Alice Haemmerle: [00:00:00] First thing with an advisor, what you want to really find out was a question that I find very simple, but it’s, what made you decide that now was the time to seek financial advice? That gives you so much information on your client. What made you decide right now, today, on this moment in time to decide to seek financial advice? What’s going on for you? From that, you’re going to find out the motivation of the individual who’s sitting across from you. You’re going to find out one of two things very quickly. One, are they focusing on the pleasure it’s going to give for them or the opportunities that financial advice is going to give them for their financial future, the possibilities for them? Or, are they moving away from pain. So, is that motivation, I’m afraid this is going to happen or I need this now, I must have this now. Those two ... that information right there is going to tell you if you have a very toward motivated client looking at the possibilities of things they’d like to have and love to own and love to purchase, versus a person who’s away from. If you can hear that right from the beginning, you’re going to know the next steps you need to do with that client.
Fraser Jack: [00:01:06] Hello and welcome to the Goals Based Advice podcast, where we have conversations with pioneers of the new world of financial advice. I’m your host Fraser Jack and I want to thank you for tuning in today. I’d also like to thank our supporting partner advice intelligence powering this podcast. Now, I have a confession to make. I love the science of the brain. Neuroplasty, neuro-linguistic program, what makes us tick. So, I’m completely geeking out over bringing you this topic to the Goals Based Advice podcast. In this episode, I chat to Alice Haemmerle who works with human behavior and motivations, high performance athletes, teams and businesses. We deep dive into the human behaviors, how our brain works, why we do the things we do, the language you can use with your clients and what not to use. We spend a lot of time talking about what advisors should be considering during conversations and communication with their clients. So, please join me in geeking out over our chat to Alice kicking off right now. Welcome tot he show Alice.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:02:15] Thank you so much Fraser, pleasure to be here. Thank you.
Fraser Jack: [00:02:20] Pleasure to be here. Now, tell me, where are you at the moment?
Alice Haemmerle: 00:02:21 I am in Singapore. The land of extraordinary vision I have to say this country, impressive.
Fraser Jack: [00:02:28] How’s it going in Singapore?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:02:31] It’s marvelous actually. We’ve been here since May of 2018 and so, six months now and exploring this little teeny red dot it’s called, it’s a red dot, but really seeing the way that they’ve come from a third world to a first world in 50 years, by the vision of the leaders of this country. Very impressive.
Fraser Jack: [00:02:53] Wow. Tell us about you and what you’re doing there.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:02:53] So, I came over, very quickly, all of our girls grew up and they all sprung out as offspring are meant to do, so we have three daughters and so, Thomas, my husband, and I decided to go and work overseas. So, we’re taking this time, we packed up our house and put it into storage and we have four suitcases and two carry-ons and we said, let’s go see the world. My business is completely online training as well as I’d come face to face sometimes [inaudible 00:03:18], but my husband’s an IT consultant and SAP consultant. So, we’ve decided to go explore Asia and then hopefully we’ll head over to Europe for a while before the grand-babies come and even when the grand-babies come, the kids are kind of used to us now doing this. So, we’re flying them all in for Christmas and with their boyfriends and yeah, we’re having a great life, fun, we’re having a lot of fun in exploring.
Fraser Jack: [00:03:43] Fantastic. Now, I first met you about 12 months ago or so now and with a lot of conversations and work that you’re doing with advisors around helping them in the goals based advice space, tell us a little bit about the business and what you do there.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:03:57] So, I work around performance. So, getting individuals, teams, companies, organizations to perform, getting their people to perform. I work around human behavior. So, what makes a human move forward? What makes them move back? What’s their motivation? What demotivates them? How can we get optimization from the individual to be able to actualize the outcomes in their life, within their organization, so, even with sports teams, to make sure that they’re working at full potential, getting that engine finely tuned so they can achieve their outcomes.
Fraser Jack: [00:04:28] Fantastic. During this chat, we’ll probably talk about both the teams as in the advisor teams and also consumer, from a consumer point of view because I think that not being an advisor, you’ll be able to bring both the consumer point of view and also from the business coaching point of view. Fantastic. Now, we might start at the beginning, how did you get into this and where did you come from and obviously you haven’t got an authentic Australian accent going on there.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:04:52] No, but Australia is my home, my home it is, 22 years in Australia, in Sydney, but I’m originally from the United States. So, I’m originally from Washington D.C, the nation’s capital. But my background is actually I’m a musician. So, I’m a classical singer. I got into what I’m doing, I traveled America, Europe, sang in Europe for a long time and I ended up over here for love. My husband is Austrian, we met in Vienna and he ended up getting a contract over here, I ended up following him here and the rest is history. So, 1996 I moved here, to Australia. Anyway, started singing, started performing, started the school of singing, started teaching that the [inaudible 00:05:30] of music, but what I found was that there was a lot of performance anxiety, performance issues. The voice is an instrument that is always telling us the truth. If you’re nervous, the voice gets tight, if you’re scared, the voice gets tight, if you’re excited, the voice is open. But I wasn’t a psychiatrist, or psychologist, I wasn’t able to diagnose what was going on, but I would have crying students, etc, or ... performance anxiety is what happened.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:05:55] I decided to study what’s called neuro-linguistic programming, neuro-linguistic programming, which you’ve also studied Fraser, [inaudible 00:06:01]. I got into that to work with the singers who were having performance issues. At no time did I ever think it would become my career. I learned it to help my students and I did. It helped my students. Eventually behind the piano, got sitting on the sofa, the sofa got busier and then I ended up opening an entire business [inaudible 00:06:23] and worked with Olympic athletes early on. So, beach volleyball, kayaking, for Olympic Games, for the Athens Games and then they’re on about four different games, both winter and summer and then sort of working with businesses. How that [inaudible 00:06:38] was people said, oh, you work with athletes, you must be good working with performance. So, sales teams and then got into companies and had a whole team of [inaudible 00:06:47] working with me and then eventually I became a very focused trainer of NLP, from 2009 to 2014 delivered about 160 days a year of just training, full on, and then I developed my own programs and my own systems and along the way, I’ve developed a program called The Communication Code which is very much what you and I have been working on and with the team at AI, bringing that in which is a behavioral profiling tool that is very, very clear into the motivation and behavior of a person.
Fraser Jack: [00:07:19] Yes, with the communication code, it’s a great piece and I bring it back to the idea that, especially with advising their clients, it’s not always what’s said, what the advisor thinks that’s said in the meeting, it’s actually what the clients remember that actually counts.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:07:34] Well said. Yeah, I think too, looking what the body language is bringing and what’s the past behavior of the individual. I think the thing that came out with the communication code just as a nutshell, it’s looking at who are we becoming in life? Sometimes somebody’s setting a goal in their life that they’re like, why is this not happening for me? For instance, look at advice, financial advice, some people want to get a property for security in their life. Some people want to get multiple properties, not for security, but for the opportunities of all the return that’s going to give them in their life. Very different motivations and different financial advice you’re going to be giving to both people. Some people want to get their first property so that they can build a family. Some people are very educated on the financial [inaudible 00:08:21], but they want to get something unique, something that’s going to give them the cutting edge of something different so that they get advice that nobody else is giving them. So, it’s being able to understand what is that client looking for? Versus a one size fits all, because a one size fits all is not a human, we are not one size fits all. There are patterns that we do, but not every human is alike.
