Page 43 - Investment Advisor June 2022

ESG HORIZONS

By Jane Wollman Rusoff

Why Half of Mercer’s 500 Advisors Are Women

CEO Dave Welling says that high water mark is a “differentiator” for the firm.

ercer Advisors is uncommon
in an industry that “sorely
M struggles with diversity,” as
CEO Dave Welling frames it. Indeed,
about half of Mercer’s 500 advisors are
women, he told Investment Advisor in
an interview.
In 2018, a year after he came on board,
Welling launched a major recruiting
push to expand the number of female
financial advisors in the firm. “It’s about
standing up for the right thing” since
“one might say that [financial advisors saw [showed] that total female advi- When you took over as CEO five years ago,
are] ‘pale, male and stale’ across the sors across the RIA industry were in AUM was about $9 billion. Now it’s about
industry,” says Welling, 53. the mid-20%s. We’re more than double $40 billion. Do you attribute that increase
That is, 82% of U.S. financial advisors that. Over 50% of our advising team are to acquisitions or organic growth?
are white, according to the Financial women; in 2017, when I joined the firm, It’s about half and half. We have very
Planning Association. Only 23% of certi- it came to about 25% or 30%. strong organic growth of new clients;
fied financial planners are women, the we bring on about $1 billion per quarter
CFP Board reports. Why has gender diversity been so of new business.
Mercer, with $40 billion in assets under important to you?
management, is ranked eighth on Barron’s It’s really about doing the right thing How many acquisitions have you made?
Top RIA list for 2021. Genstar Capital and and standing up for the right thing in About 56 since 2016 — 50 of those since
Oak Hill Capital, Mercer investors, are an industry that sorely struggles with I joined as CEO. About 10 of those have
strategic advisors for the firm. diversity. One might say it’s pale, male been female-led practices. That’s been
Launched in 1986 as a fee-only final and stale across the industry. the result of extensive work we’ve done
planning company, Mercer had expanded to drive diversity into our workforce —
to 18 offices operating as one firm by 2015. What led you to specialize in acquiring our advisor ranks and leadership.
Here is part of the interview; the full women-owned firms?
one can be found at ThinkAdvisor.com. When I joined the company, I saw many Do you ever get queries from female
talented women that already were in FAs who want to form their own firm
Investment Advisor: If I said that the organization; but I felt they weren’t and would like to join you to get the
acquiring women-owned businesses is empowered and that their voices weren’t support you provide?
your niche, would that insult you? amplified enough. So in 2018, we launched We don’t offer our platform a la carte,
I would take issue with that. I think it’s a formal recruiting initiative [for women] like a TAMP [turnkey asset manage-
an insult calling women a niche when and established mentorship programs. ment platform] does, to people who
they’re 50%-plus of the population. aren’t part of the organization. We have
You were targeting women-led firms, then? an active recruiting effort to hire people
Well, then, does acquiring women- Perhaps they targeted us as a different who are already advisors or on track to
owned financial practices differentiate kind of wealth management firm for be advisors; maybe they’re studying for
your company? women-led businesses looking for an their CFP. They can join a wealth man-
Adobe Stock We’re starkly different than the rest values, principles and the diversity they Of course, full acquisition would be at
organization to join that shared their
agement team in one of our local offices.
I do think it’s a differentiator, for sure.
the other end of the spectrum.
of the industry. The last numbers I
[wanted] to see in the industry.
JUNE 2022 INVESTMENT ADVISOR 41