This morning was pretty exciting.
After my pre-phone morning routine I opened Twitter to a notification that I had been tagged in a tweet by Harriman House. It wasn’t a surprise to me what the tweet was about but I didn’t know they would be sharing some exciting news today:
On March 21st, 2023 More Than Money: Real-Life Stories Of Financial Planning hits your favorite book store.
The Backstory
Earlier this year one of the members of the AGC approached me with the idea of writing a book as a community–we explored a few different topics and audiences and took the idea to the rest of the community. After some conversations and a community vote we decided to write a book for consumers highlighting real-life financial planning stories. The goal was to share stories that would do a few things:
- Show readers what REAL financial planning looks like–how working with an advisor has made a difference in the lives of our clients.
- Show readers that the majority of financial advisors actually do care about their clients, aren’t out to screw people over, and hopefully change the perspective of our profession.
- Help readers realize when they might need a financial advisor by seeing themselves in one or some of the stories.
- Finally, inspire other financial advisors to go above and beyond with their planning. There is no career path in our profession and many financial advisors are left to their own devices to figure out their way–this leaves far too many financial advisors unaware of what real financial planning looks like. Hopefully, we’ll be able to open some eyes and help some financial advisors find their way to a more meaningful way of helping their clients.
It’s also a hope of Taylor and mine that the book brings more attention to some phenomenal financial advisors who we have grown to love so much.
Originally, we intended on self-publishing the book via Amazon and donating all of the net proceeds to a couple of organizations in our profession. The Universe had bigger plans for More Than Money and we were connected with Harriman House, THE publisher for finance related books. They loved the concept and the sample chapters we set them and agreed to work with us to bring the stories to more people. Nothing has changed with our plans to donate 100% of the net proceeds from the sales to the Foundation For Financial Planning and the BLatinX Internship Program (BLX)…so when this book comes our, please go buy a copy (or two) so we can send them some nice checks!
To help keep us accountable, we entered into a fun little partnership with our good friend Carl Richards. The AGC sent Carl a check for $5,000–if we didn’t publish our book by March 1st, 2022 he could cash the check and do whatever he wanted with the proceeds–in true Carl fashion, he said he’d use the check to buy books from other financial advisors. If we made the deadline then he had to tear the check up and buy a few copies of the book. When we made the deal with Carl, we had no idea we’d work with a publisher on the book, so the deadline eventually became we needed to have the book deal done by March 1st, 2022.
Thankfully, Carl had to tear up the check…
Without giving away too much of the contents of the book, 28 members of The AGC each wrote a chapter with a story from their career that showed how financial planning goes beyond just numbers and dollars. These stories are full of emotions–happy, sad, inspiration, fear, abundance, frustration and more. As we get closer to the book dropping, we’ll share more details. I’ll even be interviewing each of the authors for the All About Your Benjamins Podcast so you’ll get to hear and see from each of these amazing advisors.
The Unsung Hero
This book and signing with Harriman House would have NEVER happened if it wasn’t for Shanna Due’s tireless effort to lead the group. Imagine getting 28 financial advisors spread around the world with busy practices, families, and the normal busy lives we all lead to hit deadlines, vote on book covers, and contribute on every other minor detail that goes into writing a book. It’s an impossible feat for most…
But not for Shanna.
You’ll hear more about Shanna in the future but I wanted to make sure she gets her roses on this exciting day…everyone sacrificed and worked hard to get this done but there’s no way we’d have this book if it were not for her. So please give Shanna her props if you see her in person or shout her out on social media. She deserves it all!
So mark your calendars…March 21st, 2023.
This idea that started out as a fun community effort has turned into an amazing book (I’ve read it) that will make a major impact on readers and for our profession. The project went from self-publish to working with Harriman House, so why not make this a New York Times best selling book?!?
I’ll tell you this…I’m going to do everything in my power to make that happen. I’m going into sales mode for More Than Money, which won’t be that hard because I believe in the book and the advisors so much.
Disclaimer: Nothing on this blog should be considered advice, or recommendations. If you have questions pertaining to your individual situation you should consult your financial advisor. For all of the disclaimers, please see my disclaimers page.