Fraser Jack: [00:08:44] Thank you. You’ve also done a lot of work with financial services businesses here in Australia.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:08:48] Yes. So, I worked with a very large financial services business up in Queensland for a long time and also [inaudible 00:08:55] meeting Jackie. So, it all came to be. The other thing [inaudible 00:08:59] financial services is that at the core of why people work, this is why I wanted financial services was, people work, most people, to earn money, but then they don’t know what to do with their money. So, where is it going to go? Especially young people, well, not young people, people gen x also don’t know what to do with their money. So, savings accounts, understand what savings is. The amount of debt that Australian have is phenomenal. I’m sure your financial advisors know this. But what people don’t understand often is saving and how to compound their money.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:09:29] So, there’s a lot of misunderstanding about what money is or what money can do and what investments can do and yeah, and people get very burnt out, they work, work, work, thinking they’re going to have this egg at the end of their life and what’s the average Australian living on in retirement? $65,000 a year. That’s not a planning for your future. You’re not going to last long on ... the quality of your life may not be there if you’re not set up very well by the time retirement age happens. So, I just found this need to start work with advisors because it was a ... the need for the health of the nation, if you want to call it.
Fraser Jack: [00:10:02] So, when you sit down with the advisor and you’re sort of starting a process around how you can help them, how do you chunk that down into small pieces?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:10:12] First thing with an advisor, what you want to really find out was a question that I find very simple but it’s what made you decide that now was the time to seek financial advice? That gives you so much information on your client. What made you decide right now, today, on this moment in time to decide to seek financial advice? What’s going on for you? From that, you’re going to find out the motivation of the individual who’s sitting across from you. You’re going to find out one of two things very quickly. One, are they focusing on the pleasure it’s going to give for them or the opportunities that financial advice is going to give them for their financial future, the possibilities for them? Or, are they moving away from pain. So, is that motivation, I’m afraid this is going to happen or I need this now, I must have this now. Those two ... that information right there is going to tell you if you have a very toward motivated client looking at the possibilities of things they’d like to have and love to own and love to purchase, versus a person who’s away from. If you can hear that right from the beginning, you’re going to know the next steps you need to do with that client.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:11:11] For instance, if you have a very strong toward motivated person, and you start to tell him about all the problems ahead, they’re going to be demotivated. They kind of were so excited and now they’re not anymore. It’s because it became too heavy and hard. So, what you always want to do with that, obviously with that client, is you always want to be focusing on the end in mind, getting that vision very clear, but then also working backwards to how they get there, versus working forwards. We call that that Merlin Method. Merlin the magician from King Arthur’s time who always knew King Arthur would be king because he came from the future and worked backwards. So, those toward motivated people need to be shown, this is what you’re going to get and let’s work our way backward how we’re going to get there, till we get to now, versus, you’re away from, just the opposite. Give them the first steps so they build trust with you and trust that they can do it. The first thing we’re going to do is this, the second thing we’re going to do, yes, this is your goal, we’ll set those goals, but let’s get those first steps so you feel that you can do it and that’s possible. Makes a very big difference.
Fraser Jack: [00:12:11] So, thinking about that towards and away from motivation, and techniques around that, what are some of the things that, towards motivation, we want to sort of push people to be able to look forward to something. But sometimes people are in that negative state where they’re moving away from something. So, what are some of the tips and techniques that you can give in that space?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:12:29] Yeah. So, always reminding them what the goal is. So, there’s a part of our brain that’s called the reticular activation system, known as the RAS, often people [inaudible 00:12:37] activation system is really why we write goals. Goals, our brain is always setting goals, always focusing on goals, always achieving goals, whether it’s brushing our teeth or driving a car from location to location or getting dressed. So, those are little micro goals, but the moment you sit down and you write down a goal, what you’re doing is you’re activating that reticular activation system, that goal focusing part of our brain that gets all of our senses, our visual, our sound, our auditory, our [inaudible 00:13:04] touch, our smell and our taste, that gets it all activated.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:13:09] The reason why goals are so important is because when you don’t set goals, you don’t reprogram your reticular activation system. Your reticular activation system will always focus on what is important to you and it seeks familiarity. This is the other thing about the brain. Your brain does not seek difference from the beginning, it always seeks what’s the same, and then it will look for what’s different. It’s kind of like you go to eat at a new restaurant, what’s familiar on the menu before you go, what’s a truffle? Oh, it’s like a mushroom. Oh, it’s like a mushroom. Okay. So, until you can recognize. So, that’s why we must set goals because goals reset or refocus the reticular activation system.
Fraser Jack: [00:13:53] So, it’s a bit like when you want to buy a car or you start keeping an eye out for the particular cars, and then all of a sudden you see them everywhere?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:14:00] Exactly. You sort of see them everywhere. An example I like to give is, I don’t know if you’ve ever gone to the zoo, Fraser, have you gone to the zoo recently?
Fraser Jack: [00:14:07] Not recently, but have definitely been there.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:14:09] Okay. So, you go to a zoo and all the animals are there, right? It’s easy to see the big animals because they’re right in front of you. It’s when you go look at the little reptiles and the little insects. So, you’re looking in there. I was at the zoo the other day with a friend. I was like, okay, there’s a green frog in here, it’s an amazing green frog and it’s this little. It’s a little green frog. So, she and I are looking inside the box and we’re like, it’s got to be in here and I’m so excited to show her [inaudible 00:14:31], it’s so beautiful, but in my mind it was a little green frog. I said to her, okay, just step back. I’m annoyed right now, which is what people do with goals, they can’t find it, doesn’t happen, so they step back and they give up. I said, walk away for a moment, I’m going to find this green frog. I started to look and I said, maybe it’s not little, maybe it’s big. There it was, this massive green frog looking right at me under a leaf. I’m like, it had been there all along, yet, that’s your reticular activation system.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:14:58] If you’re focusing on something not being there, you will delete all the things that are there. If you focus on ... so, the more clear we can get in our goals, the more specific we can get with our goals, it’s a honing device of our mind, our visual, our auditory that [inaudible 00:15:14] focus and hone in on on the outcome. That’s why athletes ... if you ever work with ... I mean, working with athletes and sports teams, they’re working on the percentages. They know that they improve 001% of that kick of the way that they’re angling at, they can win a game. If they work on that offensive line, improving that percent ... athletes, if they know if they change the glucose intake or the water intake, that’s going to make a difference on them winning or not winning. So, [inaudible 00:15:41] fine tuning and that’s why an advisor does, fine tunes the detail to make sure you get to that outcome, so that they know what percentages to focus on. That’s their job to know the detail. Your job is to say, this is what I’m looking for, this is currently what I’ve got, what do I need to get to my goal? And then the advisor will give you the advice on, well, this is the best interest rate here and they’re the ones who go and find the ingredients with the detail that you need.
Fraser Jack: [00:16:09] Yeah. So, we always say, you get what you focus on.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:16:12] Exactly. You get what you focus on.
Fraser Jack: [00:16:15] That also works for people in a negative state of mind too doesn’t it?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:16:20] Yeah, your brain is not just starting going ... if you focus on the things you don’t want to have happen, you start to see it. I don’t want that to [inaudible 00:16:28] happening and so, what you’re focusing on is it happening. So, it’s a bit like focusing, you and I have often discussed this, blue tree principal. Don’t think about a blue tree and you have to think about blue tree to not think about the blue tree. So, don’t think about being in debt, your brain is thinking about debt. Think about savings, your brain is going to think about savings. So, you want to be able to language in your conversations with your advisor, begin to language to your advisor the things that you’re looking for versus the things you want to avoid, because then you’re beginning now ... you’re languaging your future of what you want to have in your future.
Fraser Jack: [00:17:01] So, for the advisor, it’s around changing the conversation from not doing something to doing the opposite?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:17:08] Exactly. So, instead of saying, don’t spend money on this, you’re telling the person what to spend money on. Begin to save money or spend money on this and save money for this. Very different language from stop spending money, because they’re going to spend money on things or stop wasting money, they’re going to continue wasting money. Tell them always what you want to do. Telling a child, don’t throw the ball in the house, throw the ball outside.
