In this episode of the Trusted Adviser Podcast, Rob speaks with Jeff Thurecht, CEO of Evalesco Financial Services, about building a scalable advice business through talent development, technology, and strategic growth. Jeff shares how Evalesco grew into an award-winning firm with nearly 40 team members across Australia and the Philippines, and explains the philosophy behind their “3K30” vision to reach 3,000 ideal clients by 2030.

The conversation explores how Evalesco structures specialist service areas, develops advisers internally rather than hiring them fully formed, and uses offshore support teams to increase efficiency. Jeff also discusses the transition from adviser to CEO, the role of technology in freeing advisers to spend more time with clients, and why strong team culture remains central to the firm’s long-term growth.

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SHOW NOTES

Topics Discussed

Building a scalable financial advice firm with a strong team culture
Winning Holistic Advice Firm of the Year and Overall Company of the Year at the IFA Excellence Awards
Structuring an advice business around specialist service areas such as insurance, lending, and aged care
Segmenting advisers to serve different client demographics
Integrating offshore teams into the core business rather than treating them as outsourced support
The transition from adviser to CEO and the leadership challenges involved
Developing advisers internally through associate pathways and mentoring
Using technology to improve efficiency and client experience
Consolidating CRM systems and improving data quality across the business
Evalesco’s “3K30” vision to reach 3,000 ideal clients by 2030
Creating growth opportunities for team members through business expansion

Episode Highlights

(Timestamps are approximate)

[00:00] – Introduction to Jeff Thurecht and Evalesco
Overview of the firm’s size, team structure, and recent industry recognition.
[02:00] – The Origin of Evalesco
Jeff explains the Latin meaning behind the firm’s name and the founders’ vision to build a scalable business.
[04:00] – Winning the IFA Excellence Awards
Why team recognition mattered more than individual accolades.
[06:30] – Building a Holistic Advice Firm
The role of insurance, lending, and aged care specialists in supporting clients.
[09:30] – Segmenting Clients by Demographic Needs
Serving wealth accumulators, pre-retirees, retirees, and high-net-worth families.
[11:00] – The Principal Edge Merger
How the acquisition expanded the firm’s capabilities and client base.
[13:00] – Building an Offshore Support Team
Integrating Philippines-based team members into the daily operations of the firm.
[17:00] – Transitioning from Adviser to CEO
The personal and operational challenges of stepping away from client work.
[23:00] – Developing Advisers Internally
Why mentoring associate advisers leads to smoother client transitions.
[27:30] – Technology and the Advice Tech Stack
Using FIN365, Xplan, and integrated systems to improve workflows.
[33:40] – Creating a Technology and Advice Delivery Role
The importance of dedicated oversight for systems and processes.
[35:50] – The 3K30 Growth Vision
Evalesco’s plan to reach 3,000 ideal clients by 2030.
[39:40] – Freeing Advisers to Spend More Time with Clients
Why increasing client-facing time is the biggest driver of growth and impact.
[41:30] – The Future of the Advice Profession
Encouraging more professionals to enter financial advice.

Quotes from Jeff Thurecht

“We always set out to build a business that wasn’t just about us.”

“We’ve always tried to avoid having rock stars in the team. It’s a team game.”

“The hardest part of moving into the CEO role was figuring out how to measure progress without a diary full of client meetings.”

“It’s much easier to transition clients when the next adviser has already been on the journey with them.”

“Technology should free advisers up to spend more time in front of clients. That’s where we add the most value.”

“If we want to reach more Australians with good advice, we need to create the capacity for advisers to meet more people.”

“Financial advice is a fantastic profession. If you’re thinking about it, I’d encourage you to pursue it.”

Key Takeaways

Evalesco has 29 team members in Australia and 9 in the Philippines.
The company focuses on holistic advice and has a diverse client base.
Jeff emphasizes the importance of team recognition over individual accolades.
The firm has segmented advisors to cater to different demographics.
Acquisition of Principal Edge was a strategic move for growth.
The offshore team plays a vital role in administration and support.
COVID helped integrate the offshore team into the company culture.
Transitioning to CEO was challenging due to loss of client-facing roles.
Jeff found time management to be a significant adjustment in his new role.
The company aims to continuously improve and innovate in their services. Getting clearer on important projects is crucial for growth.
Building a business that isn’t just about the founders is essential.
Transitioning clients smoothly enhances trust and relationships.
Investing in team development leads to better client outcomes.
Technology should support, not replace, effective processes.
A strategic vision helps guide business growth and team opportunities.
Mentoring young advisors is key to their success.
Embracing technology can free up advisors to focus on clients.
Setting ambitious goals can drive motivation and growth.
Encouraging more people to enter the financial advice profession is vital.

Resources & Links

The Trusted Adviser: https://thetrustedadviser.com.au/
Evalesco Financial Services: https://evalesco.com.au/
Connect with Rob Pyne on LinkedIn
Connect with Jeff Thurecht on LinkedIn
Follow The Trusted Adviser Podcast

TRANSCRIPT

Rob (00:01.708)

Welcome, Jeff directs to the Trusted Adviser Podcast.

