While visiting Santa Cruz last year in August at the FPA Far West Roundup, I stepped into a surf shop on the wharf and saw a magic 8-ball for sale (I’m still not exactly certain what magic 8-balls and surfing have to do with each other). I hadn’t seen one of these things in quite some time, and it reminded me that, much like many of the other toys and games our children play with, …
What does it take to be a great investor today? If you consider yourself the manager of your household’s finances, or if you’re a financial advisor that believes behavioral coaching and guidance can help clients be financially successful, then you will want to take a look at our latest white paper, Understanding Great Investors: The Competencies of Investing Success. The white paper, which shares the findings from one of our latest studies on investors in the …
Our data consistently tells us that in the arena of personal-finance outcomes, behaviors matter. They matter a lot. So we thought it was time to try and quantify—from a dollars and net-worth perspective—exactly how much is “a lot.” We’ll consider savings rate as a critical behavior. We have talked here before about the difference in savings rates between “high-potential” and “low-potential” individuals, as measured by scores on the DataPoints Building Wealth assessment. As a quick …
Imagine that you can ask your prospective client only two questions before deciding if they are a good fit for your practice. What would you ask, and why? The statement above is an example of a structured interview question. Structured interviews are a systematic way to get to know a client, applicant, or other new colleague that links interview questions to topics or competencies that are critical to understand at the beginning of that …
Suppose you are trying to understand the complex underlying personal characteristics of your client, a potential employee, or even yourself. In that case, it goes without saying that you need a good tool (i.e., a good assessment) to measure these not-so-obvious personal characteristics. This is the heart of psychometrics: the science of measuring individual differences (that is, our unique personal characteristics). Typically, psychometrics involves gathering multiple responses related to a characteristic to ensure you’re …