Fraser Jack: [00:17:36] For advisors wanting to help their clients and coach their clients, this is really important, isn’t it?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:17:39] It’s vital. How you’re languaging, how you’re communicating to your client is giving their mind what to focus on with you and it’s building trust that you can see the picture that they’re looking for in their mind, but also, are you the advisor that believes they can get it? Can you language it with your client? Because also as an advisor, if you’re not able to language results with your client, your results with your client will be less than 100%. You’ll be wondering, why am I not achieving this with my clients? So, it goes both ways, how you’re languaging it and how your clients are languaging it.
Fraser Jack: [00:18:13] So, go back to that first question that you asked, as an advisor asking the client, are there any follow up questions to that? If you don’t quite work out whether they’re towards or away from motivation straight away?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:18:25] Right, then the next question you could ask is what have you done thus far with regarding your finances? Tell me what’s been your journey so far? Where are you at? How much do you know? What don’t you know? What’s worked? What has not yet worked for you? That’ll give you an idea firstly of their education, how much they know about finance, because education is the key and part of the financial ... if we look at advice, it’s education. You’ve got to educate your clients so they firstly, they understand what you’re talking about, but they also then can make sound decisions. So, education. Offering your clients to come into very uneducated, illiterate of language [inaudible 00:19:01]. In essence, I’ll say the word ignorant but not ignorant in a negative way, they just don’t know that they don’t know, so they’re ignoring what’s going on.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:19:08] So, firstly, [inaudible 00:19:10] what have they done and so, how educated are they? What have they done that’s worked for them? That’s also education. So, how come it’s worked for them? What has worked for them? Have they been able to save for a deposit for a house? That’s already showing you evidence that they know how to budget, they know how to say no to things, they know how to say yes to things and if they’ve never saved, then you’re going, okay, they don’t know how to say no to purchases, they may be a compulsive shopper that they feel they need lots of things, but they may not use all the things. So, then we understand how they value money and they value ... how they value money, what money means to them, which leads us into what [inaudible 00:19:51] if we have a person who does buy lots of things but they never use them, that’s a hoarder mentality, they hoard lots of things. So, one of the things the advisor would then know is, okay, what can we start having them use inside their home that does start to value, for instance, they buy lovely wine glasses but they never use the wine glasses, time to use the wine glasses. Because otherwise [inaudible 00:20:15] hoard the advice, they can gather lots of advice, but do nothing with the advice they’re given.
Fraser Jack: [00:20:20] So, the hoarder mentality. What are the other groups that you ...
Alice Haemmerle: [00:20:24] So, the hoarder mentality ... okay, that’s come from world war two, so the time of the depression, all this hoarding. Hoarding because there was never enough, so they need to have everything and having things is part of never having the lack again. There’s also the scarcity mentality that there is not enough. They always run out of money there’s not enough time, not enough money, not enough resources, not enough energy, scarcity. So, they run out of fuel regularly, literally. There’s also the she’ll be right mate, that the [inaudible 00:20:58], oh, everything will be fine, I’ll just do that law of attraction and everything’s going to be just fine. I’ll just focus on what I want but do nothing, take no action. Like that book the secret. The secret [inaudible 00:21:11]. Talks about quantum psychics completely, but it never talks about now get moving. Now you must take action. Yes, focus, but don’t sit there and go, I’m just going to sit on my chair and hope it all happens. No. You must move. So, yes, focus on what you want, abundance mentality, but now, get going. You’ve got to get disciplined and or start taking massive action to get the outcome. So, those are pretty much the ones I see on a regular basis and then of course the other is the non-dreamer at all, person who has no ambition, no idea at all. They let other people take care of them. So, they’re completely co-dependent.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:21:53] Others will take care of me. The government will take care of me. My family will take care of me. My partner will take care of me. I don’t want to know anything about finances at all. That’s just not my thing. This is not my thing. So, it’s not your thing. That thing will not be with you one day. Somebody will be taking care of that thing. That goes across for men and women. If you’ve got somebody taking care of your finances, let’s say they pass on or there’s a divorce and you don’t know how to manage that money, or you win a lottery ticket, you’ve got to understand what money is. It’s energy, it’s powerful but you’ve got to understand how it works.
Fraser Jack: [00:22:31] Yep. Now, I wanted to open up the conversation around the internal representation system. Do you want to just explain that from the top level?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:22:41] Okay. Top level. Fundamentally, we are a nervous system as a human that takes in information through our sensory systems, our visual, our sound, touch, tactile touch, smells and also taste. So, the five senses are taking in hundreds of millions of bits of information. Okay? So, that gets deleted and then deleted. So, we don’t take in all the visual, we don’t take in all the things we’re seeing, we don’t take all the things we’re hearing. Lots of deletion. Majority deletion. Then it gets distorted into sound. Sound is distortion. The moment I can understand your words, I’ve taken a sound wave, it’s a distortion, but the moment I can understand what it is, now I can generalize that sound into a word that I understand. So, your brain would delete, distort and then generalize the information to when I get an internal representation which we might call a picture in our mind or a memory, a bit like a folder in a ... you go onto your folders on your drive and you type in a client’s name, you’ll get ... their folders will come up and all this information comes up.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:23:48] So, the brain will do the same thing. It literally is a neural pathway that lights up in your brain with a lot of information and in that information, it maybe pictures that could be a moving picture or still picture, words that are associated to that memory, feelings that are associated to that memory and the moment that feeling is associated, your body then flushes with hormones and those hormones ... because [inaudible 00:24:11] hormones and also serotonin in the gut. Their body is in flush with the hormones that go through that neural pathway which is going through what’s called neurotransmitter chemical. You literally have a chemical reaction to that memory and that gives us a state of emotional state and that makes our physiology shift. So, if we get excited about something, you will see a physiological shift with someone. You’ll see their shoulders back, their eyes will get all bright and then you’ll see ... then you’ll notice a behavior of them ... some form of movement toward. The body will start to move toward contrast that when they’re afraid of something, cortisol is pumping through the body versus testosterone and adrenaline with excitement, so cortisol pumping through the body, body goes into a flight or freeze mechanism, eyes get glazed-over, that’s a state change right there and physiology of course, the body doesn’t move at all.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:25:07] The behavior is, I’m not going to take any action. All of this happens because of the sensor experience that internal representation that maybe in the past it’s happened to you, you have literally been frozen. Your accounts have been frozen, maybe you went bankrupt and it was complete negative emotional state of emotions. I don’t want to have that happen again. So, you don’t take any movement to say how can I make sure that that never happens again and how can I become wealthy? How can I make sure that I’m financially ... So, again, all those states are coming from an internal representation of an experience that’s happened to you that you’ve given meaning to which is in that internal representation.
