Hiring A COO And Creating Partnership Paths Early To Drive Enterprise Value On The Path To $3B AUM: #FASuccess Ep 498 With Christine DeMao

Welcome everyone! Welcome to the 498th episode of the Financial Advisor Success Podcast!

My guest on today’s podcast is Christine DeMao. Christine is the Chief Operating Officer of Gibson Capital, an RIA based in Wexford, Pennsylvania, that oversees approximately $3 billion in assets under management for 200 client households.

What’s unique about Christine, though, is how her firm since its early days has taken an intentional approach to succession planning, including by creating a “Path to Partnership” document that clearly outlines what the firm is looking for in new partners.

In this episode, we talk in-depth about how Christine’s firm has had four rounds of partnership offerings (which have included not only executives and senior advisors, but also operations professionals as well), how Christine’s “Path to Partnership” document lists the prerequisites for becoming a partner (including embracing a client-first philosophy, having strong character, being effective in one’s functional job, and adding to enterprise value) as well as other positive factors (such as making intellectual or culture contributions to the firm), and how Christine’s firm introduces this document to new hires early in their tenure to set expectations (and to help color performance management conversations).

We also talk about how Christine and her partners keep an open dialogue going to identify team members who might make good partners one day, how Christine’s firm cultivated next-generation leaders by bringing them into management conversations on a regular basis before offering them a partnership opportunity, and how Christine created a “role grid” to map out responsibilities across the firm (which helps avoid pitfalls that can come with a distributed leadership structure).

And be certain to listen to the end, where Christine shares how Gibson Capital’s culture has changed for the better following its post-pandemic transition to a hybrid environment, how Christine has found significant value from participating in groups with other operations professionals in the wealth management community, and how a near-death experience led Christine to pursue better work-life balance (and model a healthier approach for staff at her firm).

So, whether you’re interested in learning about creating a clear path to partnership for next-gen employees, building the firm infrastructure to serve high-net-worth clients, or adding enterprise value to a firm from the operational side of the business, then we hope you enjoy this episode of the Financial Advisor Success podcast, with Christine DeMao.