Closing The Back Door: Driving Growth By Stemming Advisor Attrition
To celebrate over 40 years of thought leadership, Kehrer Group is revisiting some of its landmark studies and insights, and we’re asking some members of the financial advice community to provide their take on the impact of the work.
From Paul Haines:
In my time leading wealth management businesses at BOK Financial Advisors, Atlantic Union Financial Consultants, Atria Wealth Solutions, and most recently Mariner Wealth Advisors, I came to depend on Kehrer Group’s research as more than industry perspective. It gave me a way to connect ideas to action. Their work consistently helped me translate complex challenges into clear narratives that resonated with executive teams, financial advisors, and stakeholders across the organization. This study in particular stayed with me because it put structure and clarity around something I had seen play out repeatedly in the field.
“Closing the Back Door” captured a reality that many of us felt but had not fully articulated. Growth conversations often centered on recruiting, yet the real story lived in retention. Firms losing advisors at a pace that quietly offsets hiring efforts creates a cycle that limits progress and erodes momentum. The research brought that dynamic into focus in a way that leaders could understand and act on, shifting the discussion from activity to outcomes.
What made this work especially impactful for me was its ability to quantify the cost of attrition in practical terms. It allowed me to walk into conversations with leadership and speak with confidence about the long-term revenue implications, the lost productivity, and the broader impact on the business. That clarity made it possible to advocate for meaningful investment in advisor retention, experience, and support. Those discussions changed from debating cost to recognizing opportunity.
I used this research to help influence decisions at the executive level and to align teams around a more disciplined approach to growth. It reinforced the importance of creating an environment where advisors choose to stay, grow, and build their practices over time. The message still holds. Sustainable growth does not come from simply adding advisors. It comes from keeping the right ones, supporting them well, and building a platform where they can succeed year after year.
Closing The Back Door: Driving Growth By Stemming Advisor Attrition
About Kehrer Group Highlighters
The Kehrer Group Highlighters package some of our most important findings, insights, and commentary into bite-size, digestible articles. We make the Highlighters available for free to the entire financial advice community—a small gesture of appreciation for a community that has done so much to support our work.
About Kehrer Group
Kehrer Group is the bank and credit union financial advice community’s trusted partner for original thought leadership, insight based on data, and strategies that drive success. Kehrer Group’s legacy of research and analysis has advanced the delivery of investment services in banks and credit unions and shaped the industry into what it is today. Kehrer Group’s principals meld the wisdom gained from its long history in the industry with cutting-edge analytics, data that is robust and diverse, and a deep understanding of the key drivers of performance.
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