Fraser Jack: [00:25:46] So, when clients are sitting in front of you, generally they have a stronger way of learning or a stronger way of representing that information. Obviously the first thing was to delete the amount of information and people obviously remember in different ways. Do you want to talk about those main systems that people remember?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:26:07] Yeah. So, remembering is how can I recall this information so it’s useful. So, school [inaudible 00:26:14] learning from writing down, which is the most un-useful way of memorizing because unless you get a picture in your mind or your body has physically got it in the muscle memory, writing it down, I’ve got to sit there and get some imagination going with my words. So, that’s the least effective way of memorizing. The most effective way of memorizing is physically doing something. That’s what we’ve done from ... as a baby we grab things. If you look at a little baby how they learn, they learn in the kinesthetic touch. You touch it, the baby touches the button, yeah? Eventually they touch, touch, touch until the toy opens up. So, the fastest way of learning is kinesthetically. Fastest way. Above all things, because [inaudible 00:26:54]. School, unfortunately, it has very little tactile so the kids go into sport or they go into some music and they move [inaudible 00:27:00] and that’s why you have your kinesthetic kids disassociating, removing themselves from school and becoming quite agitated.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:27:08] So, there’s a kinesthetic learner. The second learner, very strong of course is the visual learner. They see it and then they see it and that becomes an image of what it looks like and then they replicate it what they’re seeing. That’s a very, very quick memory recalling and a third way of learning is through words. Saying it again how the person said it. Musicians do this. They replicate sound. They hear a voice make ... or actors. A very strong auditory sense. They can replicate the way things sound or the words someone uses. So, as an advisor, the most effective way for an advisor firstly is to tap in I believe is the visual first off.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:27:48] Visually getting a picture, mapping it out on pieces of paper, so the client can start to see how the process works. The least effective is writing a bunch of words down, especially lots of numbers because many people have a negative association to math. They in some way or another, they may have thought, I’m not good at maths, they may not even know how to use a calculator well. So, you’re just sitting there talking all these percentages and immediately for that [inaudible 00:28:17] they’re hearing alien talk and I don’t understand what you’re talking about. So, that’s when you get your blank piece of paper out and some colored pencils and start to visually map it out what it looks like and so they go, oh, it’s like LEGO pieces. Oh, it looks like ... so, you visually [inaudible 00:28:38] I see it now and they’ll say, oh, I see it now, oh, it’s clear.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:28:42] Or you literally get them kinesthetically walking through it. Physically, they go find the house, they walk through the house, they [inaudible 00:28:51] feel it, that gets them excited about purchasing that house one day. So, you can get them ... have them drive the car they want to drive one day. That’s gonna be for their savings. Go to any retail or car dealership and drive a car, ask for a test drive, to say, do I really want this car and if you can kinesthetically connect to it, you will do everything to get that car.
Fraser Jack: [00:29:12] So, such a small percentage of the population actually learn by reading words if you like, or an [inaudible 00:29:19], is it?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:29:22] It’s called auditory digital and [inaudible 00:29:24] called auditory AD. The reason ... if you have a very small percentage and even a person who learns by AD is still using their visual auditory or a kinesthetic ... because AD is not a sense. AD is how knowledge is passed on. So, basically, words are written so that knowledge can be passed on from person to person. It was a language of replication. So, if we look at it from a, let’s take a chef for an example. A chef is only as good as his ability for his recipes to be passed onto another chef or another member of his team. So, whenever you watch a kitchen, very visual, lots of gustatory, lots of smells, but they’re very, very analytical, so that the processes are replicable. So, that’s the AD component. An artist is incredibly AD because their brush strokes, they know how to make ... and they know how to mix the paints. That’s very AD. They’ll know exactly what color that ultramarine blue is with the sepia and they’ll know, oh, I mixed that and I’m going to get this color at this ... that’s a very AD component of visual.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:30:24] With finances, because finances are numbers and numbers into themselves are AD. They’re AD. If we can take a number and we can make it ... if you look at a child and they want to know four plus one, the fastest way to teach a child four plus one is put four apples in front of them and add another apple and teach them an apple is one and they count each apple until they get to five. That’s the fastest way for a child to learn four plus one, versus the symbol four plus one, which has no value, why does that matter for ... but once I see four plus one in apples, you’re like, oh, I can buy five apples. So, that’s a visual component, kinesthetic component to bring into the AD. That make sense?
Fraser Jack: [00:31:06] It does. So, there’s obviously three main tenses here and communication codes if you like. Those clients and advisors sitting in front of their clients, sitting across from a couple of clients, they’re generally going to be one of three areas, aren’t they?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:31:21] Yeah. So, you’ll see ... when you have, for instance, a visual person walking in, you’ll notice them right away. They’ll be wearing brand clothes. They will have the handbag, the wallet, the nice watch. The makeup will be done, they will be walking in very quickly and speak even faster than I’m speaking now. So, they’ll speak very, very quickly and they want you to show ... they’ll say things, show me what you’ve got. Show me the different loans, show me the ways that I can get my outcome and they’ll come with pictures even on their phone of what they’re looking for. So, you do want to show them what they’re going to need. You’re auditories will come in and they’re looking for something that will express who they are. They’ll say, can you tell me a little bit about what you do, they want to connect with you verbally, they want to connect with you, express their personality with you.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:32:10] So, an auditory doesn’t necessarily show themselves with clothes except the clothes are expressive, so they wear an outfit how they want to express themselves on the day. Like Lady Gaga. Lady Gaga total auditory, lots of visual, but she wears clothes to express her voice on that moment. Okay, so expressive. The kinesthetic will come in and their clothes will be more relaxed, they’re for function, they’re for comfort, they’ll come in a bit more slowly, they will only connect with you when you touch them, when you touch them. I mean literally touch them. You can hand them a pen and they take the pen from you, that’s the touch. So, there’s some form of you hand them a cup of water, that is a way that they feel, oh, you’re taking care of me. So, there’s some touch of connection for that kinesthetic. If they can’t feel you, they will not connect with you, they will not trust you, they will not engage with you, that kinesthetic touch.
Fraser Jack: [00:33:15] The terminology with the kinesthetic person is very much around the feel of something isn’t it? Or the grounding.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:33:16] The grounding. Exactly. So, they’ll say, I feel like you get me. They will say, I feel that you’re real, that you’re the real thing. They’ll connect with you. You’ll feel a connection from them. Now, the contrast to that is a person who ... [inaudible 00:33:37] high auditory digital person, who really is a [inaudible 00:33:40] who has had to disassociate. So, an AD, because no one is really AD, what they are is a disassociated kinesthetic, and what that simply means is they’re a person who, something has happened in their life, they could have some form of autism or Asperger’s, which is also a way for the nervous system, it hasn’t yet learned the connection. But a person is highly AD, and I put that in quotes, is very connected to people they love.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:34:06] So, they will ... when they have a child or they have a partner, they’ll let that person touch them all the time, because they trust that person. So, when you meet that analytical personality, what they’re doing is they’re stepping back and they say, show me what you know. Can I trust myself with you? Do you have your knowledge? Are you trustworthy? I’m not going to put my nervous system anywhere near you until you prove who you are to me, and then I will come closer to you. So, they very much are functioning from a, I’ll say from a reptilian of flight freeze, but when they come to fight, it’s knowledge. They will fight you on what you know to make sure you know what you know. So, you better know your features and you better know your stuff with an AD, because they’ve done more research than you have. They’ll know if you’re BSing them very clearly, because they’ve done the research before. Their Google is their head. They’re a Google Translator machine.
