How Values Shape Financial Success with Ben Hoeger

In this episode of Looking Forward Our Way, we talk with Ben Hoeger, financial advisor and Director of Private Wealth Management at the Hedley Hoeger Group at Baird Private Wealth Management. Ben provides practical advice on navigating the often intimidating world of financial planning, especially during turbulent economic times.

We begin by celebrating Ben’s team’s recent recognition by Forbes and Shook Research as a best-in-state wealth management team—a testament to their teamwork and dedication. Ben shares some of his own journey into this field, shaped by his education at Otterbein and early career experiences that focused not just on investments, but on supporting people through life’s twists and turns.

Ben explains the key questions to ask when choosing a financial advisor, emphasizing the importance of understanding an advisor’s process, communication style, and compensation. More critically, he highlights the personal side of financial planning: finding a relationship rooted in trust and genuine interest in your life, not just your money.

We walk through what it’s like to become a new client—starting with conversations around personal values and goals long before crunching numbers. Ben underlines how effective financial planning is built on clarity around what matters most to you, so decisions during life’s expected and unexpected changes always circle back to those core values.

Our conversation covers techniques for balancing savings for near-term needs, emergencies, and longer-term goals, using a “bucket” approach to risk and time horizons. We also round out the discussion by addressing how tools like artificial intelligence fit into the advisor-client relationship, and why the human touch remains irreplaceable.

Ben introduces the Life Planning Initiative at his firm, which supports clients’ broader well-being—not just their balance sheets—and leaves us with wise advice: align your financial strategy with your values for a more fulfilling journey ahead.

If you like this episode, please let us know. We appreciate the feed back, and your support of offset costs of producing the podcast!

Moments

00:00 Discovering a passion for finance

06:40 Choosing the right team expertise

08:58 Building lasting client relationships

11:01 Discussing financial advisor background checks

15:15 Discussing personal financial motivations

19:25 Importance of financial goals

23:22 Using the bucketing approach

24:39 Discussing investment risk strategies

27:45 Aligning risk tolerance with guidance

31:56 AI and Social Security advice

35:03 Finding purpose beyond retirement

38:04 Aligning investments with personal values

FAQ

1. What should I ask a financial advisor in my first meeting?

According to Ben Hoeger at 06:06, you should ask about their process, the type of clients they typically serve, how and how often they communicate, their investment philosophy, and critically, how they get paid. It's also important to ensure their approach aligns with your needs and that you feel comfortable and can trust them.

2. How do I start working with a financial advisor?

Ben Hoeger explains at 12:51 that the process usually starts with an introductory conversation focused on getting to know each other and discussing your motivations for seeking financial advice, rather than diving into numbers right away. The next steps typically involve discussing your values, vision, and goals before moving on to financial details.

5. How do I check a financial advisor's background or credentials?

At 11:01, Ben Hoeger recommends reviewing a financial advisor's "U4" report, which documents their work history, licenses, and any complaints. This is an essential part of doing your due diligence before entrusting someone with your finances.

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Recorded in Studio C at 511 Studios. A production of Circle 270 Media® Podcast Consultants.

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/

Copyright 2026 Carol Ventresca and Brett Johnson

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Listener Disclaimer

The views and opinions expressed by the experts interviewed on this podcast are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of the podcast hosts or any affiliated organizations. The information provided in these interviews is for general informational purposes only and should not be considered as professional advice. Listeners are encouraged to consult with qualified professionals for specific advice or information related to their individual circumstances. The podcast host and producers do not endorse or guarantee the accuracy, completeness, or reliability of any information provided by the experts interviewed. Listener discretion is advised.

We are looking forward our way. Hi, this is Brett. As we watch the stock market bounce up and down and then nervously open our retirement account reports, we know how essential financial planning can be. Today we're going to learn more about successfully finding and working with a financial advisor and the challenges we each face in building our own personal strategy. Our expert guest is Ben Hoegar, financial advisor and director of Private Wealth Management at Hedley Hoeger Group at Baird Private Wealth Management. Ben, thanks again for joining us.

Yeah, absolutely. Happy to be here again.

It's good to see you. We always like having Ben come back. He gives us great tips. As Brett always says, we learn something new each time we have one of our guests in. So thank you for your time.