Jeff Thurecht (00:04.803)

Thanks very much, Rob. Thanks for having me on. Looking forward to the chat.

Rob (00:08.418)

Thanks for joining me, Jeff. I’m really keen to have this conversation because what you’re doing there at Evalesco is obviously very impressive. You’ve picked up the company of the year in the IFA Excellence Awards and that’s no small feat. I see the list of firms that you were competing against and there’s some great businesses there, high quality businesses. So you must be doing something right, which is why I was very keen to have a chat and just find out what that is and share it with our listeners so people can learn. That’s what it’s about this podcast. Listen to what people are doing that’s working and that actually is really making them excel in their profession and see if we can impart some of that wisdom that you’ve got there on the rest of the listeners. So before we get into the details, Jeff, of what you figured out and what’s working so well, can you give us a sense of the scale of the business today? So how many team members do you have and what does the structure look like for Evalesco?

Jeff Thurecht (00:59.855)

Sure. So we’ve got 29 team members in Australia and nine team members based in the Philippines who work for us. So we had a merger with the business called Principal Edge about 18 months ago. So those numbers are across the combined entity. So we’ve got 12 advisors. We look after about 1,300 family groups. There’s probably within those numbers is about 300 insurance only clients. The rest are holistic advice clients across a fairly broad range of demographics and I guess niche markets. So yeah, that’s kind of a high level overview.

Rob (01:42.126)

Yeah, it’s a big team, both here and offshore. So you’ve really built out a business that’s scaling. When you and Marshall started the firm, nearly two decades ago now, did you always intend to build a scale business like this? Were you always thinking we’re going to build something that really grows and scales with a team size like you are now? And obviously you’ve got bigger ambitions as well from where you are today.

Jeff Thurecht (02:03.745)

Yeah, we did. We always set out that when we started, we would build a business that wasn’t just about us. So when we came up with the name, you know, we didn’t want to go with Brenton and Thurrock and co or something like that. wanted it to be something to be different. So we went with the current trend at the time, which was to choose a Latin name. So we always. So it is a Latin word, it means to grow strong, prevail and add value.

Rob (02:23.448)

What does that FLSCO mean, tell us? Now that you said that.

Rob (02:32.654)

Terrific, very apt.

Jeff Thurecht (02:33.335)

So we thought, yeah, we thought it had some connection to what we were setting out to do at the time and continues to. So yeah, we did think about growing a business that, you know, wasn’t reliant just on us seeing clients forever and, you being the only ones. So that has guided some of our decision making over time. And, you know, as you said, it’s 18 years now since Marshall and I sort of came together. And sometimes I look back and think of it from the perspective of.

Rob (02:38.104)

Brilliant.

Jeff Thurecht (03:01.775)

You know, we’ve done really well to get where we are. Other times I look back on it and say really over 18 years, this is all we’ve got sort of thing. there’s always that tension there. But yeah, I mean, I think in the main, we’re doing okay.

Rob (03:09.112)

Yeah.

Rob (03:16.243)

I, when we were chatting pre-episode, I think we call that a perpetual state of constructive dissatisfaction never completely satisfied. And so, yeah, you can reflect on thinking we’ve come a long way, but you’re always thinking about how we can improve. that’s hence why you’ve picked up this Excellence Award, because you’re not ever resting, you’re not ever settling for where you are, and you’re always looking to improve. So again, big congrats on that award. How did it feel to have the business recognised, particularly with the team award, because you are a big team now. Tell me about your feelings about that sort of team award versus individuals who obviously are doing impressive things in your industry as well, but you really shown as a company.

Jeff Thurecht (03:58.576)

Yeah, I was really excited, really proud and actually a little bit emotional on the night winning that award because I do see what we do as such a team game. And so to have a recognition for the business as a whole and every individual within the team who plays a part in that I think was something that we’re really proud of and something we’ve talked a lot about a lot. Don’t. We’ve always set out not to have any rock stars in our team. We do have advisors who have been up for individual awards and won individual awards. And I really think that’s a great thing for them. But I think for the business to be recognized for what we do overall for our clients was a real highlight and something really, really exciting.

Rob (04:45.698)

I’m so pleased to hear that you said that and you were open to sharing that you’re a bit emotional on the night because it means a lot, doesn’t it? To be recognised by your peers, to say, you you’re doing really good things here and we just want to shout out to say, hey, let’s go, good work you guys. We’re gonna give you this top gong as the company of the year. And you feel that sense of collective effort that you’ve all put in to get to that award because it is very much, you just say, a collective team effort to win awards such as that.

Jeff Thurecht (05:11.693)

Yeah, and on the night we had 10 of our team there, we had a whole table and so all of us got up on the stage to accept the final award, which was another exciting opportunity that a lot of the team members don’t get a lot of profile. So for them to sort of get up there and feel part of it, that was even extra special.

Rob (05:31.244)

Yeah, fantastic. When you submitted for the IFA Awards this year, what did you think going into that that stood out about your business compared with the peer group perhaps that you’re being compared against?