Fraser Jack: [00:35:05] So, this really dives deep into the communication code [inaudible 00:35:09] advisors can use with their client in how they express or how they communicate with their client in these three areas.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:35:16] Yeah. And then the communication code, what I’ve done is I’ve taken those three areas and I brought them [inaudible 00:35:21] into the communication code which actually there are four areas of the communication code. Four different what I call archetypes and the archetypes are really individual personality characterizations and each of us ... if you watch a movie for example, Fraser, there’s a ... if you watch a movie like say Star Wars or Matrix, there’s a hero, there’s a villain, there’s some characters in there that help the hero get to their goal. So, if we look at actualization of an outcome, each of us has in us different characters that we need. For example, some people are very strong dreamers. They have an idea of what they’d like to achieve and they dream. They dream and dream and dream, but the dream can die with them if they never have ... they never get to the work of doing the actualization, but once they learn how to do something very well, they become magicians and eventually that magician can become an artist, but the artist is only an artist once they know how to do the art form very, very well. So, they’ve created magic over and over again.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:36:21] So, they’ve worked very, very strongly on the art form. So, that’s one set of archetypes, the dreamer, magician and artist. That person is continually thinking what if, what if, what if, but they’re very chaotic. They can be very chaotic. They can cause lots of problems. So, you might have a dreamer come into you as an advisor, but they’ve not achieved anything. That person is gonna need a lot of focused attention and they might have a partner who said, but how are we gonna make this happen honey? Because that person, in their partnership, might be what’s called a warrior. They see all the work they need to get done, they work, work, work, work, work, they’ll fight for it, but they may burn out. But, if those two can work in tandem, man, they can create amazing things that warrior.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:37:09] So, that contrast of those two. That being said, so, you’ll get the dreamers. Most of the time though, I’ll say for advisors, the dreamers aren’t going to be walking in as much. The person who will be walking in, I think more often is a person who wants to take care of their family. So, they want to make sure there’s money left for their family, they want to make sure they’ve got a nest egg so that nobody needs to take care of them in that regard, but they have the needs of taking care of others, they want to leave money for others, so they’re the carer, that healer energy. So, they want to make sure that everyone’s taken care of. So, you’ll get that person coming in. So, they’ll make sure that after they passed on, the money continues. That’s that energy. For the needs of others.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:37:53] Another person who will come in is what I call that teacher archetype, that teacher, that student, they love learning about finance. Many advisers sit in this who love educating, advising, gathering more knowledge and you will look for the strategy and the system that will be most useful for what that client needs. That’s why AI is just fabulous, because AI is very much, here’s a system, but this system is holistic, it’s not a one size ... it is a holistic system. It’s looking at the individual, it’s looking at all of what’s happening in the marketplace and integrating this into a holistic system that is great for those people who want to provide the best advice to their client. It’s a magical system. So, that system ... that’s a student teacher and there’s always a student, teacher who loves teaching and sharing knowledge, will always keep learning, lifelong learning.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:38:48] The fourth archetype within the communication code is the archetype of the warrior, but before they’re a warrior, they’re often a servant or a slave. So, they work very, very hard. They called it golden handcuffs sometimes in the corporate world, they’re making good money, but they’re a slave to their business. But what they really need is discipline. So, they get self-discipline [inaudible 00:39:06] to warrior until one day, they have a kingdom and they are literally ... they’ve got a kingdom, they have a lot of territory, they own lots of properties, they own lots of shares, they have riches to show. What their fear is, is that someone’s going to take it from them. So, they want to get proper tax advice, etc, etc. That’s that they literally have a territory that they want to protect which is very different from the person who’s the carer, they’re not looking, they want to protect their people, whereas the warrior, the king, queen want to protect what they’ve amassed of their fortune. So, that’s all inside of AI that communication code information. We can find it very quickly [inaudible 00:39:44] that person any one of those four archetypes. The visual auditory kinesthetic sit in any one of those as well.
Fraser Jack: [00:39:52] So, really there’s ... we call service packages as in advisers will set up certain services that they want to provide to their clients but you can really get into those service packages depending on those archetypes because there’ll be different amounts of work required for each person.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:40:08] Exactly. So, the AI has been designed with each of those archetypes in mind. So, the question in the behavioral profiling that happens early on really gives us the certain questions and immediately we know where they are in the archetype, therefore you move it into that archetype, because then they’re actualizing who they want to become. It’s no good in working with a person who has no desire to amass a fortune. If they are a strong teacher. That’s not their driving force. Their driving force is not have a mass fortune, but what the driving force is to make sure their kids are educated in how to compound money, how to save money, how to ... educating their family, education, that’s the Warren Buffetts of the world. Yes he has a fortune, but ultimately Warren Buffett has earned the education. He’s a thinker. He’s a teacher. Remember, he didn’t give his money to his children until they learned how to make it happen for themselves. So, he’s very much that teacher archetype.
Fraser Jack: [00:41:07] Great. Now, what I [inaudible 00:41:08] you about goals and the idea of setting goals and using timelines and those sorts of things to set goals in the future, how can advisors go about this process?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:41:17] Yeah, okay, good. So, one of the things to understand about people, some people see very much out into the future, they could see years and years and other people can only see a day ahead. So, you need to know what you’ve got in front of you. Okay? So ... and again, this is conditioning based on culture. Australia as a culture does not think that far in the future. You only have to look at the politics. Okay? I’m in Singapore. They are still working on their whole vision of where the country is going. They started a 50-year vision 50 years ago and they’re still implementing it. So is China. Americans as well, very short-term. You’ve got a four-year term, but yet there’s a two-year term in between and we can see all that mess right now. That being said, if you have short-term vision, you will make short-term plans and you’re seeking short-term gain. What can I get right now in the short term?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:42:03] That is causing problems for finance and health and [inaudible 00:42:06] well-being because we’re ... we can look at the planet short-term versus long-term. The moment though you’re with your clients can start to set long term, but not too far out, not 30 years out, maybe touch on it like where do you want to be when you’re 60, 80 years old. Touch on it. Imagine it, then you’ve got to come all the way back to, okay, what do we need to do right now in the short term to make sure you get to that long term? However, some people have been conditioned ... again, you’ve got to know who your client is. If you have a person coming from Asia who’s been raised in, let’s [inaudible 00:42:39] example China, that’s long term. They’ve been conditioned to long term thinking. So, you would need to focus long-term for them. That short term, sure, I’ll take care of that, but I’m going to continually thinking of what am I leaving for my children? That’s a long term vision.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:42:54] What am I leaving in the future? So, that’s being able to, what we call pace, be like understanding pacing your client in front of you. So, if you have a person who is short-term, give them short-term wins, but you as a financial adviser need to see the long-term. You need to see the long-term. It’s a marathon. Finances are a marathon. It’s not a short sprint. It’s a marathon. So, they may not know even how to run a marathon. They might be only a hundred meter sprinter, but you’re conditioning them to be able to run for the rest of their life long term, long term marathon. Is that making sense?
Fraser Jack: [00:43:31] Yeah, it certainly is. I like the word you use there when you said imagine the future. Can we talk a little bit about that imagination?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:43:39] Yes, imagination. So, your brain has an ability to ... this is the amazing thing about humans. We have a possibility of always dreaming about what’s possible, imagining if something could happen. The great thing about your brain and it does it all day long is it imagines tomorrow, imagines what you’re going to have for lunch and in doing that, it always sees yourself having that outcome and that’s called a disassociation. So, you can see yourself having an outcome, seeing yourself having dinner, see yourself going on the holiday. Now, the great thing about that imagination and the brain’s capacity to do that, is if you see yourself having a meal in the future, there is no emotional connection to that meal yet. So, your brain will not have any emotional drive to it yet. Your brain ... go ahead.
Fraser Jack: [00:44:30] I was just going to say then, I’ll just separate that. So, when you say see yourself, what you’re saying is, if you like watching a movie of you in the future, it’s not you actually experiencing that, it’s actually you seeing yourself as a person, like you’re watching a movie of yourself?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:44:47] Like you’re watching a movie of yourself or you’re watching yourself playing the game on the field. You’re watching yourself on the TV screen. Yep? In doing that, you can create an incredible imagination of what your future can be. Let’s be very clear. That’s why we like watching movies and watching television and watching our phones because we’re continually observing what’s possible. That is what we call in the brain, it’s a disassociation. Now, your brain disassociates and whenever it disassociates, your brain will then start to seek knowledge, information, resources, that it needs to be able to how do I get that? So, that ability to disassociate, like for example, you want to learn how to ... you want to go ... you go to a financial advisor, you see yourself with the financial advisor, the financial advisor has information that you need that you don’t yet have, those are resources, right? Resources that you’re gonna bring.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:45:41] So, you see yourself going to the financial advisor, then you’re in front of the financial advisor. That’s association. I’m in front of the financial advisor and the more associated, the more I can feel that financial advisor, I can connect with that financial advisor, the more that financial advisor can connect me to my goals and make me feel excited or that my goal is possible. Also, give me some pain, if I don’t take some action around that goal, so give me a bit of pain so I take some action. That’s association. Then my financial advisor then can set some goals that imagines that I can see myself with that goal, again, I set my goal vision, I set my outcomes. Okay, so, there is some pain associated to getting this goal, but I know my goal is possible. [inaudible 00:46:25] disassociation. So, I can see myself getting the goal yet, the reality is always associated where my body is having a sensory experience, that’s association.