Yeah, happy to be here. Absolutely.

So I need to mention that back in January, the Hedley Hager Group was recognized by Forbes magazine and shook research, which I had not heard of, as a 2026 best in state wealth management team. So congratulations to you and your team.

Yeah, absolutely. And that's the big part there. You know, Jeff and I have had these individually in the past, but this one being a team award and recognition is. It really meant a lot to us because this at the end of the day is a team sport for us. So that really meant a lot to all of us.

How does that affect people? Do you get information like people. More people coming in because they saw that?

Yeah, you know, I think it. It gets out there that it's an accolade and recognition that sometimes your name will float more to the top of the list, I guess you could probably say. But more than anything, what we find is. It's interesting. I know we're going to talk about this later is in. In a world of AI, when how people search to find teams like PR announcements, stuff like that, it automatically makes your name come to the top a little bit faster. And I think there's an element of trust that it's not just me saying we're good. There's other people through their research and their metrics, that they're kind of signing off on the same kind of idea.

Like a Yelp.

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Right, Exactly. Much more legitimate than Yelp.

Exactly. Yes. No money, intent, you know, connected.

But.

Well, I would. I would think that, you know, I. Cause I look at stuff like that. I mean, especially Forbes, you know, this isn't, you know, recognized. Exactly. This isn't Columbus Monthly or something. So. Anyway, Ben, thank you again for joining us.

There are many adults in Ohio who are struggling to make ends meet as well as think about their eventual retirement. A lot of folks saying they don't think they'll ever get to retire. So we really appreciate your insights in all of this, but first let's hear about you and your background and how your journey to a career in financial planning began.

Yeah, so obviously Carol, you and I, we, we have our common connection of Otterbein, where I started my schooling and it was a combination of finance and economics. And you know, what I found over time was I was definitely gravitating more towards, I guess you'd kind of call it the social science aspect of helping people with personal finances and investments are a part of it. But these days, more and more it feels like the investment part is, is the basic blocking and tackling that everybody assumes. It's all the other stuff that comes with your journey of finances for people as you become an adult, have a family, et cetera. That is really what I started to gravitate towards. And so in my, the end of my sophomore year, I met Jeff Headley, my, my now business partner, and that was over 20 years ago, started working with him at UBS as an intern and kind of started to work, learned more about what this industry is really about. Learned about the fact that at the end of the day, what you read in a book doesn't really explain everything that happens with our personal finances. And not everything is black and white.

You can't read everything. And so really built some skills through that and an understanding stayed at UBS and more of an associate planner role. And that was really where my eyes were open to everything that it takes to help families and higher net worth individuals as I worked with a brilliant group of attorneys and other specialists that was helping families. And then about 17 years ago, Jeff and I got the band back together, as they say, and we started our time at Baird, where we've been for the last 17 years.

Wonderful. Yeah. You know, again, the opportunity for students, college students, to actually be in a workplace. And this is a perfect example of not only helping you see even more as to what the opportunities were for you, but to also let you know that this is something you want to do. I mean, because sometimes internships tell you what you don't want to do, but to not be shocked by whomever walks in the door.

Yeah, absolutely.

And that's huge.

Absolutely. I had a great professor while I was at Otterbein and he always would share this in many classes over the years that your work in the classroom should make your internship or your work easier. And the work that you're doing in the office should make your classroom work easier if you're really finding your right stride. And, and it's, and it's meant for you. So it, it's something I recognized early and knew that I was going down the right path.

Yeah, we're wonderful. And of course, shout out to our, our fellow alum and to those at Otterbein that we so still dearly love that little quiet, peaceful village.

Any chance we can.

Right, Exactly.

Well, last year we discussed the importance of saving and planning through turbulent times. Never too early to get started. Obviously, we're still in turbulent times, so we want to focus on finding a qualified financial advisor we can be comfortable working with for those first critical steps. Are there particular questions an individual should prepare for their first meeting with that potential financial advisor?

Yeah. So I think of this in two different tranches. It's all the things that I would consider to be basic questions, but it's the things that at the end of the day, if you did a Google search, what question should I ask Advisor? It's going to be the things that are most likely going to pop up. It's the questions about what's their process. And ultimately asking yourself whatever that answer is, does it align with what you're looking to get advice on? Some. There are some financial advisor teams out there that they're simply there to help you invest your money. They're not going to answer questions about Social Security or tax or estate. Right.