Jeff Thurecht (05:43.824)

Well, the primary award that we won for was the holistic advice sperm of the year. And so I think…you know, it’s probably obvious, but we have a genuinely holistic offering. And I think we’ve built that out a fair bit. And we’ve probably got better at communicating that over the last 12 to 18 months about how that benefits our clients and how that differentiates us in some ways in the marketplace. So I think our ability to communicate that probably carried through pretty strongly. So that includes, you know, an insurance specialist advisor, aged care offering, lending. You know, and a lot more within our free and we also I think, you know, we talked about holistic in terms of our ability to work with different demographics. So we’ve set the business up in pods where those pods focus on specific client demographics. So we think that’s really helpful. And probably the other one is we have a high number of female advisors. So we’re able to really specialise in that women’s wealth area as well. And I think that sets us apart a little bit gives us again, it is holistic. We’re a broad range of demographics as well as a broad range of services. So, you know, I don’t know exactly what the judges were thinking, but I feel like that’s probably some things we’ve done better in recent times.

Rob (07:06.54)

Yeah, so aged care, insurance, lending, so those sort of verticals that actually support your clients in whatever stage of life they’re at. And you’ve got dedicated people in those roles, not people trying to cover wear too many hats, they’ve got really specialist, dedicated people looking after it. But then beyond that, as you say there, you’ve actually gone and segmented advisors across demographics. Can you tell us bit more about the segments? You’ve said they’re women in wealth and so you’ve got some more female advisors, perhaps more than average, which is a great attribute to have there. Wonderful at that engagement and empathy with clients and so. Women in Wealth is one segment. Do you have other segments that you’ve actually defined within your client group that you have advisors dedicated to?

Jeff Thurecht (07:53.296)

Yeah, we do. I think when we started the business, Marshall and I set out to look after primarily wealth accumulators. And that was people who were similar age to ourselves, so the five or 10 years either side of our age at the time. And obviously, as we’ve gotten older, those clients have gotten older and grown with us. And to a degree we’ve focused a little bit more in recent times on growing that pre-retiree and retiree client base, which is the traditional sort of client base. But we’ve always maintained a focus on the accumulators and so it’s know senior execs, small business owners who are in their 40s who are growing families and you know most of our clients are in Sydney. It’s expensive place to live Sydney so they’re making good money but they’re spending most of it so you know how do we help them make good decisions. So we’ve got advisors who are really specialists in that area and they work very closely with our insurance specialist and lending specialist as you would imagine in that sort of space. Then we’ve got other advisors who focus more on the pre-retirees, so kind of the 50 upwards. So those people who are looking at, you know, thinking they might be 10 years out from retirement or 10 years out from making work optional and looking at all the strategies that are appropriate around that and specialising that. And then some other advisors who are really about, you know, people who are in retirement, a little bit more centrelink from time to time, a little bit more expertise around aged care to at least know the questions to ask and how to facilitate that conversation. It tends to be those people who are having the conversations for their parents and maybe starting to think about it for themselves when they’re getting a little bit older as well. And then we’ve got with the principal edge business a genuine high net worth multi-family office offering coming down the path. We’re looking after sophisticated clients there. So that gives us another string to the bow, which has been very helpful.

Rob (09:51.021)

Yeah, great. Yeah, it’s, as you said there, just reflecting on how you described the client base originally, the wealth accumulator, of, know, plus or minus five years to you and Marshall, who started the business. And so that wouldn’t have been typical, I suspect, even when you started, everyone was focused on the retiree, where the capital’s transitioning from super to pension and doing the retirement planning work. So. It’s no wonder that you built out a really dedicated insurance, dedicated lending team, because as you say, that’s the need, isn’t it? That’s where people are actually have their borrowing needs and they’re upgrading their house for a bigger family and just the insurance needs are so high there. You’ve got people earning very good money, but they are. You know, sending their kids to school and they’ve got big mortgages to pay and if something happens to the breadwinners, you know, things are in a fair disarray. So I can see how you’ve kind of really leaned into that. And now as you say, when you moved into that retiree market, building out the aged care advisory offering as well to support them as they journey through their retirement years and get to that needing that more support at the end. The principal edge business, how long ago was that acquisition? When was that one done and executed on Jeff? And I know Bruce really well. And in fact, we’re actually at a dimensional practice management symposium. In a couple of weeks together on a panel talking about it. So tell me a bit about that.

Jeff Thurecht (11:10.263)

Yeah, so that happened in November 24, so almost 18 months ago. So that was a really great opportunity for us. We knew Bruce. a little bit, not really well, knew the business pretty well through reputation. And so that was fantastic. came together really quickly. was something that we had set out as a strategic objective of the business was to continue to look for opportunities for mergers and acquisitions. We’ve made a few smaller sort of bolt-on acquisitions over the time and we’d made a strategic decision that we weren’t going to do any more smaller bolt-ons. We were looking for something to move the needle a little bit more. And so it’s fair to say the principal edge business was a bit bigger than what we thought might be the next step. But through the conversations, it just felt like a really natural fit in terms of the values, the advice philosophy, the investment philosophy, know, real focused on client care. So that was a really good opportunity for us. And it’s been, yeah, it’s been a lot of work. And there’s been some know, ups and downs you’ve got to work through with these things, but overall it’s going really well and we’re really excited about the next chapters around that as well.

