For many financial advisors, summer is often viewed as a slower season. Clients are traveling, families are spending time together, children are on summer break, and calendars tend to become less predictable. As a result, some advisors begin to treat the season as a period of reduced activity, focusing on maintaining the status quo until the busier months arrive. In this episode of Bird's Eye View, Steve Phillips challenges that mindset by encouraging advisors to see seasonal slowdowns not as lost opportunities but as valuable moments to strengthen relationships and create meaningful engagement.
Steve begins by reflecting on the two passions that have shaped much of his professional and personal life: birding and coaching financial advisors. Having spent more than three decades immersed in both worlds, he has discovered remarkable similarities between them. The themes of patience, observation, curiosity, and intentional effort are central to both pursuits. Whether watching wildlife or helping advisors grow their businesses, success often comes from paying attention to details that others might overlook.
One of the most common conversations Steve has with advisors during the summer months revolves around declining activity levels. The explanation is understandable. Clients are often away on vacation, children are home from school, and many advisors themselves use the season to recharge and spend time with family. While there is nothing wrong with enjoying the slower pace, Steve cautions against viewing summer as a period when meaningful advisor-client engagement must be put on hold.
Instead, he encourages advisors to focus on an area that can sometimes be neglected amid the demands of investment reviews, planning discussions, and business development: understanding clients on a deeper personal level. Summer presents a unique opportunity to reconnect with clients through conversations that have little to do with portfolios and everything to do with the people behind them.
Steve highlights the importance of learning more about clients' families, occupations, recreational interests, and life experiences. Advisors often know a great deal about a client's financial situation, but how much do they know about the people most important to them? Questions about family vacations, favorite destinations, annual traditions, or milestone events can reveal insights that strengthen relationships far beyond what can be discovered in a financial review.
For example, summer vacations are often emotionally significant experiences for families. Some trips are annual traditions that span generations, while others represent lifelong dreams that families have finally achieved. Clients typically enjoy sharing these stories, and advisors who take a sincere interest in those experiences demonstrate that they care about more than financial outcomes.
Another area Steve emphasizes is understanding clients' children and major family transitions. The end of summer often coincides with students heading back to school or departing for college. These moments can carry tremendous emotional weight for parents. A child's first year of college, in particular, represents a major milestone filled with pride, excitement, uncertainty, and change. Advisors who know their clients well enough to ask about these experiences can create conversations that build trust and deepen connections.
These discussions are not sales conversations. They are relationship conversations. Steve's message is that meaningful relationships are built through genuine curiosity and engagement. Advisors who know their clients' stories are often better positioned to serve them because they understand the broader context of their lives, goals, challenges, and motivations.
The episode then shifts to Steve's birding experiences and the lessons they offer for advisors. Living in Kansas City, Steve describes enduring a particularly hot summer. For birders, extreme summer heat often means reduced activity and fewer opportunities to observe birds. Many bird species become less visible, making the season less exciting than migration periods or cooler months.
Typically, Steve might travel elsewhere to enjoy more productive birding opportunities, but this year he remained close to home. At first glance, it appeared that his birding season might be disappointing. There simply did not seem to be much activity to observe.
Rather than accepting that reality, Steve decided to take action. He looked for ways to create opportunities instead of waiting for opportunities to appear. In his backyard, he installed bluebird nesting boxes with the hope of attracting wildlife and increasing activity around his home.
The results exceeded expectations. A pair of bluebirds moved into one of the nesting boxes and successfully raised two separate clutches of young birds. Steve describes the excitement of watching the fledglings emerge and begin learning how to feed themselves. What might have otherwise been a quiet and uneventful summer turned into a season filled with discovery, learning, and enjoyment.
Even more unexpectedly, another pair of birds selected a natural cavity in a nearby tree as their nesting site. Great crested flycatchers raised three young birds there, providing additional opportunities for observation. Steve and his wife were able to witness the developmental stages of the young birds and eventually watch as they prepared to leave the nest and begin life on their own.
The birding story serves as a powerful metaphor for the advisory profession. At first glance, both situations appeared slow and unproductive. Advisors may feel that summer provides fewer opportunities to meet new clients or conduct significant business. Similarly, a birder might conclude that a hot summer offers fewer opportunities to observe wildlife.
Yet in both cases, Steve demonstrates that intentional effort can change the outcome. Instead of passively accepting the slowdown, he created an environment that encouraged activity. The bluebird houses did not guarantee success, but they increased the likelihood that something meaningful would happen. Likewise, advisors who proactively reach out, ask thoughtful questions, and invest time in understanding their clients may find opportunities where others see limitations.
The central lesson of the episode is that opportunities often exist beneath the surface of seemingly quiet periods. Slow seasons can become highly productive when individuals focus on relationships, curiosity, and purposeful action. Whether in birding or financial advising, meaningful results often come from creating the conditions for engagement rather than waiting for circumstances to change.
Steve leaves listeners with a reminder that growth is not always measured by immediate business activity. Sometimes growth occurs through stronger relationships, deeper understanding, and a greater appreciation for the people and experiences that surround us. By embracing those opportunities, advisors can transform a slow season into one of the most valuable periods of the year, laying the foundation for stronger client relationships and future success.
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