So understanding what it is that you're looking for. And more and more these days, teams are starting to have niches or expertise just around like the medical profession or just executives or just business owners. So understanding what their process is, what their background is, what, what their, the folks that they help, what that looks like, and making sure it aligns with what you're trying to achieve, I think is where you'd want to spend some time with your questions, how they communicate and how often that that becomes an expectation thing. I've, I shared this in another recording that, that my partner Jeff and I did, and I've been using it a lot recently. This, there's, there's a saying that happiness equals reality minus expectations. So. Right. So I, I think about that a lot.

And, and for me, this is a lot of the questions that you're building and, and asking any advisor is what you're expecting, are they aligning with what they're going to share the reality of your experience with them. So that I think that's a big one. You know, learning who is the team and who will communicate with you most often? Again, that that can be a big misnomer. You might meet with, quote, unquote, a partner from day one, but then who you're actually talking with on a day in and day out basis might be someone completely different. So understanding is that, again, it's expectations. That doesn't even mean that that has to be a bad thing. But learning that and knowing that up front is going to ease a lot of pain or unhappiness as time passes. Just understand their investment philosophy.

You don't have to spend a ton of time on it, but if they can kind of share their general view, views of how they help people handle their money. Because if it's something that's just grossly wrong or against your moral values or something like that, you want to make sure that you're aligned. And again, that that's not going to be a point of friction as time goes on. Lastly, I obviously, you know, I feel like the obvious one is how they get paid in our world today. It feels like more and more, some of the traditional ways of how you pay for the service is starting to shift and change a little bit. So just understanding what is that? How. How could it change over time as I add more money or if money goes away, however that might look, just understand that. So those are what I'd call the basic questions now, the things that aren't really a question, but I'd say it's kind of a gut feeling.

Comes back to this idea that financial planning and this relationship you're looking to build is not a transaction. I think there's a lot of good realtors out there that go way beyond just a transaction. But it makes me immediately think of a real estate transaction where it happens, it's done, and you may never talk to that realtor again because you may just stay in that home. Right. The relationships that we build, I'm talking with them several times a year, sitting down with them face to face several times a year. So it kind of feels a bit like a marriage where you have to understand who is this person that I'm getting into this relationship with and why look forward to talking with this person. The last thing that you would want to do is you see this person, your advisor, who's supposed to be helping you with your financial decisions. You see them calling your phone and you just want to hit silence because you don't want to talk to him.

Right? Yeah. Not. Not a good outcome. So. So that's. That's a Biggie. And I think it just goes hand in hand with the same idea of, you know, can you trust them at the end of the day? And lastly, are they interested in you? Are they interested in you or just your money?

Oh, that's huge.

That's a biggie.

That is huge. I have said this to you. Nothing aggravates me more than the idiot TV commercials where the hook is you don't want to pay taxes. Well, guess what? You're going to pay taxes today or tomorrow. It's going to happen. And we're going. That's the hook that they pull people in. And, you know, you know that they're not worried about you in particular in your own situation.

And two, you know, if we are looking at the backgrounds of our doctors, how could we not look at how we're going to work with somebody who's going to literally have our livelihood in their hands for the next few decades?

Yeah. And I don't remember if we've talked about this before because I know I've been on here a couple of times, so maybe I've shared this with you and the listeners that follow you all in the past. But around that question, if there's ever a concern, or quite frankly, it's your own due diligence as someone that's about to turn over this money to someone, there's essentially, I would call it my license report or my driver's license history, if you will, of my work. It's called your U4, and it documents where I've worked, when I earned my licenses, if I've ever had any complaints. I mean, you can see the ins and outs of my past, if that's, you know, and I do think that's something that everyone should make sure that they're researching.

You know, I think we did talk about that the last time, and we put it in our resources, information for the audience, and we'll do it again this time.

Absolutely. I think it's critical as a part of that due diligence on your part of an investor working with an advisor.

