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Hosted by Financial Advisor Coach, Ray Sclafani, "Building The Billion Dollar Business" is the ultimate podcast for financial advisors seeking to elevate their practice. Each episode features deep dives into actionable advice and exclusive interviews with top professionals in the financial services industry. Tune in to unlock your potential and build a successful, enduring financial advisory practice.
Ray Sclafani (00:00.142)
Welcome to Building the Billion Dollar Business, the podcast where we dive deep into the strategies, insights, and stories behind the world's most successful financial advisors and introduce content and actionable ideas to fuel your growth. Together, we'll unlock the methods, tactics, and mindset shifts that set the top 1 % apart from the rest. I'm Ray Sclafani, and I'll be your host.
Have you ever had this thought? Why doesn't my team just do the thing that seems so obvious? I mean, the answer's right there. Well, that thought is a clear signal of something I call the silent leadership paradox. And it's a pattern I see repeatedly with founders and CEOs, not just at mid-tier advisory firms, but among firms that perform at the very highest level.
I'll share an experience I had coaching the leader of a multi-billion dollar team recently. He's an incredibly bright guy, experienced, proven track record, but he was feeling increasingly frustrated with his leadership team. He saw execution was moving slower than expected, ownership lacked clarity, and momentum was falling well short of his own expectations. So as we worked through this problem together, a pattern quickly surfaced. Actions that seemed obvious to him.
did not seem so obvious to his team. You see, they weren't disengaged and they weren't underperforming. They simply lacked direction and clarity, something he was not aware that he was withholding. He knew what to do. He knew what came next. He knew what needed to happen, in what order and who should own what. He assumed his team saw it the same way, but they didn't. It's this precise gap which created this firm's silent leadership paradox.
Ray Sclafani (01:54.656)
expectations and standard existed, leaders on his team simply failed to say them aloud. Silent standards, well, they always slow execution. It's a pattern which tends to especially show up in founder led companies. And why you may ask? Because most founders perform at an exceedingly high level. They're excellent at building strong relationships and advising clients well, and they run strong businesses. As their companies grow, however,
they eventually step into the C-suite to help lead their teams, not just their clients. And one strength shows up consistently. They're able to spot potential in others well before those people see it in themselves. In fact, Robert Diltz writes about this in his book, From Coach to Awakener, which is one of my favorite books. He argues that leaders awaken potential rather than control behavior. And many founders instinctively lead this way. That instinct is usually right.
but the execution can quickly undermine it. The leader already holds the answers he or she sees the connections. They know which projects matter most and in what order they should receive attention and which individuals on the teams are best suited to own them. But instead of just conveying their vision directly, well, they ask questions, they encourage, and then they wait for the teams to figure it out. Inside, however, they're silently thinking, well, if you just do it this
one way, this one thing right now, well, your contribution is going to be enormous. And over time, this silence creates frustration for both parties. The leader believes their team isn't stepping up and the team feels like their leader has failed to clarify expectations. Both perspectives make sense. In fact, Patrick Lencioni has warned leaders about this dynamic for years. In his book, The Advantage, he reminds us that clarity sits at the top of every leader's responsibilities.
Leaders don't achieve leverage through harmony or empowerment theater. They earn it through clarity. And when clarity disappears, teams slow down. Decision stall and accountability ultimately turns personal. The leader believes he's empowering people while the team hesitantly guesses. Andy Grove stated it even more directly in high output management. Output, he says, doesn't come from intent. Output comes from clear,
Ray Sclafani (04:21.442)
well-defined objectives, ownership, and ongoing measurement and adjustment. Leaders create leverage when they define the objective and assign accountability. Your team does not need you to lower the bar. They need you to define the bar. Team members grow when they own real outcomes, when they're empowered to deliver results and hold themselves accountable to a visible scorecard. Execution builds skills and confidence, not the other way around.
In fact, Jim Collins reinforces this in Good to Great. Great leaders, he says, place the right people in the right seats and give them a clear scorecard. But how do you go about overcoming the silent leadership paradox without becoming overly controlling or turning into a micromanager? I mean, who wants that? The following three steps will provide a roadmap and a few guardrails to help you. So think about this first, externalize your thinking.
Pull the execution plan out of your head. Identify the five to eight outcomes that matter the most this quarter. Assign one owner to each outcome and define what done looks like in plain language. Because if you can't define done, then certainly no one else will be able to. You don't need to document everything, but you do need to remove any ambiguity. The second thing is turn roles into charters, not job descriptions.
define a clear scorecard for each team member, as well as a visible scorecard for the organization, and then review it weekly, same day, same time. Public scorecards make accountability fair, because as soon as ownership and accountability become clear, individuals stop guessing and start executing. The third idea here is match your leadership style to the task. Lead directly at the beginning.
State exactly what you see and what you expect then as competence and confidence grow, gradually shift into coach mode. Kim Scott captures this balance well in the book, Radical Candor. Care personally, challenge directly, and remember that silence does not equal kindness. Remember, you cannot unlock potential when people lack clarity about which responsibilities they own, and you cannot scale a company when execution depends
Ray Sclafani (06:45.418)
on what only the founder sees. If someone sits down with your leadership team and asks them what business responsibilities and outcomes they own this quarter, how the success of each will be measured, and what done looks like, if the answer is not categorically a yes, then the issue with your team is an effort or talent. The issue is clarity.
With each episode, we provide a few coaching questions for reflection on today's episode. And today I've got three questions for you. First, identify one thing that seems most obvious to you, maybe not so obvious to a team member or a larger group within your team. What can you share that will make your vision and insight more clear to them? Number two, what would change or improve over the next 90 days if you made expectations more explicit and required your team
to claim more ownership? And third, how will your team more clearly communicated expected outcomes this quarter? If you enjoyed today's episode, please share it with somebody on your team or someone you know needs to hear it. Well, thanks for tuning in and that's a wrap. Until next time, this is Ray Sclafani. Keep building, growing and striving for greatness. Together, we'll redefine what's possible in the world of wealth management. Be sure to check back for our latest episode and article.