Rob (12:26.796)

Yeah, that’s great. Yeah, it’s as you say, the philosophies around investments and advice and just client care are aligned, it makes everything a little easier. Cause it’s never smooth. It’s always gonna be some bumps as you figure things out and get it right. But if you’ve built on that core foundation of alignment around culture and philosophies, you can overcome almost any challenge. The rest is logistics. You’ve to of figure out together, but ultimately you’ve got that foundation to work from. I want to circle back for a second because you mentioned in the earlier, there that you’ve got nine staff I think you said offshore in the Philippines. Can you tell us a bit about how long that’s been in place and how’s that evolved for you over the years? What role does it play in the business now to have offshore team members?

Jeff Thurecht (13:12.845)

Yeah, it’s a really, really valuable role that the team plays. So we use vital business partners, VBP. We’ve been working with them for about eight years. Before that, we tried a couple of different models. And I think it’s fair to say it was probably the early stages of financial services companies investigating those types of models. So there wasn’t a clear, you know, largest provider or specialist provider. And we learned a lot from that experience. And we also learned a lot from the first, you know, couple of years of work with VBP as well to a point where we’re always still learning but we feel like it works pretty well for our business now. We think it works pretty well for the team over there and they add a heap of values so it’s been been fantastic for us.

Rob (14:00.632)

Sort of functions that they’re performing for you, Geoff, in the business.

Jeff Thurecht (14:03.599)

So in the main, they’re in administration roles. So we’ve structured it now so that the newer team members are focusing on data entry, a little bit of research. You know, not really client facing type stuff, preparing, review presentations, those types of things. And then after they’ve been with us for a little while, they progress into an implementation support role. So they’re doing the admin around implementation of advice, a little bit more communication with clients and focusing on that side of things. So that’s where the majority of our team sit. We have one paraplanner, so she works in our insurance specialist pod. So she does a lot of the research and then some plans for the insurance pod. We have one licensee support person as well. So she works on with our management team around running the license and does a lot of the admin on that side of things. yeah, that’s a bit of a breakdown of what they.

Rob (15:07.352)

Great, you really leaned into that and actually been able to expand beyond the non-client facing admin tasks, but actually going into implementation, even as you say, compliance and the like, it’s clearly working well for you and you’ve built that team out no doubt from dipping your toe in eight years ago to having one person to now a team of nine that are really integral to the way your business functions.

Jeff Thurecht (15:29.901)

Yeah, I think that’s a key point is that we do see them as part of our business. And I think a real turning point for that was COVID. So in COVID, our Sydney based team were having to work from home. And they really got a sense then what it was to be working out of the office and working remotely. And it’s like, actually, this can work, but you’ve got to work at it. And so I think that really allowed us to take it to the next level with the team in the Philippines, because it’s kind of like, we’re all working from home or we’re all working remotely. They just happened to be in Cebu and we happened to be, I was in Enondale. It’s like, you know, no real difference. So that helped us integrate that more. And I think since then we’ve kind of gone on and balance in terms of how effective that’s been. But it’s really about making them part of the team. They’re not outsources, they work remotely, but they’re part of the business and they’re all on our website, they’re all included in all our team meetings, we’re all communicating with them every day on video as much as we can and trying to make them feel like they’re part of the team.

Rob (16:34.242)

That’s brilliant, Geoff. mean, everyone who I’ve heard, who are here has had it work so well for them. I’ve said the same thing. Essentially, a part of that team, they’re offshore, but it’s not an outsourced solution. It’s actually their offshore team members. And as you said, through COVID, everyone was kind of remote. it felt like they were just same as everyone else just happened to be in the Philippines rather than in a suburb of Sydney. I want to take a second to talk about how you made a transition from being an advisor into this CEO role. It’s a very significant shift. I remember myself doing it as well. so we had a bit of a, we could relate a little bit to this story, but we chatted about it. But tell me about how that was for you. You stepped back from being a primary advisor to clients and you moved into the CEO role. How difficult did you find that transition at the time?

Jeff Thurecht (17:27.947)