Well, Brett and I were just having a conversation earlier today about scam emails and how many times we get information coming at us that looks like it's from our bank or someone, you know, you need to know who it is you're communicating with out there. You can't assume because they have an office that they're not going to walk away with your money. So, yeah, there you go. So, okay, let's pretend I'm a new client and you are My new financial advisor. What are the steps? How do we start the first steps on a path to financial success? Do we document our goals based on our values? What about tolerance to risk and perhaps the amount of time we have to retirement? Give us the basics on these steps.

Yeah, absolutely. So every time, first of all, everybody's gonna do this in their own slightly different way. So everybody's process is gonna. But it's probably going to follow some kind of similar path in general. So ours always starts with just a basic intro conversation. If someone reaches out to us or is referred to us, whatever it might be. And at the heart of that intro conversation, it's really not much to do with numbers at all. It's really the goal of it is for me to get to know you a little bit as a person, for you to get to know me a little bit as a person.

And probably one of the biggest things that I want to come out of that conversation that then can start to steer some of our conversations, not necessarily goals. But why is it that you chose to pick up the phone and talk to a stranger about your money?

Right. You don't even talk to your parents about your money.

No. I mean, in the hierarchy of things that we are open about sharing with our friends, colleagues, et cetera, it's interesting. We'll share a lot of crazy stuff before we'll talk about money. And so keeping that in mind, I always, always have that in my heart and on my mind when. When I go into these. One of these conversations is, look, this person's probably not super comfortable. There probably is something that is really weighing on their mind, and that's why they chose to pick up that. That phone.

And there's probably also going to be moments of vulnerability where they're going to admit that they made a mistake. Right. And so I. I have that in mind every time I go into these conversations. And I'm there just to support that conversation and figure out what it is that pushed them over to say, I want to talk to someone. So we figure that out the next. And. And then we, at that point, we agree, okay, based on what you learned about me, what I learned about you, kind of what you have going on, does it make sense that we proceed at least with the next step? Still not committing, but let's go a little bit further.

And that next step, we still don't. We still don't get into the numbers much, but this is when that. That idea of goals starts to come out that you mentioned, Carol, is. And we just think about Goals a little bit different. So we, we, we look at it and we say we want to move on to a value and vision discussion. So in, in this value and vision discussion, this is where we want to get into the heart of kind of the why. So someone can say, I want to retire in five years. That's wonderful.

Help me understand a little bit why. Right. You know, what is it that's driving that decision? Or if someone says, I want to buy a lake house, okay, that's awesome. We can help solve for that. But let's understand why. Okay? So that value and vision discussion really still isn't about the money. Because ultimately after that, once we've figured out what it is that shapes the decisions that you make when it comes to your finances, after that, pretty much everything else becomes math, right? But if you don't figure out those values and the vision, that really is going to drive the emotions and what really makes you tick as a person when it comes to your finances, when those numbers shift around, it's going to be hard to help you because we don't know what drives you. Right.

So that's where we start. And then after that, we get into the numbers and we understand your risk tolerance and timelines and finances and gaps. And ultimately we're going to build a plan, agree on that plan, and then from there on out, it's monitor and adjust.

You know, I have mentioned to you before that I talk to my young cousins, particularly when they are just coming out of college, to really think about financial planning. And it's never too early, never too late to think about retirement. Do you see people coming to you? They're going through life transitions or is it crisis management?

Yeah, it's a little bit of both, I'll be honest. It's kind of one of the really neat things about the work that we get to do is I never know what's going to come up the next day or what that conversation might look like. Even if it's a family I've worked with for a couple of decades or more, and I think their situation is extremely stable, next thing you know, they might call me and, you know, all the terrible things I've seen over the years. A spouse passed away unexpectedly in their 50s, never should have happened. They were, you know, a marathon runner and they dropped out of a heart attack.

And.

And then we get the call from, From. From the widow. Right. Or all of a sudden there's a divorce or, you know, some of those are the terrible things. But then on the flip side, it's the, you know, the really exciting stuff. Hey, I'm getting married, I'm having a kid, or, hey, my kid is having a grandkid. How can we help them plan for college? Right. So a lot of them are driven by.

By life changes, but then sometimes it's the. The catastrophes or the unknowns, the unexpected that happens that we're here to support people through.

Wonderful.