Fraser Jack: [00:46:37] So, advisors can really use that technique when they’re explaining the future and whether they think something’s going to be too emotional to talk about in the associated frame, they can talk about it in a disassociated frame?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:46:52] Absolutely. One of the one ways that you can really help your clients, and I call it kind of an anxiety bust or fear bust. How to do it very quickly, is we talked early on Frazer about how people focus on what they desire, what they don’t want. So, one of the ways that you can start to use a very successful strategy is have your client think about 15 minutes after successful completion of their goal. That’s a disassociative technique. it’s seeing themselves 15 minutes after successful completion and the key is successful completion, not completion, successful completion, and going to 15 minutes afterwards is evidence that it has been successful within time and the person then goes, wow, it’s possible. Example is this. I use it with my kids all the time when they’re taking exams. Go 15 minutes after successful completion of your exam and how does it feel? They’re like, I feel great. Is there any fear? No, because I’ve been successful, right?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:47:51] And then we say, how did you get there? How did you get there? Then we work our way backward. Well, how did you prepare? What did you do in your studies to make sure you are 15 minutes after successful completion? So, we do the same with our clients. 15 minutes after successful completion, you own your own home. You’ve signed the contract. 15 minutes you’re driving home having signed the contract for your own home and not only that, you know you have the money to pay for that home. You’re not in massive debt. You feel good about it. The body feels good about that successful completion. You can even go to 15 minutes after successful completion of your own death. I know it sounds morbid here, but 15 minutes after successful completion and you can look at all your finances that you left behind for your family and there is no debt within your family. Your family has been well taken care of and you literally can pass peacefully 15 minutes after how was that all set up and you do your financial planning that way. So, 15 minutes after successful completion is a time based therapy of getting rid of anxiety. Anxiety is fear of your future happening the way you don’t want it to happen. So, training the brain differently.
Fraser Jack: [00:49:03] Yeah, I use that anxiety buster whenever I’m doing some public speaking and I just imagine the 15 minutes after the end of the talk and it was well received and everybody was coming up to me and saying how great it was. So, [inaudible 00:49:15] anxiety buster.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:49:17] Yeah, anxiety buster. Your planning is completely different then, because you’re planning on success versus planning on something not working out.
Fraser Jack: [00:49:26] Yeah. Now, we touched on during the conversation about the motivation around getting clients to be motivated towards and you mentioned sort of that away from and often you can use a combination of both can’t you?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:49:40] Absolutely. So, let’s be clear. Some people are highly toward motivated people, some people are highly away from. That being said, what you’ll find is [inaudible 00:49:50] or away with toward. Understand, motivation is simply emotions. All motivation is driven by emotional factors. Emotion drives all movements. So, emotions, but in order for emotion to happen, our body needs to be releasing chemicals. We need testosterone to move. We need adrenaline to move. We need, oh my gosh, if you have serotonin which is our happy hormone, we’re enjoying the movement. If we have dopamine, oh my god, we are over the moon to moving. That’s the most powerful hormone of all, that’s our ecstatic pill, but if we have cortisol inside that mix, cortisol is our moving away from hormone and it creates stress in the body, cortisol.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:50:33] So, we need to be aware, when we’ve got our client, of the concoction of hormones. So, to have a toward motivated person, to get them continually, because the toward motivated person is avoiding pain, they don’t want the pain of it. So, what we do is this. This is your goal and when you do this, you’re going to get this goal. If you don’t do this, this goal is gone. Oh my gosh, okay, so I need to do that. Yes. Always keep that goal front of mine for them. If you start to talk about all the things that can go wrong, the goal gets dimmer and dimmer and smaller and smaller and they get completely demoted and so, what’s the point? It’s never gonna happen anyway. So, they stop dreaming. So, we want to do with our toward motivated, tell them what they need to do. Give them the goal in front first then tell them the things they need to do to get that goal.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:51:23] So, we need to start getting a budget in place so that you can get that house and what we’re gonna do is we’re going to set up some different savings plans or different whatever, [inaudible 00:51:35], oh, but I don’t know how. That’s all right, I’m going to show you how. In fact, we’re going to set it up so you don’t have to think about it anymore, but even setting it up is going to be painful for them. What you need to give them, [inaudible 00:51:45] going to be work involved to get that goal. You’re away from ... go ahead.
Fraser Jack: [00:51:50] So, asking them the two questions in what’s important to them about achieving that goal and then what’s important to them about not achieving that goal?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:51:57] Exactly. So, what will happen if they don’t get that goal? What’s the pain associated? Then working with those two. It’s a bit like a rubber band. You’ve got to just know how much pain to give them so they still stay motivated, still as pleasurable, but along the way, just so we’re clear, a person who is highly motivated toward pleasure often is lacking some self motivation. They’re used to other people often doing things for them. So, we do need to start to train them and teach them how to self initiate their goals, versus waiting for somebody else to applaud for them or to give them positive feedback on how they’re going, they’re gonna need that along the way, like you’re doing really great. Thank you so much, that’ll keep them moving. I need that from you. Okay great. Thank you for saying that to me. So, giving them some reward for doing something that was an uncomfortable task, because it’s uncomfortable for them to do something that is uncomfortable, but we reward them for doing that uncomfortable until that uncomfortable becomes comfortable for them. Oh yeah, I didn’t like doing that but now, I’m okay with it. That still keeps them toward.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:53:08] The contrast of that is you’re an away from person, who is always moving away from pain. They don’t want pain, so they’ll come to you when their back’s against the wall. That’s not a great place for them. You don’t want them to wait till the end because often, that person has waited inside their head, so that’s a highly often internally driven person, they’re gonna figure out all by themselves, but then they don’t figure it out, so everything comes crumbling down around them or they blame everybody, but they take no responsibility. So, basically, what’s happening with that person, we never want them to be in that position ever again, where they lose everything, where they’ve not set themselves up if something goes wrong financially that they haven’t lost all their money. That’s what a prenup is all about. A prenup is for those toward motivated people.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:53:59] [inaudible 00:53:59] they set themselves up, but there are also, for those away from motivated people, who make sure that they’ve got ... they don’t have ... they’re not going to lose everything. So, what you do with your away from people, you tell them everything they can lose. You make it worse. If you don’t do this and you don’t do that and this is the worst-case scenario and they’re going, oh my gosh. They’re probably saying some other words. I don’t want that. Oh my god, I need to go to the toilet, I feel sick. So, you don’t want that to happen. No? So, now, let’s show us how it’s never going to happen again, and you move them now toward. But you need to give them more pain, because I’m gonna be honest, when people come to the advisor, they’re kind of in pain, but the advisor knows there’s more pain and we never want our guides to have that pain, because that’s really not for their whole physiology, not healthy for them. They can get quite unwell. Physically and emotionally and mentally. So, we don’t want people to get that away from.
Fraser Jack: [00:55:01] We’re really structuring those conversations to make sure we touch on the negative in the pain but then give them an outcome.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:55:08] Let’s get you out of this pain. So, we’re no longer gonna have this symptomology again. You want to move a person who’s that far away from pain so they don’t need the drugs ever again. You’re going to teach them how to get to health. That’s your education. That’s why an adviser is just so vital for financial health. Financial health is literally, I can heal my finances, I don’t need the drugs anymore, I don’t need to go into emergency surgery because I didn’t understand that I was causing clogged arteries by buying too much stuff and clogging my arteries, you know what I mean? I now know what my health is. I know how to have ... That’s why an advisor is really financial health.
Fraser Jack: [00:55:48] Now, we’ve talked a lot about the conversations we have with clients, during or before the advice is being given, but once we’ve set some goals and we’re moving forward and you mentioned before with regards to positive reinforcement, is there any particular time frames or amount of reinforcement people need or?