I found it more difficult than most of our clients found it. So that’s probably the first point. It’s a little bit of a kick to the ego when some clients go, yeah, that’s fine. I don’t need to see you anymore kind of thing. It’s nice when those clients, other clients say, yeah, can you come to the meeting? And I’m still happy to do that. So I think that’s probably one learning that I took out of it. For me, it took a little bit longer to get here than what we probably originally thought it would. And part of that was because we did make a small bolt on acquisition a few years ago when I’d started moving down the path of transitioning a lot of clients and as part of that the advisor who was departing asked me to specifically look after a few of his top clients because we had a really strong relationship. So that kind of you know it made sense you know on a lot of levels so it made me step back into taking on a bit more of that role for a period of time when I was you know sort of one foot out and one foot in the camp. The principal edge acquisition was really the catalyst to go, right, we’ve got to stop being half in, half out on this and make that happen. it was good in terms of the timing was right. I’d been working really closely with Virginia as my associate advisor for a number of years. She’d just been promoted to be an advisor and had built some strong relationships with a lot of those clients. And she was, she is a fantastic advisor and exactly what we needed to help me to let go of a lot of those advisor related roles. And so for me, and I think we shared a similar conversation, for me, the client meetings is the easy bit, it’s the fun bit usually and the part that I still enjoy, it’s all the stuff that happens in between your and your advisor. It’s the ad hoc inquiries or it’s some of the other stuff that goes into it, which I found quite difficult to manage when I was trying to focus on managing and running the business as well. So being able to formally say, right, that’s all now, Virginia is accountable for all of that was quite liberating. However, it meant that I had to work out what I was going to do with my time. And, you know, being an advisor for many years, and I guess I’d never really just been an advisor because most of my most of my journey as an advisor was also, you know, starting a business and managing that there was probably a couple of years where I was just an advisor, but it’s been a long time. So as an advisor, I was used to having my diary full with appointments, and I knew exactly what I had to do every day and who I had to call and who was coming in and which SOAs I needed to check or how I needed to liaise with the paraplanner and that sort of thing. When I relinquished a lot of that, a lot of the structure in my week kind of disappeared and it was now okay, you’ve got this business to run but what are you gonna do? And it was actually harder, that was probably the hardest bit.

Rob (20:24.686)

It surprised you, I suppose, at the time you were thinking, it’s a logical transition. Virginia has been there alongside you. She’d been elevated to advisor. She had the relationships and the trust had been built there. So the building blocks were well in place for you to make that transition, but you had to adjust to the fact that you’re diary was no longer full of client appointments and you’re thinking, okay, now I’ve got to think about how do I structure up my week? What am I going to do? Would I focus my time and attention? What surprised you the most in that transition do you think? Can you think of anything that kind of like really was a surprise and you didn’t expect?

Jeff Thurecht (21:00.023)

I think it was mostly about that time management. I struggled to feel like I was achieving something because when I was seeing clients and you know, I knew my activity, I knew I had to see the seven or eight clients a week and that was what I was measuring myself on. I’m still in client meetings, but I’m in a lot less than I used to be and I’ve got a lot less work to do before those. it was like, how do I measure progress? Because I think it’s a very human thing. You want to see some progress and now I’m thinking up here more. It’s like, okay, I feel like I know I’ve been busy. I know I’ve been doing stuff, but you know, what’s the progress or what have I been doing?

Rob (21:27.79)

100%.

Jeff Thurecht (21:37.57)

Getting clearer on what were the important projects I had to be spending my time on and work. So working with our business coach slash independent board member, he’s given me lot of coaching, a lot of direction, a lot of accountability around that, which has been really good. And then working closely with Belinda, who’s our general manager, who’s been with us pretty much forever on.you know, helping each other get clear on, you’re working on that, what do need my help with? And you know, she needs me to go and do this. So getting better, still a work in progress, but that’s improving a lot.

Rob (22:15.704)

Yeah, what you’re describing there is I think the biggest transition is that you move from being easily measurable, the progress you’re making, feeling like I know the clients, I can see the revenue I look after in terms of the clients, but then having to measure your own progress on things that are not quite as simple linear, because it’s easier to do as an advisor, but yes, focusing your time and attention on what can be. How can we demonstrate progress now with me applying my time and attention on other things in the business? And one area you’ve focused on in particular as a business more broadly is just developing advices internally rather than hiring them fully formed. And Virginia was obviously one of those. Why has that been such an important strategy for you?

Jeff Thurecht (23:03.107)

I think it was something that we sort of fell into it fairly naturally in the early days. I think part of it is because we did decide we wanted to build a business that wasn’t just about us, but we were probably a little bit concerned about where we’re at when we started the business and if we brought other senior people in, how would that work in the business? And so we felt like the support we needed in the short term was more, you know, just sitting below us to allow us to see more people. But then we wanted people who, you know, wanted to grow with us within the business. And that’s been a big focus of the businesses, you while we want to grow is to allow those opportunities. I think the other part of it is we saw pretty early that it’s much easier to transition clients. When they’ve been on the journey with the business and with the client over a number of years. So it helps to bring people like Virginia is a great story. And as an associate advisor, she started meeting with my clients from day one when she was in the business. She was here for 12 months, then she did her, started doing a PY and then another 12 months working closely with me to get to know the clients more and starting to take on a few clients of her own. And then, when the time was right, who sort of appointed that full-time advisor and that’s a well-driven path within our business. We’ve transitioned a lot of clients over the years to other advisors on a similar basis and it just makes the relationship I think with the clients much more seamless and it’s a nice transition.

