By: Amy Irvine, CFP®, EA, MPAS®, CCFC
Five Years of Independence and Entrepreneurship!
June 1, 2020 celebrated FIVE years of independence and becoming an entrepreneur. I can hardly believe it's been that long. It's been an interesting journey to say the least. For those of you that were with me at the start of the journey, the words, "thank you" don't seem sufficient enough words. For those of you have have joined us along the way, we are so honored you've selected us.
Starting your own business is hard work, I new it would be when I set off on the journey. Typical to my personality, I planned for "what could go wrong" and worried about it all the time. I will admit, it certainly started out a little rocky with significant challenges, as some of you may remember the flash crash of August 2015.
This was then followed by a decision in early 2016 to create Irvine Wealth Planning Strategies (spinning off from the partnership I had started initially) This was a hard decision, but was one of the best pivots I made early on and 2016 and 2017 were major growth years for the business, moving from 66 clients at the end of 2016 to 118 clients at the end of 2017. Yes, that is a 44% growth rate in one year. I remember being on a podcast and being asked how other's could replicate my "success" and my response was "don't." That was too much growth and all I did was work VERY long days.
It was also in 2016 that "Monday Morning Quarter-Buck" was "born." Yes we have over 4-years worth of blogs out in the world, for which I'm very excited and never would have thought possible.
In 2017, we launched the Wine and Dime Podcast, with the first episode releasing on September 22! It was an episode with my mom. We've come a long way from those early episodes and with the release of episode 116 this past Friday (see below).
That's why 2018 was a big hiring year, with the first addition being Kate Welker in February of 2018. I'm sure Kate would have some funny "stories" about those early days! As would Becky Eason who joined us shortly thereafter in April of 2018, and then Kerrie Beene in August of 2018. Hiring people is one of the most stressful parts of running a company, the realization that their success is dependent on my success. It's one thing to be a financial planner and understand how clients are leaning on you for guidance and advice, but when you put that business owner's hat on, it's a completely different grape you are tasting (yes, I had to get at least one wine related metaphor in here). But, helping develop people certainly has made some awesome wine (okay two metaphors).
With the expansion of the team in 2018, we decided to re-brand in 2019 and Irvine Wealth Planning Strategies began doing business as Rooted Planning Group. If you are a small business and ever want to re-brand, give us a call, we will tell what not to do! We thought it was going to be an "easy" process. We were WRONG. Our growth in 2019 slowed a bit, growing at about 6% for a total client count of 137 at the end of the year. However, the later part of 2019 was really picking up momentum and both Kerrie Beene and Kate Welker attained their CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER designation.
Then came 2020. When I said I planned for what could go "wrong," I left out a pandemic scenario, a major economic correction, one major Act from Congress (but 4 in total, so far), all in the first 5-months of ONE year. Thank goodness we had the ability to work remotely already, as I can't image trying to figure that out too. To add "drama" to all this going on, Becky Eason sat for Certified Financial Planner exam in March (which turned out to be the day before they shut down testing) and successfully passed the exam. It was a bit of a Hallmark ending in my opinion. We are also thrilled to have added Rachel to the team earlier this year too, and many of you have started to receive meeting reminders from her already.
Here's the one thing I hope anyone reading this understands, I planned for what could go wrong and I think that is important, but it was a recent podcast guest that got me thinking, what if I had approached this with "What if I Fly" instead. So in 2020, we want to plan more for "flying" with all of you. It has been an amazing journey, we are honored to be part of your lives. Thank you for being the critical part of our success journey and for giving us the wings that will now give us the ability to fly.