Janet Galloway and Emily Isom, B&B Strategic Management
The Work Relationship Makes The Personal Relationship Stronger
We’ve been featuring independent advisor firms in our network that are family-operated: parents and children working together to build and grow a financial advisory. B&B Strategic Management allows mother Janet Galloway and daughter Emily Isom to work together every day, and they say that makes their personal relationship as mother and daughter even stronger.
Finance Was Not Our First Career Path to Being an Independent Team
Janet always says that her first career was raising her kids. In fact, she went back to school as they got older and got her finance degree — to start her second career. She didn’t know exactly what she wanted to do but she just loved all the numbers. Right out of school Janet worked for a small RIA, but she soon realized she wanted more.
So back to school she went again, this time to get her masters in financial planning. Janet completed her masters and earned her CFP® (CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER® ) designation while working at Merrill Lynch. Soon after she realized it wasn’t a good fit. Janet still wanted the freedom, independence and flexibility to spend time with her now adult children, and grandson. And a 9-to-5 at Merrill Lynch was not it. That’s when she decided to become an independent financial advisor.
Meanwhile, her daughter Emily worked for ten years at Panera Bread working her way up to being the GM. Then moved to Allstate Property & Casualty selling insurance. As a mother, she was searching for a consistent schedule — and just like her mom — the freedom and flexibility to be a mom.
So after a short break to be a stay-at-home mom, Emily joined Janet at B&B, as the Senior Vice President of Marketing and Client Outreach. To her, walking clients through things and getting to know them on a personal level had always been the best part of any position. At B&B she does just that, in addition to setting up streamlined processes and forms, and handling social media.
Integrated Has Been The Key to Being Independent for Janet and Emily
When Janet found Michael and Integrated Advisors Network, she realized she had been trying to go independent the wrong way. Michael could answer all her questions, offer team support and give her the freedom and flexibility to focus on her customers. And adding Emily to the firm helped dramatically with setting up systems, workflow processes and technology to make everything feel very personal.
Integrated gives them the freedom to focus and not worry about all the back-end responsibilities. They feel they’ve built an amazing independent team — and that includes Integrated.
Entrepreneur and Intrapreneur
“I’m the entrepreneur, and Emily’s the intrapreneur” Janet likes to say.
Janet says she can give Emily the big picture and then she can figure out the details to implement, and this skill has been a breath of fresh air to the firm. Janet’s strength is evident in the way she is able to take complex financial concepts and simplify them for clients to understand. Being a part-time Kaplan teacher is her secret weapon — she hones this ability to make things understandable to others here. Emily loves watching Janet help people understand their finances and create the wealth they want.
Their skill sets strike a balance at B&B, giving both of them professional fulfillment and time for family. Neither thought they’d end up as a mother-daughter company, and even though they work a lot, they enjoy building their relationship out of the office too. And both of them really enjoy being a part of Integrated’s Women of Wealth Management Group, started by Janet, where they’ve learned so many shared lessons from this amazing group of independent women.
Janet and Emily, Independent Together
Emily’s next goal is getting her Series 65 license and becoming an Independent Advisor Representative (IAR). That will put her on the road to having some ownership of the firm as they grow and add to the team. And for Janet, having a member of her family be her partner creates a strong trust-bond.
B&B Strategic Management has a simple philosophy about financial advice and management. “You don’t have to be a millionaire to benefit from a financial advisor. If you never use one, you may never get there. The whole point is creating a plan that will help set you on the right path. If you have a plan, you can create wealth to pass down to generations.” Together, they’re building independence, not just for themselves, but for their clients as well.