Mike Papedis speaks with Paul Karlitz, CEO of Sagient — an 85-person, $2B MassMutual-affiliated RIA — on how behavioral finance, product-agnostic planning, and disciplined recruiting combine to build a firm that can scale without sacrificing client experience. Karlitz's approach: never start with a product in mind, and leave the product discussion for last.
Mike's Take
"The advisors who are winning the wealth transfer conversation aren't the ones with the most sophisticated products — they're the ones who figured out that the product discussion comes last. If you're leading with Monte Carlo simulations before you understand what the client is actually trying to solve for, you're not advising. You're pitching. Start with the outcome, build the plan, then find the tools that serve it."
This interview was originally published in Financial Advisor Magazine.
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