Ep #179: From Managing a Hedge Fund to Building an RIA - The Career of Michelle Gass
November 21, 2018
XYPN member Michelle Gass has had quite a unique path into the financial planning world. After starting her career as a tax accountant, Michelle transitioned into a family office, and then ended up launching and running a successful hedge fund for over twenty years. It wasn’t until after she retired that she decided to get her CFP and launch her own financial planning firm.
Now the founder of Paradigm Advisors, a fee-only financial advisory practice that focuses on guidance and support, Michelle joins this episode to share her professional journey. She opens up about what it was like starting a firm from scratch, what her business looks like today, and the important lessons she learned along the way.
Listen to the Full Interview:
Want more from XYPN Radio? Become a VIP to access our private community!
What You'll Learn from This Episode:
- An overview of Michelle’s practice.
- Her unique career path.
- The definition of a family office.
- What a hedge fund is.
- Why Michelle decided to come out of retirement and open her firm.
- The most challenging part of starting her own business.
- What her first months ramping up were like.
- Why she opened two offices at the same time.
- Key lessons she learned from starting her own firm.
- What Michelle calls the biggest failure of any business.
- How her fee structure has evolved since she started.
- Staff she has hired and their roles within the company.
- Paradigm's service model.
- Michelle's onboarding process with clients.
- Her long-term vision and priorities for growing her firm going forward.
- Advice she would go back and give her younger self.
Featured on the Show:
- Michelle Gass: Website | LinkedIn
- Fidelity
- eMoney
- Elizabeth Jetton
- Joe Messinger
- XYPN Radio Episode #65: Developing a Specialty Service Around College Planning
This Episode is Sponsored By:
Fun Fact! What do many financial advisors have in common? They’re often terrible at doing their own bookkeeping! Enter the Bean Team at FA Bean Counters, powered by XY Planning Network. There’s no shame in falling behind in your books. We’re all guilty of that from time to time. But if you’re leaving money on the table because you haven’t filed expenses correctly, you need the bean team.
Start cleaning up your books with a free Chart of Accounts template. Visit www.fabeancounters.com/xypnradio to download your copy.
Share
- Financial Planning (197)
- Advisors (172)
- Financial Education (138)
- Fee-only advisor (136)
- Financial Planners (136)
- Millennials (116)
- NextGen (115)
- Advice (113)
- Marketing (93)
- Training (87)
- Professionals (86)
- Profit (85)
- Growing Your Firm (80)
- Entrepreneurship (77)
- Financial Advisors (76)
- Business Development (54)
- Niche (53)
- Advisor Success (45)
- RIA (44)
- Building Your Firm (42)
- Growth (34)
- Career Changers (31)
- Starting a Firm (28)
- Networking & Community (27)
- Staffing & HR (27)
- Family (23)
- Launching a firm (23)
- Social Responsibility (22)
- Compliance (21)
- Financial Plan (21)
- Preparing to Launch (18)
- Careers (16)
- CFP Certification (14)
- Online Marketing (14)
- First Year (12)
- Michael Kitces (12)
- New Business (12)
- Partnership (12)
- Scaling (12)
- Communication (11)
- Taxes (11)
- Women (10)
- Family Business (9)
- Assets Under Management (AUM) (8)
- Ethical Advisor (8)
