother really.

17:19 - 17:24
Eric Franklin
Cleared up everything And to this day, you know, you know, sort of like managing that.

17:24 - 17:27
Eric Franklin
Trust was one of my first financial experiences.

17:27 - 17:30
Eric Franklin
He was a local business owner and he left money.

17:30 - 17:38
Eric Franklin
So that my, my, my step mom would be well provided for and my, you know, my brothers and I would be well provided for.

17:38 - 17:49
Eric Franklin
And so it's just like, you know, when you, when you see something like that done, Well, it, it leaves an impression because I've now seen it done poorly in some other cases.

17:49 - 17:56
Eric Franklin
And and, you know, and certainly a huge percentage of the people that come to us.

17:56 - 18:09
Eric Franklin
You know, they're, they're generally younger starting their families, The majority of them are lacking any estate plans, let alone or recently updated one or a well maintained one.

18:09 - 18:15
Eric Franklin
And, so, that's just, it's an area that I think really brings the whole planning experience together.

18:15 - 18:19
Eric Franklin
There is some interesting technology now, come into play.

18:19 - 18:24
Eric Franklin
We're looking at a lot of that, you know, adding to our business here shortly.

18:24 - 18:33
Eric Franklin
But, yeah, that's, that's an area we're moving a lot deeper on with our clients, especially as you know, our demos getting older as we go as well So.

18:34 - 18:35
Chris Hensley
Well, I love it, I love it.

18:35 - 18:50
Chris Hensley
I just thought that was a really impactful story because it was an example of somebody who had done it right on the front end and there was no bickering or infighting, at least on what the intentions were.

18:50 - 18:54
Chris Hensley
Because they were clearly stated and they had been done recently right.

18:55 - 18:58
Chris Hensley
And then fast forward to where you're, you know, you're working with clients.

18:58 - 19:11
Chris Hensley
I'm working with clients, and we could see where, as you mentioned, a lot of people don't have any estate planning in place, and so, you're leaving behind a headache, right, for, for your, for your, you know, beneficiaries, your family members.

19:12 - 19:13
Chris Hensley
Yeah.

19:13 - 19:14
Eric Franklin
It's a good family.

19:14 - 19:26
Eric Franklin
Nobody wants to do it, but it's, it's a, it's a gift and at it, it's terrible to talk about your mortality and to make these decisions about your health care, your, your medical directives, and all this.

19:26 - 19:28
Eric Franklin
But it's, it's critical.

19:30 - 19:32
Chris Hensley
Absolutely, Absolutely.

19:33 - 19:34
Chris Hensley
Well, and we're right here.

19:34 - 19:35
Chris Hensley
Towards the end of the show.

19:35 - 19:44
Chris Hensley
One of the things I wanted to make sure for listeners who want to find out more about you in your practice, where can they go to find out more information?

19:45 - 19:55
Eric Franklin
Pretty easy it's prospero wealth dot com, Prospero PR, O S P R O like the character from Shakespeare's Tempest.

19:55 - 19:56
Chris Hensley
There you go.

19:56 - 19:57
Chris Hensley
There you go.

19:57 - 20:01
Chris Hensley
Now, are you guys just in Washington or do you or where's your licensing at?

20:01 - 20:04
Chris Hensley
Are you all across the US, are we.

20:04 - 20:11
Eric Franklin
Are registered in Washington, in California, OK, our clients right now, and in nine states.

20:11 - 20:12
Eric Franklin
I believe, you know.

20:13 - 20:18
Eric Franklin
But, but hopefully, we'll be SEC registered one of these days, and it'll just, that'll be even easier.

20:19 - 20:28
Chris Hensley
I know, if there's people interested from outside of that, it's as easy as them raising their hand and you know, latent Linton letting you know, to see if they can work with you as well.

20:28 - 20:29
Chris Hensley
Fantastic.

20:29 - 20:36
Chris Hensley
Know, as we're closing out right now, or what have I forgot to ask you that you'd like to leave with listeners today?

20:38 - 20:39
Eric Franklin
Um, that's great.

20:40 - 20:51
Eric Franklin
I think, if I were to leave one thing, I would say, having an accountability partner, that can get you beyond sort of the do it yourself approach.

20:51 - 20:53
Eric Franklin
It is really valuable.

20:53 - 21:09
Eric Franklin
And even I, somebody who's been an enthusiast in this space for, for, ever since my, my working career started, I used an advisor who became my co-founder for eight years, it's really helped to have that accountability partner.

21:09 - 21:10
Eric Franklin
And there is a lot.

21:10 - 21:13
Eric Franklin
I mean, I think we have a lot of very intelligent clients.

21:13 - 21:18
Eric Franklin
I think all of our clients are part above average, you know, intelligence and good-looking, right?

21:19 - 21:26
Eric Franklin
But, you know, if you, if you look, there's a report from Vanguard that talks about Adviser Alpha.

21:28 - 21:35
Eric Franklin
This report, like, breaks down the areas that you would know that you can benefit from professional money management.

21:36 - 21:46
Eric Franklin
None of them are things you can't do on your own, but, you know, most of our clients, when they look hard at that report, they say, I'm not doing at least 1 or 2 of these things.

21:46 - 22:02
Eric Franklin
And that is typically enough to pay for professional management, let alone the avoidance of large mistakes as you're making large-scale transitions, you know, and having somebody to help you with those state plans, with your insurance needs.

22:03 - 22:13
Eric Franklin
It goes, goes well beyond, so, find an accountability partner, that can make sure that you're up to date and is staying in contact with you and keeping you honest.

22:15 - 22:16
Chris Hensley
I love it, I love it.

22:16 - 22:18
Chris Hensley
Eric, thank you so much for sharing that with us today.

22:18 - 22:19
Chris Hensley
Have a good rest of the day, there.

22:20 - 22:22
Eric Franklin
Thank you so much, Chris, appreciate it.

22:23 - 22:23
Chris Hensley
Have a good one.