Well, let's keep on with that scenario. We found the best financial advisor. We've drafted the goals. This financial advisor also needs to help us prepare for transitions. We kind of alluded to that we're going to face changes affecting those funds. As an advisor, what can you do to guide that client? Do you make changes to the plan or stick with it? How does that work?

Yeah. So I never want to be a broken record, but I'm going to come back to some. Some words, and you're going to keep hearing me say these words of values and vision. And in this case, it comes back to that idea of values. If, if again, if we're doing our work on the front end correctly and we're understanding, you know, your values and what's truly driving you as life changes, we are going to be able to pivot with that because we understood your why. Yes, you maybe also gave us a concrete goal, whether it's a number or a thing you're trying to achieve. But more importantly, we understood the why and the driving force behind that. So sometimes I think it's helpful to give an example of how this plays out in actual world here.

So I always use the example of the lake house I brought up. I think it's the easiest one to use as an example in this conversation. So that's a goal, right? At the end of the day, that's a goal. And I always tell people, planning just becomes math. Then what's the dollar amount we need to get to? What's our ability to save to it? And assume some returns and a timeline, and we've come back into the math. Right. However, as you suggested, Brett, life can change. Things can come up along the way that you didn't expect.

So let's say we were trying to save for this lake house and we were making our progress towards it, and then someone unexpectedly loses a job, and all of a sudden your financial picture changes. Well, if we had that conversation on the front end of, why is this lake house so important to me or my family as a priority? And let's just say that priority was, hey, I grew up going to this, a similar lake house or a lake house of some form. I built all these memories. It's so important to me. I want to build that same idea for my kids. Right. Well, now I understand the motivating factor behind this. So if your finances change, I'm going to be there to guide us through that discussion and say, remember why you said you wanted to do this? Okay, let's go back to that.

Well, do we have to own the lakehouse to be able to still generate those memories? No. All right, can we pivot and do something like an Airbnb for a week every summer? And it still doesn't even mean that that's out of your picture forever. But for now, because of this curveball that life threw you, we need to understand how we can pivot on those goals, but still be concrete in your values and in your vision of what you're really trying to achieve.

That could even be where a situation is not so much that you're never going to reach that goal, but say there's a really important thing that came up that suddenly you don't really want to do the lake house, but I want to do something else. So having that plan gives you that flexibility to pop from one to the other. So it may not be because of a job change. It may be because, well, I don't need a lake house because I move near the ocean. Yeah, there you go.

Absolutely. And we see all kinds of scenarios of, hey, gosh, I never imagined my kids would move to the west coast or down south or whatever. It. So this idea of maybe a second property you thought you were going to have, well, now it's irrelevant, primarily because it's like, well, where my kids are, where they're living, they're never going to be here. All right, well, that was a new one. So let's figure out how we're going to pivot this so we can still make sure that we're getting together as a family. Because that, again, was the driving force of the goal.

Right. Well, so then the next step, we're making these plans to not only meet today's needs, but future changes, too. Do we need to look at the savings process of our money using different techniques, some that meet our current needs, while other techniques may be to meet soon to be needs and then other techniques for long term goals. How do we build in all of those different ways to cushion savings? Also for emergencies?

Yeah, for sure. This is where I come back to. I try to help paint a picture for folks. And one, a lot of this comes back to the Timeline. But I think of this idea of a bucket approach, right. Where you have, if you could kind of imagine a cascading set of buckets full of water and the top one is flowing into the second one and down into the lower one. And the idea is each one of those buckets have different, I guess, risk profiles. Right.

So the lowest bucket, that's kind of the last place that the water is flowing into in this cascading image is for your very near term priorities. Right. It's, it's the time horizon that says we don't have time to make up for losses. If something unexpected happens in the market, which happens all the time, every year and you know, multiple times, so every day. Right? Yeah, we have to, we have to deal with this again. It's kind of the same as we were talking about with life can change. Well, so can markets or economic circumstances. So we have to have a game plan for that.

And so having this bucketing approach makes a lot of sense from a time horizon standpoint. But then even segregating what your, what your goals are, you know, I personally do this. I, you know, I have multiple bank accounts. I have the thing for the house, I have the thing for vacation. So you're, you're kind of mentally doing some accounting or maybe just very purposefully having different accounts with absolutely different purposes. So I think all of that, everybody's going to find their own way to do this. I've heard families still have the, like the jar method where they have cash in the jar and they pull it out. Well, when, when they reach in the jar and it's not there when they, they don't go out to dinner that day.

