• Explaining the overall financial process and discussing any issues of concern to you
• Explaining and documenting the services that will be provided to you
• Defining the responsibilities of both parties
• Discussing compensation
• Agreeing on the expected length of the relationship
• Agreeing on how decisions will be made

Benefits to you
By covering the structure, the details of the relationship and compensation in this first step, the foundation for a good working relationship will be laid.

The more your Wealth Manager understands about your financial situation, the better prepared he/she will be to provide the valued service you deserve. Our goal in this second step is to pull all relevant information together by:

• Discussing your financial situation with you, thereby clearly defining both your resources and your obligations
• Working with you to define your personal and financial needs, priorities, and goals
• Determining your time frame for financial results and going over the implications with you
• Listening carefully to better understand your values, expectations, and feelings about financial risk

Benefits to you
Good decision-making is the key to financial success, and good decisions come from having the right information. Values, needs, priorities, goals, and expectations - these are all part of the equation when it comes to making good financial decisions.

Having gathered the information in Step 2, your Wealth Manager will be fully equipped to conduct an in-depth analysis of your financial status. The Wealth Manager’s goal is to identify problem areas that require resolution opportunities to pursue by:

• Analyzing all relevant records and documents provided by you and organizing the information according to the 8 Financial Advisory Categories (see below) provided by the Wealth Manager;
• Looking at possible solutions to problem areas and identifying possible strategies that will enable you to capitalize on opportunities;
• Determining what you can do to meet your goals, then formulating a recommendation for each of the 8 Financial Advisory categories.

Benefits to you
The analysis done here is important for two reasons. Firstly, it tell me the quality of information gathered in Step 2 and secondly, it indicates the care I took to understand your values, needs, priorities, goals and expectations in Step 1

The 8 Financial Advisory Categories

1. Budgeting, Cash Flow Management, and Net Worth determination
2. Risk Management Planning
3. Investment Planning
4. Retirement Planning
5. Education Funding and Planning
6. Estate Planning
7. Tax Planning
8. Succession Planning

Crue Consulting recognizes the importance of organizing and developing financial recommendations that are easily understandable by the client. The Wealth Manager’s goal in this fourth step is to prepare a financial plan that is useful to you by:

• Preparing financial planning recommendations based on the analysis done in Step 3;
• Meeting with you to go over those recommendations so you can make informed decisions;
• Hearing your concerns and making revisions to your financial plan as needed;
• Completing a formal financial plan and presenting it to you.

Benefits to you
This process, together with the previous steps, ensures that the financial plan is organized in a language that is clear to you and that it is exactly what you expected.

Financial Plans tend to sit on shelves and be ignored. For Crue Consulting, completing the plan is only part of our responsibility to you. Our goal in this 5th step is to set the process in motion by:

• Developing a working agreement with you, detailing how we will implement your financial plan;
• Determining specifically what you do and how we will coach you so as to keep you fully advised throughout the process.

Benefits to you
By completing this step, you have the confidence of knowing that your plan is in motion, and that we have begun to help you achieve your goals.

Rather than simply meeting with you periodically, Crue Consulting use two guidelines to determine when the Wealth Manager needs to sit down with you. The first sets of milestones are those times when your Wealth Manager should review the impact of your decisions. The second set of milestones includes unpredictable changes that need attention. Our goal in this sixth step will be to establish a pattern for monitoring those issues by:

• Establishing milestone indicators i.e. when to review progress-to-date with you in person;
• Meeting with you at each milestone or at any point where changes in tax laws, economic conditions, your personal or financial status require new decisions;
• Providing you with a written report on each meeting

Benefits to you
Step 6 is a starting point, but it is open-ended. This transforms your financial plan into a living document and ensures that it will never become outdated.