- Perseverance (8)
- Broker-Dealers (7)
- Financial Therapy (7)
- Industry Trends & Insights (7)
- Preparing to Launch (7)
- RIA Operations (7)
- RIA Owner (7)
- Tax Preparation (7)
- Work Life Balance (7)
- Benchmarking Study (6)
- Business Coach (6)
- Hourly (6)
- Leadership & Vision (6)
- Small Business Owner (6)
- Student Loan Debt (6)
- College Planning (5)
- Discrimination (5)
- Female Financial Planners (5)
- Financial Independence (5)
- Investment Management (5)
- Leverage (5)
- Mergers (5)
- Passions (5)
- Technology (5)
- Business Owner (4)
- Challenges (4)
- Finances (4)
- Firm Ownership (4)
- Inspiration (4)
- Military Finance (4)
- Pricing Models (4)
- Retirement (4)
- Sales (4)
- Side Hustle (4)
- Support System (4)
- Virtual (4)
- Working Mom (4)
- Advice-Only Planning (3)
- Company (3)
- Data (3)
- Divorce (3)
- Evolving (3)
- Experience Wealth (3)
- Facebook Groups (3)
- Financial Management & Investment (3)
- Finding Success (3)
- Grief (3)
- Investing (3)
- Lessons (3)
- Management (3)
- Minorities (3)
- Monthly Retainer Model (3)
- Operations Manager (3)
- Philosophy (3)
- Recession (3)
- Reflection (3)
- Small Business (3)
- Spouse (3)
- Strategy (3)
- Succession Plans (3)
- Tech Stack (3)
- Time Management (3)
- Virtual Advisor (3)
- Wealth (3)
- Authenticity (2)
- Building Your Firm (2)
- Certified Divorce Financial Analyst (CDFA) (2)
- Changes (2)
- Charitable Donations (2)
- Check in (2)
- Conversations (2)
- Equity Compensation (2)
- Fiduciary (2)
- Firm Within a Firm (2)
- First Six Months (2)
- Healing (2)
- Homeschool Families (2)
- Impact Folio (2)
- Maddy Roche (2)
- Marriage (2)
- Meg Bartelt (2)
- Mental Health (2)
- Mindset Shift (2)
- Modern Money Advisor (2)
- Morgen Rochard (2)
- Outsourcing (2)
- Pandemic (2)
- Planning (2)
- Pricing (2)
- Processes (2)
- Public Relations (PR) (2)
- RIA Consultant (2)
- RIA Operations (2)
- Real Estate (2)
- Security (2)
- Selling Insurance (2)
- Solutions (2)
- Survey (2)
- Tech Professionals (2)
- Visionary and Integrator Roles (2)
- Automation (1)
- Behavior (1)
- Business (1)
- Care (1)
- Clarity Wealth Development (1)
- Client Acquisition (1)
- Consulting (1)
- Consumer Protection (1)
- Corporate Banking (1)
- Couples (1)
- Cryptocurrency (1)
- Delegating Tasks (1)
- Differentiation (1)
- Disability Accounts (1)
- Early Retirement (1)
- Economics (1)
- Educators (1)
- Effectiveness (1)
- Elements (1)
- Equally-Owned Firm (1)
- Events (1)
- Exchange-Traded Funds (ETF) (1)
- Finance for Parents (1)
- Financial Independence, Retire Early (FIRE) (1)
- Goals (1)
- Health Care (1)
- Heather Townsend (1)
- Hedge Fund (1)
- How to be a Financial Advisor (1)
- IRA (1)
- Impact (1)
- Impact Acceleration (1)
- Implementing (1)
- Independent Financial Advisor (1)
- Independent RIA (1)
- Insurance (1)
- Internal Revenue Service (1)
- Investment Planner (1)
- Investor (1)
- Kori Lennon (1)
- Listener survey (1)
- Loan forgiveness (1)
- Money Quotient (1)
- Motherhood (1)
- Motivation (1)
- Native American (1)
- Opportunities (1)
- Pro Bono (1)
- Progress Report (1)
- Progressives (1)
- Realtors (1)
- Reese Harper (1)
- Reg BI (1)
- Registered Life Planner (RLP) (1)
- Restricted growth (1)
- Retirees (1)
- Robo Advisors (1)
- Selling a Firm (1)
- Stigma (1)
- TAMP (1)
- Trader (1)
- Transparency (1)
- Trusts (1)
- XYPN Books (1)
- XYPN Invest (1)
Get episode alerts by email
You May Also Like
These Related Episodes