Rob (24:37.974)

It’s a smooth transition for them isn’t it they don’t get the dislocation of meeting a new advisor by the way this is your new advisor they’ve known Virginia for some time they’ve worked closely with her alongside you for a number of years and so there’s no disruption to the client relationship and the trust they’ve established with your team so yeah it’s just I mean it’s a just a given, isn’t it, that when you do that well, it makes everyone happier in the process. Virginia doesn’t need to be thrown into the deep end either, because otherwise she’s got to try and build trust from day one too. So everyone’s better for that experience, and we follow very much the same path as well.

Jeff Thurecht (25:09.369)

Yeah, I think that’s a really good call out as well in terms of throwing them in the deep end. I think within the business, some of the people who’ve been here a long time would say that my management style is to throw people in the deep end. But it’s more to give them the opportunity. I’m always there with the life ring if they’re gonna drown, I’m gonna throw that out to them before that. But the conversation with a few of our advisors who are now really good, still young advisors is that we wanna make sure we’re setting them up for success as advisors. And so sure, maybe they thought they were ready six or nine months ago to be an advisor. And I would have the conversation that I’m sure it feels like I’m holding you back. And I am, but the reason is, know you could work it out. I know you could make it work, but I don’t want you to go in there and have to make it work. I want you to go in there and thrive in that role. So, you know, take a little bit more time. You’re still young. You’ve got a big long career ahead of you. The business is growing. We want you to grow with us. And that’s probably been the case. You know, I mentioned earlier, we’ve got a higher percentage of female advisors than the industry. And I think with the female advisors, the biggest challenge that many of them face is just the confidence in their own ability. And so to take a little bit more time with them, it’s a balancing act of saying, look, I know you can do it. But I wanna make sure you’re thriving when you move into that role. So, you know, just work with me on that. And that’s, I think, worked well and been rewarding for them as well as our clients, as well as the business. you know, it’s one of my favorite things about my role is seeing those awesome people grow and thrive in their roles.

Rob (26:53.708)

Yeah, I think what you’re describing is something everyone can relate to when they have both young men and young women that want to become advisors and how young men think they’re ready before they are and young women are way ready before they think they are. So it’s just such a contrast and we’ve seen the same thing in our business too. So, but yes, it’s a balancing act with the young guys that are keen to be there today or yesterday. But yeah, encouraging them to just be ready to thrive and be ready. You know, make sure that you have all things in place so that when you’re in the hot seat, the primary advisor, you are fully ready for it. I wanna touch on something that’s the hottest topic. We can’t go a conversation with another practice principle without talking about technology. How are you thinking about technology and advice delivery inside your business? What are you doing? What does the tech stack look like? And what are you spending your time thinking about?

Jeff Thurecht (27:50.308)

Yeah, spending a lot of time like a lot of people thinking about technology. From our perspective, it’s really about how do we keep our focus on the client experience. So getting a better client experience for our value clients and for new clients coming in. But a lot of it is about how do we free up the time of our advisors to spend more time in front of the clients, because that’s when we know that’s when they’re at their best and when they can add the most value. So thinking about how does technology support that has been a big driver. So one of the tech stack at the moment, so we use. We’ve just moved on to FIN 365 as our CRM. So that came about as the principal edge acquisition, they were using PractiFY, we were using Zepo, both firms using XPLAN to write plans and do the modeling side of things. Those contracts were sort of up for renewal. So it made sense to have one CRM anyway. We didn’t think XPLAN was the right solution to be that overall CRM. So we went to the market and came up with FIN 365 as our go-forward CRM. The primary driver of that was because of the Microsoft infrastructure. It’s built on Microsoft Dynamics. We use Microsoft for pretty much everything else. So that’s sort of key integration. So that’s an ongoing project. We’re still, you know, reasonably early days in that it’s given us a great opportunity to really focus on our data to make sure our data is really clean. We’ve got the right information in the right place, that central place now, which, you know, there was some gaps we thought on the Evalesco side, we thought we doing that pretty well. And it was okay, but there’s room to improve. And then on the principal edge side, they had a couple of different places where data was being stored. So being able to bring that together is important. It’s a big, big job. But that was a really valuable exercise there, which can then help us with business level reporting, give us more information for the advisors around their client base and what they can do with that, which I think will be really valuable. And then we can build that one way, same way approach to our processes and systems. yeah, really mindful of not putting good technology on bad processes. So we need to make sure that we’re getting that right as well, because it doesn’t matter how good your tech is, if you’ve got an inefficient process, it’s probably not really going to solve that problem.

Rob (30:19.406)

Yeah, if you’re making something that’s not working more efficient, that’s really not the answer, is it? But I think your point’s well made there. In fact, some of the guests that I’ve had previously talk exactly, even people that are very technology focused and that’s their entire role, they talk about, don’t worry about the technology, get the process right first and then the technology just tries to expedite the process and support the process, but the process must be right. So just to dig into it, so FIN 365 is now the CRM, that’s the… The font of all wisdom in terms of where client information is contained. moved as you say, PractiFY was the platform that Principal Edge had. You were using Zepo. You’ve gone away from both Zepo and PractiFY. It’s now Fin365. Does XPLAN still exist in the business and does it still have a function for you?

