In this episode of The Rare Advisor, host Aaron Grady is joined by his mentor and colleague, Steve Phillips, to unpack a concept that lies at the heart of financial advisor coaching: building your ideal practice. The conversation opens with a reminder that many advisors enter the industry with dreams of freedom and flexibility, only to find themselves overwhelmed by a business that’s running them, rather than the other way around. As Steve puts it, “There is no ideal life unless you have the ideal practice.” This episode is a deep dive into what that truly means—and how to build with intention.
Aaron introduces the idea that, while advisors often focus on ideal clients or practice size, there are actually four critical pillars to consider: ideal clients, ideal practice size, ideal strategic partners, and ideal affiliations. These areas, when thoughtfully aligned, help ensure that an advisor’s business supports their life—not consumes it.
They begin by discussing the first element: the ideal client. Most advisors start by taking on anyone who can fog a mirror, as Aaron jokes, because they need to survive early on. But over time, the shift should be from quantity to quality—moving from a bottom-up to a top-down business model. Steve emphasizes how foundational it is to define this early. Waiting until the business has hundreds of households can lead to inefficiencies, service challenges, and staffing issues. Defining who your ideal client is—whether that's retirees, business owners, or another niche—not only focuses your marketing but sets the stage for a scalable, satisfying business.
This leads naturally into the second pillar: ideal practice size. Aaron and Steve stress how critical it is to determine how big you actually want your business to get. Do you want 1,000 households? Or would you prefer 150 high-value relationships? Do you envision one office or several? A lean team or a robust staff? Many advisors get caught in a growth-for-growth’s-sake trap without ever questioning whether that growth aligns with their personal goals. Steve notes that nearly every small to mid-sized practice they’ve coached eventually hits a tipping point where the number of clients becomes unsustainable, and they’re forced to make tough decisions that could have been avoided with early planning.
The third pillar—ideal strategic partners—is often the most overlooked. These are the estate attorneys, CPAs, mortgage brokers, and other professionals who interact with your clients. Many advisors focus on what they can get from these relationships (i.e., referrals), but Aaron and Steve argue that the priority should be alignment. Does this partner serve clients at the same level you do? Do they reflect the values and service standards of your firm? A strategic partner who serves your clients well makes you look good and helps client retention, even if they never refer a single prospect.
Then comes the fourth and final pillar: ideal affiliation. This part of the conversation arises out of the recent industry-wide trend toward consolidation, private equity acquisitions, and rapid scaling by some of the largest firms. As Aaron points out, affiliations are often treated as a secondary decision—but they are central to the kind of business you build and how you live your life. Who you affiliate with—whether it’s a broker-dealer, RIA, or another platform—will shape your culture, your support, and your future options. Advisors often make short-term decisions based on immediate incentives or frustration with their current setup, without evaluating whether the affiliation aligns with their long-term goals.
Steve shares that many advisors at large firms—some with 30,000 or more reps—feel invisible, especially if they were early adopters who helped build those firms. These advisors, once central to their organization’s identity, now find themselves lost in a sea of names. That disconnection highlights the need to evaluate whether your affiliation is still the right fit. At USA Financial, where Steve and Aaron coach and consult advisors, the focus isn’t on how big they can get—it’s how small they can stay while still delivering top-tier support and resources. Their model is centered around relationships, implementation, and individualized attention—something they believe is hard to scale effectively with tens of thousands of advisors.
Aaron adds that when you’re evaluating an affiliation, the key is to determine whether the support structure helps you implement and execute on your vision—not just talk about it. Support should include help classifying clients, building acquisition plans, managing investments, and delivering an outstanding client experience. Without help in execution, even the best-laid plans often fizzle out.
As the conversation wraps up, Steve poses a powerful and often overlooked question that they ask every advisor considering a change: “What’s the one thing you could accomplish in the next 6, 9, or 12 months that would move your practice forward?” The follow-up is just as important: “Is your current affiliation helping you make that happen? And if not, why not?” These questions help clarify not only whether a new affiliation might be a better fit, but also whether your current environment is actually supporting your growth and vision.
Aaron closes by reiterating that all these pillars—clients, size, partners, and affiliations—should be evaluated through the lens of your ideal life. What kind of business supports the lifestyle and impact you want? Are you moving toward that, or have you veered off course? Thinking with the end in mind isn’t just about succession or retirement—it’s about crafting a business that serves you today and tomorrow.