Alice Haemmerle: [00:56:07] From the very beginning, the brain ... we need to be convinced very early on, like at the very beginning that something’s good. Something works, something’s good. Example, just very simply, is a restaurant. You’re gonna go fine dining. Let’s be clear. Someone coming to a restaurant is not coming to Maccas. An adviser is not Maccas. An advisor is, I want to go have a good meal. I’m willing to spend some money on something that I’ve never spent money on before. So, I already know the value and I’m hoping the value’s there. So, I’m going to Google review and I’m not gonna go to Google review below 4.2. I want to go to a good Google review. So, if I’m gonna go to a restaurant, the first thing I’m gonna check out is what does this restaurant look like? Does it smell good? If it smells dirty, I’m walking out.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:56:55] So, that goes for the adviser’s office. A person’s gonna walk into your office and they’re gonna look around first before you’re even greeted. Is this adviser quality? Is this look like money? I would assume if I’m going finance, I want to see money. I don’t want to see poverty around. So, that also goes to the grooming of your staff, the grooming of how you’re looking, how well are you taking care of yourself? You may not, as an adviser, may not have a lot of money yet, but whatever you have, take care of what you have. So, make sure your shirts are ironed, your shoes are polished, that you’re taking care of what you have. If you have a plant in your office, make sure it’s alive. It’s like, all of this matters because that’s the first thing is the visual, I’m looking at, am I in the right place? You will have clients who will turn around and not even walk in because this advisor doesn’t look good.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:57:51] So, they won’t even have a conversation with you. If you walk into the restaurant, it looks like a restaurant, it smells good, so make sure your advisory office smells good as well. Then, you’re gonna be seated. Are your chairs comfortable? Have you put me in a room where I feel safe? Have you put me in a closed room where I can’t get out? I don’t want to be in here, I’m scared. So, all of the sensory experiences, am I where I need to be? Can I experience [inaudible 00:58:19] where I feel safe? Do I have a comfortable chair to sit on? Am I sitting across some advisor who I can trust or are they like a shark that’s scary? Have they put me away from a door that I can exit or they put me far away on the other side of the room where I can’t get out? All of this matters. So, you want to make sure when your client comes in that if you do put them in a room, that you put them near the door, so they can get out.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:58:43] If you put them where they can’t get out, they’re gonna feel threatened, they’re gonna be looking out that door, how do I get out of this room? So, all of this matters. So, you walk into the restaurant, you’re seated at a lovely table, you’re not seated near the toilet, you’re not ... you get a nice table then you’re greeted by the waiter and you’re offered something to drink. The same thing in your advisor. Do you offer your guests, your clients something to drink? You must, right upon arrival, offer them a cup of tea, some water. Why? Because they are going to be your client, your guest, most importantly, above all, you’re relaxing their gut. You’re getting to their gut which is their serotonin, the gut is 99% serotonin which is your happy hormone, is produced in your gut. You’re now selling my stomach, I’m not producing acid, I’ve got water. Don’t give them coffee really, because that’s a bitter thing, creates acid. Give them a nice cup of tea. Definitely give them some water, even if they don’t want to bring it anyway. Drink water with them, it settles their stomach.
Fraser Jack: [00:59:53] I really like the way you call them a guest. That actually changes the mind frame a little bit.
Alice Haemmerle: [00:59:58] Very much, because they’re gonna be with you for a long time. They’re definitely not a transaction. They’re definitely, in essence, I [inaudible 01:00:07] they’re a client. They’re a client. They’re a guest, they’re a client, but they’re not a customer, never, ever, ever. They’re definitely a client in essence because they’re service based. A client is with you for long term. They’re a client. You know about them, you have their history, you know their symptomology, you know their patterns, it’s a client. Any service bases, I know, I’m going to pull out a folder and I’m gonna see all your history and I’m gonna see where you want to go. I’m gonna take care of you for your life long ... in fact, I’m a client for life. I’m a client for you’re ... you’re going to be a client with ... all your family members are going to come in because you’re clients, long-term. But they’re a guest at the beginning to become a client. That’s a very big difference, because a client is, I know all about you and I’m here to take care of you, to service you and your family for life.
Fraser Jack: [01:01:02] You’ve seen a lot of financial services in Australia. How do you see the short-term future panning out?
Alice Haemmerle: [01:01:09] I see that it must be client based. I see that people must be service based, versus transactionary. The financial advisors who see their clients as long-term, who see their clients as, I’m here to take care of you and your family long-term, really care, the care factor, are going to be around. Eventually, those that don’t, they’re going to be just like we look at retail. All the online retail. People can have their own experience online. I’m gonna go online and take care of what I need online. Why would I need to spend one minute with another human being if that human being doesn’t care about me? Doesn’t know me, doesn’t find out about me, doesn’t think about me and find out about things that I need. Why should I have to research my finances when I’m paying a financial advisor to seek information that’s going to be what I’m gonna need? That’s an advisor.
Alice Haemmerle: [01:02:02] An advisor is going [inaudible 01:02:04] you’re the expert in that field. That’s your job to go seek out the best quality advice for my client and otherwise, why am I paying an advisor if I can go find all that out on Google? Or go do that research? You’re saving me time, which is my most valuable resource of all, not my money, my time. If you can compound my time, get done in time, what would take me energy to go do, it’s gonna allow me to compound my money. Wow. I will meet with you once or twice a year. I will meet with you every month if my time has been valued, but if you waste my time, I’m not gonna come see you. Why should I come see you? Because you’re wasting my time. Time wasting is the most disrespectful of all.
Alice Haemmerle: [01:02:52] You waste my time. No. I will go and find somebody who will value my time because they’re going to give me knowledge and they’re gonna inform me, they’re gonna connect with me because they care with me, they care about me. I will spend more time with you because you care about me. In fact, not only that, I will tell other people about you who I want to spend time with that need to spend time with you. So, all referrals, our first and foremost, yes, you’ve improved my money, but you’re taking care of me and I will refer a friend, I will refer a colleague, I will refer a family member because you took care of me.
Fraser Jack: [01:03:29] Very good. Yep. Now, what are you working on at the moment?
Alice Haemmerle: [01:03:33] I’m working with a global company right now on ... a company called Lulu Lemon. It’s an apparel, an activewear apparel from Canada. I’m working with them on their entire team. It’s an amazing company, which is very much around personal development, their whole company’s about personal development. They happen to sell clothes. That’s amazing. So, they’re educating all of their teams on ... they call their teams educators. They call their clients guests because they know people are going to be there for a whole experience. They know retail had to change, that they had to give a different experience in the store. So, they’re very future based. There’s a lot they’re doing. And then I’m also training people in what I do. I have online courses that I run with people and it’s called the communication code consulting training. So, it’s teaching the code, bringing [inaudible 01:04:24] principles but also coaching principles and performance principles.
Alice Haemmerle: [01:04:29] A lot of young people. My courses are filled with people between the ages of 24 to 40, who are seen that they need to understand human behavior. Human behavior. I’m also with a new company working on creating a whole consultancy program to train their consultants in human behavior, because they’re very good at being technical, but they’re not good with the people, they don’t understand people. So, I’m working with them to develop a consultancy training for them.
Fraser Jack: [01:04:53] So, you got advises or small business here in Australia that want to look at that or follow it up? Where can they find that?
Alice Haemmerle: [01:05:03] Basically, because I’m in Singapore, what they would do is they need to find me through, I want to say through you guys, I would suggest that connection would come through you, because I’m no longer ... I’m not online right now and the reason being is because we’re traveling a lot. I am a word-of-mouth person now. I’m not running large trainings. I used to run trainings with 200 people, 100 people. I have small courses which are, I can work with small groups, but I would suggest you contact AI to contact me. You have a group of advisers that want training, talk to AI and then they can connect to Alice.