Jeff Thurecht (31:08.139)

It does at the moment. So at the moment, it’s still our advice documentation engine. So SOAs are still written out there. Most ROAs are still written out there. We still use it for most of the modeling. And at the moment, it’s still a fair few of the data feeds and that sort of thing still comes through there. That will change. We have removed the ExPlan licenses from many of our team. So now it’s only those who need an ExPlan license. There’s a couple who think they need an ExPlan license that have still got an ExPlan license that, you know, that’s a conversation for another day. So that’s allowed us to be much more focused on, you know, most of the work our advisors are doing is in FIN 365. They don’t need ExPlan. Our associate advisors, para planners and a couple of the admin team have access to X-Plans still. I think that’s the solution for foreseeable future. I haven’t come up with a full X-Plans replacement at this stage. Probably like many people, I think it’s possible over time and probably a direction we would like to head in. But it’s not the number one issue in that space right now.

Rob (32:20.162)

Yeah, it’s not the number one thing you’re thinking about. I’m really curious, Jeff, what you’re doing there with the lending team and the insurance team and the aged care advisory. Are they all using FIN 365 as their central database?

Jeff Thurecht (32:33.197)

The lending team is not, no. They are using it to update. At the moment, they’ve got a separate CRM, which has got all their tools in it. And there is a pathway to having that integrated, which will make that a little bit more seamless. But at the moment it’s not the insurance team are, and actually they’ve been fantastic advocates in recent times about adapting to the processes and systems in there and really taking that on and leading the way. I think from their perspective it’s a little bit easier that’s a smaller team. So it’s like a team within the team and they’ve just gone, right, we’re gonna transition today. This is how we’re gonna do it. We’re gonna embrace the new way. And that’s been fantastic. So yeah, they’re using it for sure.

Rob (33:18.254)

Yeah, so the vision there ultimately is that the tools that are available to the lending team on the software they’re currently using, they might retain those tools, but that the data set might integrate ultimately into the one central CRM. And so you’ve got some things to do there and it’s a never ending scenario trying to make technology all talk to each other and connect and bring all your data into one central warehouse. But so yeah, I totally understand it.

Jeff Thurecht (33:41.796)

Yeah, I mean, one thing we have done recently, and I mentioned to you previously in that space is we’ve just appointed a new role within the business who’s technology and advice delivery manager. So Sam joined us about a month ago. So it’s all brand new. And a lot of it was about what you were just articulating there was there’s so many moving pieces across the business. And you kind of don’t know if you pull on this thread over here, you kind of forget that it might impact something over there until you’ve already done it. And then how do you remind So having someone to come in and because we are in the process of bringing two businesses together, it was the right time to have somebody having that oversight across the top of it. You know, as basic things as advice templates, document templates, and changes we need to make for that. So having one person own that as we bring it together, those processes that we talked about as being so important. So to be able to take the best of both worlds and build a new one way, same way process. We’ve made a lot of ground on that, but we now have a person who is going to be driving that harder and owning that across the business, which was a conscious decision to make it. It’s a technology focus role, she owns Fin365, but it’s also that advice delivery piece which brings in the templates and the processes as well.

Rob (35:01.23)

Did Sam have a technology background or did she come from the financial planning space?

Jeff Thurecht (35:06.287)

Financial Planning Space, so she was a practice manager at a smaller business and had fairly holistic exposure, but she really has been enjoying and liking the technology side of things in recent times, so was eager to be able to narrow her focus a little bit. That was what she said before she got here, now she’s been here a month, I’m sure she’s going, oh my goodness, what have I done? But I think, yeah, I think we’ll get there.

Rob (35:28.814)

What have I signed up for? No, brilliant. mean, it helps, I guess, that you will be able to articulate a vision of what you’re trying to create, but you’ve got someone that can be the DRI, I’ve heard is the new acronym, we love acronyms, don’t we? The Directly Responsible Individual, the DRI. So that’ll be Sam. So speaking of a vision, you’ve set a strategic vision for Evalesco of reaching 3,000 ideal clients by 2030.

Jeff Thurecht (35:48.366)

Yeah, absolutely.

Rob (35:59.215)

You said that some time ago. What sits behind that goal? How do you plan to get to that 3000 by 2030? Is that how you say it? Like 30 by 30 or?

Jeff Thurecht (36:08.111)

3K30. Yeah.

Rob (36:10.158)

3K30.

Jeff Thurecht (36:12.623)