Ultimately, this episode is a call to step back and design your practice with clarity and intention. Don’t settle for growth without direction or affiliations without alignment. Ask better questions, start with purpose, and build something that serves your life—not the other way around.
TRANSCRIPT
Aaron Grady, Advisor Consulting Director at USA Financial - Welcome back to another edition of the Rare Advisor. I'm your host, Aaron Grady. And with me again today is my friend and mentor, Chief Practice Management Officer, Steve Phillips. Hey, Steve, thanks for joining.
Steve Phillips, Chief Practice Management Officer at USA Financial - Mr. Grady, good to be here with you brother, always.
Aaron Grady - So Steve, I appreciate you taking the time to join me today. You and I were having a conversation, uh, the other day about the concept of ideal life and more specifically building the ideal practice. And it's a, it's a common theme that we talk about a lot when it comes to the coaching we do with financial advisors and, starting with the end in mind. And usually we say, Hey, what does your ideal practice look like? We say, well, what does your ideal life look like? What is your why? And it really delved, know, our conversation took a bunch of different paths, but where we ended up is usually when we talk to advisors about ideal life and ideal practice, it's usually ideal clients and maybe ideal practice size are usually where we stop. But what we really identified through our conversation is there's really, there's four key areas. There's four key areas that I think most advisors and even us for that matter kind of miss sometimes.
Steve Phillips - Yeah.
Aaron Grady - But there's four areas when you're looking at building an ideal practice that I think needs to take into some consideration. And the four are, ideal client.
Steve Phillips - Yes, yep.
Aaron Grady - Ideal practice size, ideal strategic partners, which is the long lost cousin of some of these. And then the one that really kind of hit home, this is where we're gonna spend the bulk of our time today, but ideal affiliations. And this one actually kind of just jumped up and bit us through some of our conversation that kind of led us down this path. So let's take a little time. Let's first, let's touch on the first three to give some color to that. And then let's talk about number four.
Steve Phillips - Sure. Here's one quick comment for you. was just thinking about it. We did have a really good conversation the other day. And when you talk about ideal life, ideal practice, and you kind of, it just hit me right as you were saying it. I don't think we talked about this the other day. How many advisors would say to us, I'm not living my ideal life. It's that whole idea of, you know, the business is running you or you're running the business. And so it's a great topic because, you know, and number one, there is no ideal life unless you have the ideal practice. So that your business is not running you and running your life.
Aaron Grady - One of the greatest things I ever heard with relative to this topic was, I listened to someone say one time, if you raise your practice or your business to be a spoiled and impetuous child, it will act as such. And I was like, there you go. Yeah. The idea of having a plan and executing the plan to perfection. And look, maybe it's not perfection, but at least having a plan.
Steve Phillips - Why, we see that too!
Aaron Grady - So often we see advisors get into this business because they look at the freedom it affords them, the lifestyle, the income, but they wake up the next thing, you know, they have a business and maybe the business doesn't exactly go where they want it to go. So they need to take a step back and say, okay, what am I doing and why am I doing it? And so I would say, so let's just kind of run down through the list. So the first one I would say, and this is the one we spent a lot of time on is, is ideal client. And, you know, ideal client set.
Steve Phillips - Yeah.
Aaron Grady - Is that thing that it seems like it's that, well, it makes, you know, who do we all want to work with? Well, you know, as well as I do, advisors often, when they get in this business, it's, they're taking on anybody that can fog a mirror. And we understand it's, you got to feed your family. You know, you, you, you have to, you have to do what you have to do to keep the business afloat. But eventually you get to the point where you want to grow the business from the top down, not from the bottom up. And maybe I don't want to have a thousand households. Maybe I want to have. 150 of the right households and I want to grow for profit and progress, not just for the sake of growth.
Steve Phillips - Yeah, you know, it's interesting too when I think of all the practices that we've been a part of that sometimes the younger practices we can help advisors focus on, know, there's people who come to us, I only have five ideal clients, I only have 10 ideal clients. That's still a foundation because I think what happens to a lot of practices is they don't think about a classification or identifying an ideal client until the practice is however big.
Aaron Grady - Mm-hmm.