Fraser Jack: [01:05:39] Okay, no problem. So, you also mentioned teams and obviously there’s a lot of advisers here that run teams and I’m trying to get the most out of their teams and create cultures. Any sort of tips for those businesses?
Alice Haemmerle: [01:05:49] Okay. First and foremost, the most important thing for those teams is you as the leader, if I’m talking to a leader right now, the leader of your organization, it is up to you to set the vision of your organization. You are setting the attitude of your organization. You are setting the culture of your organization and your culture is everything. What are your values in your organization? Let me be clear. You’ve got to set values that are actionable. So, integrity is not a value. The value is trust. Trust is a value. So, what you ... if you want to have a ... integrity happens because trust happens. So, people trust you. Are you following through? So, I would make sure you set the vision, you’ve got to have everyone on board with the vision and the mission of your organization, you need to live and breathe the values of your company and if you’re not, if you’re not consistent, your team won’t be consistent. If you aren’t committed, your team won’t be committed. If you lie, your team will lie. If you are honest, your team will be honest.
Alice Haemmerle: [01:06:44] You need to live and breathe your values. If you are valuing your clients, your team will value the clients. If you talk about your clients behind the back, your team will do the same. So, you are the leader. You are the benchmark of excellence or you’re the benchmark of average or you’re the benchmark of failure. You are setting the benchmarks. It always, as we say, the fish stinks from the head down.
Fraser Jack: [01:07:09] Yep. If you lead they’ll follow.
Alice Haemmerle: [01:07:11] They will follow. Otherwise you end up managing and management and leadership are two different things. So, you need to be the leader, then hire managers, because if you’re having to manage, you cannot lead. They’re two different things. So, two different skill sets. Managing is managing the systems and making sure that people are following the processes, but leading is, this is where we’re going and this is how we’re gonna get there, but then get a manager to manage your team so that you can do what ... don’t manage your people, hire a manager. I want to say that [crosstalk 01:07:44] you’ve got two different roles here.
Fraser Jack: [01:07:49] Now, just a couple of quick fire questions to finish up on. If you’re giving advice to another consumer, a friend of yours that was thinking about getting financial advice, what would you say to them?
Alice Haemmerle: [01:08:00] Firstly, find someone who has results. So, I would always seek results. Find a financial adviser who has ... you can talk to clients that have been with them for a period of time, short-term and long-term, short-term ... I want to find an advisor who also has some short-term clients and I want to find out, are they still fresh? How are they with the new people? Or, are they a bit too relaxed? Are their pockets already filled, that they don’t want new clients? Are they still hungry? So, I want to ... I would want to seek, what advice are they getting with these new clients and what advice [inaudible 01:08:36] are they getting with long-term clients? I want to find both. I want to find out as well who’s their team. How will I be taking care of the moment I walk in the door? Will I be able to have time with my advisor or do I get [inaudible 01:08:50] off to a junior? How has that junior been trained? Or is that junior just there because I’ve got to spring another new adviser on because I’m expanding my business but that person’s not been trained well?
Alice Haemmerle: [01:09:01] So, I want to know what’s the training that the young advisors have. I don’t mind being with a young advisor who has a good system, who has a mentor, who’s advising them and giving ... but is that young junior just sitting there by themselves having to figure it out? No. I want to know what the training is in the development of the people. So, also ... That’s the first thing. Results. Honestly, it’s all about the results. Why is a person coming for financial advice? They’re coming to get financial results. You go to a restaurant because you want to be fed food that, one, nourishes you and tastes delicious, but firstly, it needs to nourish you. If it doesn’t nourish you, then you go, it doesn’t taste too good, but I didn’t feel very good afterwards. You know what I mean? It was good, but I feel sick, I’m not gonna go back. So, what’s the financial purpose like Fraser? Why do people need ... why do people go for financial advice?
Fraser Jack: [01:10:02] So, if you’re speaking to somebody who is wanting to get into financial advice, a younger advisor, what advice would you give to them?
Alice Haemmerle: [01:10:05] All right. I would ... a young person who wants to become a financial adviser? Alright. Firstly, find an organization, consultancy group that gets results. They are driven to look for, firstly, what is happening in the market place, so they’ve got the finger on the pulse, they know that AI here is the future. So, they’re looking at systems that are future based versus old. This is the way it’s always done. Do not go there. Look for those that are continually looking at how they can improve their team, improve themselves, they put some form of personal development inside their organization, they make sure that there’s some form of ongoing training for their advisors.
Alice Haemmerle: [01:10:44] I would look at people who’ve been in the organization for two years time and are starting to thrive. I would look at that, how often are they having to replace advisors or are they in a place of expanding, but not rapid expansion, healthy expansion. Healthy expansion, because you can expand very rapidly, but you don’t have any systems in place and everything comes collapsing. I would be looking at ... so, an advisory from ... let’s say you’ve got advisory from three people, the next number would be seven. Beautiful compound number. Great. Three people [inaudible 01:11:19], they can all still sit around the table. Next size of your team would be about 14. That’s a double, it’s a compound. The next size magic numbers are 24, team, you’ve got a 24 team, you’re not earning great money, you’ve got systems in place and still everyone can be in a room together, but when your advisory gets to 100, people don’t know each other’s names anymore. That’s why you’ve got to have the culture.
Alice Haemmerle: [01:11:43] So, up to 24, culture’s very strong, but that’s where I see companies make a big mistake. They compound very quickly and they don’t have any form of HR, they definitely don’t have any personal development in their team development, they don’t have their systems ongoing and then the brand, the company loses the quality. So, I will say this. If you’re a young advisor, go find a mentor, go find somebody at an organization where you could be mentored, especially if you’re young, but that being said, if you’ve been going in a while and you’re ready for the next, go for the next player. If you’re going down, that means you don’t have skills. It’s like sports. You have to have skill, you have to have technique and if you find yourself dropping, you say, oh, they were not so good, I’m going to a lower, that’s you, you have not developed your skill. That’s lazy. So, get your skills. What skills do you need as a financial advisor? Make sure your skills are continually upgraded, continually performing and you will then go to that next grade.
Alice Haemmerle: [01:12:50] You’ll be earning more money. Your money is a direct reflection of your skill level. You will cap when your skills stop. You will cap when your mindset is not being developed, but your mindset is a result of your skill set, let me be clear. Your mindset is a ... you are a great performer because you get results over and over, because of your skill set, and then you’re like, how can I become even better? That’s mindset, right? So, I’ve got to go find someone who’s even better and be challenged by that and love the competition. But if you’re not a competitor, you won’t go seek those competition, you go [inaudible 01:13:24]. You’ve just got to know thyself. I say know thyself.
Fraser Jack: [01:13:28] That’s very, very good advice. Thank You Alice. I appreciate that. Now, we’re kind of out of time now. So, I wanted to say, thank you so much for joining us today on the show, it’s been amazing having you on. We’ve talked ...
Alice Haemmerle: [01:13:37] Thank you.
Fraser Jack: [01:13:38] We got very deep into the mind and it was a little bit different episode this one than the normal story, but I thank you so much for sharing all that knowledge with us.
Alice Haemmerle: [01:13:47] Thank you so much Fraser, and looking forward to seeing the results that AI brings to all the advisers.
Fraser Jack: [01:13:52] Yeah, we’re looking forward to it as well. So, thank you very much and we look forward to chatting to you soon.
Alice Haemmerle: [01:13:58] Okay, thank you.
Fraser Jack: [01:13:58] Thanks Alice. If you haven’t already, I’d love you to subscribe to the podcast on your podcast platform of choice and to continue the conversation, head over to our social media channels. We’ll catch you next time.
Disclaimer: This document is a transcription obtained through a third party. There is no claim to accuracy on the content provided in this document, and divergence from the audio file are to be expected. As a transcription, this is not a legal document in itself, and should not be considered binding to advice intelligence, but merely a convenience for reference.