So 3K30 is the tagline. So yeah, we set that a few years ago, probably three years ago, we started working towards that when we had about a thousand clients. It seemed like a stretch goal and it still seems like a stretch goal, which we thought was important to be able to aim high. A couple of key drivers really in setting that goal were we think we do a good job for our clients and we just love for more clients, more Australians to get good financial advice and so we want to play a role in that. So that was one part of it. And then as we talked about before, in terms of the growth of the team, so if the business isn’t growing, then the team are going to hit the ceiling, you know, potentially much sooner than what they would otherwise. So creating those opportunities for the team, and that’s really important for them to see, okay, if the business is growing, that gives me room to move. And as we found as the business has got a little bit bigger, people have probably moved into slightly different roles or different focuses or specialities than what they thought they might have otherwise done. And they’ve had they’ve tried different things and it hasn’t really worked and they’ve gone, well, can I go back to doing what I was doing or can I do something different? And if they’re a good person, then we sort of go, yeah, let’s do it, let’s make it happen. So that was an important part of it as well. So that’s kind of the driver for that number. How are we gonna do it? So we’re targeting 2000 clients organically. And then we’ll probably need to look at some acquisitions, mergers, bolt-ons, not bolt-ons, but acquisitions on mergers to plug that gap. And that’s a real focus. So we’re not looking, we’re always talking to people, but the strategic roadmap for this year is really to bed down the existing processes, get the principal edge merger squared away and focus on the organic growth engine. And then in years two, three, then we’ll look at where the comes up for another merger.

Rob (38:13.048)

Yeah, for sure. It’s all about getting those foundations in place. say always building the platform for growth and not running ahead to inorganic when you’ve actually got to just make sure the house is in order. You’ve just done acquisition, a big one at that, know, 18 months ago. And there’s still some work to be done there to make sure everything’s nice and smooth. But having Sam on the team that make the technology piece run that I’m sure will be a big part of that plan. yeah, she’ll carry a load there for you, I’m sure. So. I’ve got one more question for you, Jeff, if that’s okay. If you had to focus on just one thing, and we’ve talked technology and you’ve built a business that’s been about helping your team grow as you grow, so you said that’s about your big vision. What would move the needle the most for Evalesco right now if you had to focus on just one thing?

Jeff Thurecht (38:45.71)

Yeah, of course. It’s hard to narrow it down, isn’t it? I think, I would say, allowing our advisors to spend more time in front of clients. So that’s multifaceted. It’s to give better service, deliver better outcomes for our existing clients, because I think the more time we spend in front of them, the more helpful we can be to them. But it’s also, if we want to achieve that vision of 3K30, we need to get in front of more Australians. So our advisors need to be freed up to be able to do that. That’s a real important focus of my role and how we’re building out the team.

Rob (39:41.785)

Yeah, as you say there, it’s about delivering better client service. So being able to be more available to the clients is not always about saying, just want to get every advisor to have go from 110 to 150 clients. It’s actually about how do we actually give our advisors more time to spend time with their clients? And so I think I might’ve shared this before on this podcast, but I’ll share it again. It’s worth repeating. When you said it to me when we were having our pre-episode chat, I said there was four things that the Michael Kitsis research out of the US identified as the greatest productivity drivers for advisors. That was one of the three, more time in front of clients. There’s fee confidence is a fourth one. And the top two was getting the team structure right. And you clearly very focused on team. You talked about Virginia’s ascension to advisor working in alongside you. And the Kitsis research just the triangle structure is the most effective structure. Advisor, associate and client services support. And then the second one in that and principle ledger sounds like they’re big part of what your solution will be here is the affluence per client. So the higher affluent clients you actually would tend to be, there’s higher fees and not necessarily double the time spent for double the fee necessarily, but you are certainly delivering a higher value service to a higher value client. So the third on the list was that client facing time which you just said, clearly your focus is in the right area, if that’s the thing that you’re take the time to focus on, because with support of technology and a great team around you, clearly you’re doing great things already. Any final thoughts that you wanna share, because you’re clearly doing a lot of great things in the business there, Jeff, anything you wanna sort of finish up with saying before we call it a day on this episode?

Jeff Thurecht (41:33.027)

Thank you for the kind words Rob. I think, yeah, I certainly can really take on board those four key points that you just raised. think, you know, throughout our conversation, there’s probably been elements of all of those that we’ve talked about and, you know, the growth focus around, you know, ideal clients is really important. So we don’t really need more clients for the sake of it, but we do want to help as many Aussies as we can in the right way. So part of that is around understanding what an ideal client is and that fee confidence to be able to add the value that’s required to charge the right levels of fees. So yeah, that all resonates. I think I’m really excited by the opportunities that we have in front of us as an industry and burgeoning profession, certainly encouraging more people to get involved. I think that’s a big challenge for us. As over the next few years to have more people coming into the industry to help us to be able to provide more advice to Australians because I do think we add so much value. So if anyone’s listening and they’re thinking about getting involved in financial advice, it’s a great profession, great community, can be a really rewarding role and I would 100 % encourage you to pursue that.

Rob (42:46.062)

Love it, Jeff. The whole way through this episode, the one thing that’s come through loud and clear is you’re a very client-focused principal. You’re really thinking about how do we just get advice in the hands of more Australians, because we can actually do so much good for them. And people that do what we do know this already. And so I love the fact that’s a really heart-centered approach to the way you’re building your business. It’s about how do we make sure we do good work for great people and make their lives better. So… Congratulations again, Jeff. Well done winning the IFA Excellence Award, Holistic Advice Award of Year and the Overall Company Award. Terrific work and I’m sure there’s people listening now that will be inspired by hearing what you’re doing and thinking there’s things they can do to make their business improve the way you’re just relentlessly trying to do it as well. So well done again.