Steve Phillips - 150 households 250 households 500 households and by that time the ideal client or lack thereof You know you and I both know causes a lot of other I'm gonna say it's not necessarily trouble But it's things that have to be considered obviously how you're going to service different clients How much staff does it take and all those types of things so focus on an ideal client? Early in the practice I think is really important and now it's something that we talk about when we have that opportunity
Aaron Grady - And I know some of my comments there kind of bled into the second one, which is also ideal practice size, but you're right. Ideal clients. So who do I want? So what do they look like? You know, pre-retirees, how much income, you know, business owners, what have you. So who's the ideal client we want? But then the second one is, you know, as we're kind of, you know, they, do both kind of fit together hand in glove. What's the ideal practice size? Do I want to have.
Steve Phillips - Yeah, true, yeah.
Aaron Grady - As we said, do we want to have a thousand households? Do we want to have seven offices? Do we want to have two offices? Do we want to have one office with six advisors? Do I want to be a solopreneur? Do I need one staff member, two staff members? know, starting with the end in mind, where do we want to go? Where do we want to build this is, is the next thing. So who do I want to, who do I want to work with ideally? And then how big do we want to make this thing?
Steve Phillips - You know, with the exception of some of the really larger practices that I know that you've been working with over the last couple of years, multiple advisors and a larger staff and that kind of thing, correct me if I'm wrong here, but think of all of the small to medium sized practices that we've worked with and we've helped so many of them grow. Every one of them gets to a point, it seems, where they would agree there's too many households. And even when they classify, And what's the problem? The issue for them there is, oh, well, we certainly can't downsize. We're not going to go from 500 households to 300 and rectify the problem. And so your point about the ideal practice size is also something that needs to be looked at early on. And I get it. think you're right that when I first start my business and I become an advisor and I like the business, I'm good at it, I like people, and we'll take on just about anybody as a client without really You you say it all the time and you said it at the beginning here, this beginning with the end in mind and how few advisors, look, it's not just, where do we want to go? We're going to sell it, hand it down to a family member, whatever becomes of it, your legacy. It's all those other little pieces. How big is the staff going to be? How many clients will we serve? And invariably, if an advisor or a team doesn't think about it as they're growing and going along, it's going to become an issue down the road.
Aaron Grady - Yeah, well, it affects those two things, the first two, which we know those are the foundational elements. If you say, start with your ideal life, the why am I doing this? Because that drives everything. But when looking specifically at the practice, ideal client and ideal practice size are the foundational elements because ideal client drives your marketing. Who do we want to attract? What kind of audience do we want for any marketing efforts that we're doing? And as we continue to grow and scale, who are we looking to replicate? Who do we want to be advocates of our firm? And then the ideal practice size, it's about creating scalability with intention. So you're building with purpose. So it's not, hey, we're just going to end up here one day. I'm going to take a road trip across the United States, and I'm going to end up someplace. Where do we want to go with this? Because then you can start really allocating resources, time being the most important and most valuable. practical resources towards a goal. so I think those things, as we said, are foundational. So I'd say the third one is, I was going say the lost poor country cousin that I see too many advisors miss and just forget about is ideal strategic partners. Sometimes people I think treat that as a throwaway. But you think about, look, the people that your clients interact with outside of your staff.
Steve Phillips - You. Yeah.
Aaron Grady - If you've got a state planning attorneys or CPAs or mortgage brokers or personal bankers or whatever, and they are affiliated or strategic partners of yours, they need to align and be ideal for your practice because they're an extension and representation of who you are.
Steve Phillips - And oftentimes a part of the process when we're working with advisors. It's built right into the practice. So alignment is the word. I'm glad you said that.
Aaron Grady - Yeah, I mean, and I say this because I think oftentimes advisors go into these strategic partner relationships looking for, I need to find the right person who's going to be sending me introductions. And we would say that's the wrong aspect to look at it. Start with finding the right strategic partner that can serve your clients at a high level in the manner that you wish them to and makes you look good.
Steve Phillips - Right.
Aaron Grady - Then nurture that relationship so that they want to introduce people to you. If you build the two-way street, great, but if nothing else, you find a strategic partner who serves your clients super well and make you look great and make your clients sticky, you've already won. but I think...
Steve Phillips - And I'm sure that's a whole rare episode. You've either done it or you're going to do it about advisors are always telling us, I'm introducing all the time, all the time, all the time. My accountant doesn't send anybody back or my state attorney doesn't send anybody back. And the question always is, I wonder why the lineman. yeah.
