Best time to Leave a Firm
5 RepliesJump to last post
Doing a little reality testing, and can use your feedback, my brothers and sisters.
Whats your opinion: when leaving a firm to go Indy, is it worth it to wait for a less "rocky" market? I know, my clients bought me, not my firm, but lets face it, there is uncertainty coming at clients from all directions currently. How was your experience? Whats your 2 cents worth? Thanks kindly!!When your philosophy and the firms’ begin to diverge, it’s time to go independent. Plan well.
I’ll agree with Miss J too, end of the year.
End of the year is when I chose to leave -- FINRA closes down for like 2 weeks at the end of the year, so you have to plan appropriately. The year I left, Christmas was on a Saturday, so the markets were closed on Friday and markets were closing early on Thursday. Our office had planned a gift exchange and just eating goodies for Thursday morning. Most of the brokers weren't even in the office. I packed up and left my resignation letter Wednesday night. Thursday was the last day for my registration to get moved before the 2 week shut-down. The branch manager couldn't even start to get my book divided up until the next week, but I was able to contact all my clients almost immediately. It worked great!
I'm not sure about good market or bad. I jumped the end of 1999 (everyone was worried about Y2K and if the computers were going to shut down the economy) and then we had the tech bubble burst and a down market for three years. None of that mattered to my clients - they followed me and they stayed with me.I don’t see why the end of the year would be better than the middle of the year. I just wouldn’t do it in OCT-NOV-DEC because clients may use the “Oh, I’m so busy with the holidays excuse.”
I DO think that good markets matter. Right now, none of your clients are that happy.