Aaron Grady - Why? Why? Yeah, it's, you know, it's funny to see that's actually been a big topic of late and yeah, you're probably right. I probably should do a rare on it. And so we'll add it to the list. So that brings us full circle to the fourth. And this is the one that I think, I wouldn't say it surprised us, but it was the thing that we kind of, what led us, honestly led us back to the conversation of ideal life and ideal practice was we were having a conversation about all the transition that's going on in the industry right now.
Steve Phillips - Yes, you should.
Aaron Grady - All the consolidation with private equity and these big groups are buying up and consolidating the industry. And then bigger firms buying up and buying smaller firms. With all this transition going on and all this affiliation or new affiliation, we started talking about, well, what's ideal? What makes sense? should it... And I know you're very passionate about this, and rightly so.
Steve Phillips - Yes.
Aaron Grady - This is the part that I think that sometimes when we think about building the ideal practice, advisors too often overlook as well, is who is the ideal affiliation for my practice, not just today, because sometimes advisors take a short term approach, they can only see this far and they miss the long term, where does this all go?
Steve Phillips - Yeah, you know it is it's really a hot button for me and there's a couple of things I Jotted something down from earlier. We're talking about the ideal size of your firm and I was thinking to myself Some of these advisors that are busy growing growing growing growing with no number in mind or anything Wonder if they could just buy a practice with 150 households and solve it which that's interesting and then it comes right to the conversation that we're talking about all of the mergers, all of the acquisitions and what does that do to certain practices or certain advisors? First thing I'll say is I don't think either one of us would hate on a particular model. We know the organizations that are at 30,000 advisors and headed to 50 and headed to 100,000 and there's, we know advisors that feel right at home there and running their practices, they fit in that model. They like the bigger sort of communities, that kind of thing. I think it would be fair to say that we're hearing more though from advisors that were once affiliates. The thing is, that the 30,000, 50,000, whatever it is, firms didn't start out that way. You know, we talk about 30,000, you know, one particular firm that's at 30,000 going to 50, going to a hundred. You and I know advisors from our past that were at that firm when they were less than a thousand advisors.
Aaron Grady - Mm-hmm.
Steve Phillips - And so the question, one of the questions becomes, how on earth do I suddenly become invisible? When I see myself as the foundation of this firm and I've been loyal to the firm and I've grown with the firm. And so that's a legit conversation. And for an organization like ours that's been committed to not how big we can get, but how small we can stay, that's something that's been in place at USA for almost 25 years since 2002, there's kind of a caveat to that, isn't there? And I think that you and I were talking about that. It's true that I would say that our model is the antithesis of the 30,000 or 50,000. And how small we can stay, I think, generates a conversation and perhaps an explanation. Because I think some advisors would be like, the big show, all the resources, all the people, all the staffing, all the support, all of that. Now, whether it's true or not remains to be seen. And so the question comes, yeah, you're small, but are you too small? And I love when we get that question. My answer is this. We are definitely committed to how small we can stay. We're big time on that. Small is the word there. I would say that we are gigantic on relationships. then you have, so it's not enough to say all the relationships and the support. I think you and I over the years have come up with this sort of three-pronged, what does support and relationship mean? Well, it means number one in my book anyway. And I think of not just coaching and consulting, which we've spent years in, but it's everything that a firm should bring to your practice. And that's an implementation part.
Aaron Grady - Right.
Steve Phillips - If I just left it there, it's hard to fathom how an organization of 30,000 or more could come alongside you in your practice and implement with you, whatever that is, classifying your clients. How are we helping you strategize with your portfolios and your asset management and how are you delivering those things to clients and what is your client acquisition? It is hard to do that kind of stuff with 30,000 advisors. So implementation is a big big thing. You and I also believe, go ahead, I want your thought there.
Aaron Grady - I was going say, I think the word, and I think you used it a moment ago is it's about right fit. And I know you and I can dig deep and wide in the idea of, really, when you're looking at affiliation and going there, what things do really need to consider? And there's a myriad of things that every advisor, and look, you said it yourself. We're not saying that the 30,000 model is broken for the right team, for the right advisor, it makes sense if it's the right fit. And I think really the point we're saying is ideally when you're evaluating the practice that you want to build, you have to identify what is ideal. Who is my ideal client? What's my ideal practice side? Who are my ideal strategic partners? And who's my ideal affiliation? So if I'm going to be affiliated with a broker dealer, an RIA, you know, Do they align with my values? Do they align with the size and scope? Can they provide the level of support that I need? Do they have tools and resources? they all, those things so often, I think people kind of miss when they swing and miss. And it's something that it needs to be in the conversation when you're thinking about ideal practice. And often it gets left on its own little shelf as something else. And I think, again, I think that in my simplified terms, I think I bring it back down to right fit.
Steve Phillips - Yeah. Well, I think it's a perfectly legitimate point. You we can talk about, you and I can talk about this all day long. And we're going to try to stay within a certain timeframe here. But you know, the other question is the whole implementation and right fit and your goals and all of that, whose model is it? Again, neither one of us is condemning the 30,000 advisor model, but at the same time, you have to call it what it is. If I'm that big, the mission of that organization is different. And we do provide services and strategies and coaching and consulting. And here it is in a box and everybody gets the same kind of thing. Is that wrong? As you said, it depends on it. It's right fit both ways. We're not making a judgment that one model is better than the other. can tell you that we, and partly of what we love to do organizationally, you know, and being involved in a practice. year after year after year, watching it grow, talking to advisors, the whole other thing about implementation. As an implementation partner, what that leads to is execution, proper execution of your plan. How many households? What's my client acquisition plan? How am I going to put a classification matrix together? All these types of things that we do year over year, and that's what fosters growth and progress. Now there's one other caveat and you know I was going to get to this. I think that every advisor, not just if you're considering a move or a transition, certainly if you are, but if you are considering staying with the current affiliation, the question is fair. We ask this of every advisor we ever come into conversation with and it's very simple. And you mentioned beginning with the end in mind, we say that so many times and all the videos that we do and all the coaching and it's a fair, legitimate point. With the end in mind, let's bring it back to six months, nine months, 12 months. I think this is a dramatically overlooked question in conversation for advisors. And that is if you can accomplish one thing in the next six, nine, 12 months that you think would make a significant difference in your practice, what would that be? And you know that every time we ask that question, we get a specific answer. It's not like, don't know. Advisors think about that and there's something to say. The next question is then, what is your current affiliation doing to promote, facilitate that thing to happen, growth, progress, and then continuing? What do you think that the new organization, if you're considering a transition or a move, is going to do to facilitate or promote that growth? From there, I think you get a good look into the future of, you know, we talk about growth, expansion, and legacy. I think that if you start with the simpler conversations, the future is easier to clarify. From our side as a support engine and from the advisor and the team side as to how we're going to get there and the things we need to consider.
Aaron Grady - All great and salient points in, you know, I think in the broader scope of what's going on in the industry, it's really awareness. It's go into any situation with eyes open. And I know we've said it 15 times on this call, go in with the end in mind. So what am I building? Why am I building it? Where do I want this to go? And then... MI aligning ideally with a partner who can not just support me today, but through all the transitions of my business going forward and to where it eventually ends up.
Steve Phillips - Yeah, I'm gonna let me overstate one more time. This is so great that you, because I do believe we definitely believe from coaching and consulting and indeed our entire company model is begin with the end in mind. But you have to take a first step, don't you? Especially when you're considering the move. That's why I think the questions that we ask of potential right fit advisors, potential right fit affiliation, that question is how do we get started together? Let's pick out the one or two things that have to happen. Yes, the end in mind is super important, but I think here's the deal with the 30,000 advisor firms, they can say everything they want about the end in mind. And then I think advisors are sitting around going, what are we doing to start? It's hard to get down in the trenches and make that start. If you're an advisor looking for a smaller community that's big on relationship and implementation, that's one model.
Aaron Grady - Right.
Steve Phillips - And there's another model.
Aaron Grady - I love it. Well, Steve, I appreciate you taking some time today to dig a little deeper into an ideal practice, ideal clients, ideal practice size, ideal strategic partners, and ideal affiliations. If you like what you've heard today, like and subscribe. Follow us for more videos on the Rare Advisor. And always, we wish you much, much success in the coming weeks and months. And with that, we hope you all the best. Talk to you soon.
Steve Phillips - Yeah.
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The RARE Advisor is a business model supercharged by Recurring And Repeatable Events. With decades of experience coaching successful advisors, your host, along with other leaders in the industry, discusses what it takes to grow a successful practice. With the aim of helping financial professionals and financial advisors take their business to the next level, this podcast shares insights and success stories that will make a real impact. Regardless of the stage of your practice, The RARE Advisor will provide thoughtful guidance, suggestions for developing systems and processes that work, and ideas for creating an authentic experience for your clients.
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