Right. So everybody has their own method of managing this. But I do think having some way to account for these different priorities you're trying to achieve and how you're allocating dollars is going to be a big thing to keep you in line, but also then helping you be rational about when market situations change or the outcome of your investments change. You can deal with that a little bit more rationally if what you're trying to use that money for is still 10 plus years away. Do we need a panic because of a headline today? I would argue no. It's probably the worst thing we could do.

I like that idea too. When the buckets gives me a better way to view it because I always think of accounts and that's almost overwhelming. But you think of buckets and you think that each one has its own separate profile in terms of risk. Again, for young People, they may be one or the other. Like I'm going to risk everything because I got 50 years to make it up, or I'm not losing one penny, I'm working too hard for it. But to see how each bucket, each priority has a different amount of risk that you're able to, to deal with. I mean, I can remember I was 49 when I got my current financial planner and I didn't think I should take any risk. But when you.

Luckily our conversation was, oh, you've got four decades here that you can make up. And also I think too, a much more rational look at the market. People panic each day. And I've been sort of laughing this year. One month you lose this many thousands of dollars and the next month you made it all back, plus a bit you just don't know.

No. And that is probably the toughest thing. It's really hard for us to deal with this as investors. I'm just going to put myself in the same pool as everyone trying to achieve some kind of goal and that this isn't my purpose profession. It's really hard for us as investors to deal with this because if, if it's an unknown, it's the same as your health. If I'm not a doctor and I feel something weird going on, it's hard to stop your brain from going to the worst case scenario. Right? It's. We are really good at projecting what is happening today forever.

So when things are going bad, we assume it's going to go bad forever. When things are going to go great, we assume it's going to go great forever. But we know that that's not really how it happens. Everything kind of moves back to the median at some point.

So when you're also looking at different risks for different pots of money, and I mentioned in my question methods, there are different ways of looking at savings. So for some people, they only want to invest in specific stocks because they love trying to find out what's going to make money. And then for those of the rest of us who are looking at only mutual funds and people who want to only do gold and now cryptocurrency. So that's all part of that planning

has to all be, has to all make sense. And I think probably the best way to think about this is everybody has a different level of two things. Risk capacity versus risk tolerance. Right. So your plan is what's going to define risk capacity? How much risk can you take?

Take.

Okay. And we're here to help educate someone on that idea of Risk capacity. So they understand that part. But unfortunately, even if I tell you you can take a lot or you can't take a lot, whichever way it falls on, someone might have a completely different idea of what their risk should be and what their tolerance is. And then I think that comes back to your point, Carol, of look, I could tell you you need X amount in, you know, more growth type investments, stocks, whether it's individual or funds, whatever fits the profile or fits that advisor's philosophy and style. But at the end of the day, if you say I don't want any, the problem is, if I put you in that and then the bad day comes, how am I ever going to hold you there? It is absolutely going to be the conversation of sell everything I have and sell it all now. And it's probably at the worst possible moment. So being aligned with that and having that open line of communication with your advisor has to be paramount in that discussion.

Yeah, well, artificial intelligence is finding its way into every aspect of our lives and financial planning is included in that bucket. There may be a lot of great information in the AI space, but can it provide what a live financial advisor, face to face, can deliver?

Yeah, it's a great question because this is something that I think our every. Gosh, I think every industry is grappling with right now. I would start with the idea that we need to understand what is AI really suited for. AI is really good at analyzing large data sets of market information. So that could be a huge benefit and a tool to an advisor. Does that do a lot to help you understand if you're on track for retirement? It could in some sense, but not in others. Right. Again, I think it's.

You need to understand it for what it is and where its limitations are. But it is a really good tool. So it can also identify trends or inconsistencies. It's absolutely improving speed and efficiency behind the scenes. So our ability, when questions are asked or when we're doing work for families that we serve, our ability to serve them in a greater capacity is being influenced by AI. Do I think it's replacing us? No, because I'm not relying on it to answer the question. It's kind of takes me back to some of my early finance days at Otterbein, where, yes, we had financial calculators that could do all these fancy future value type calculations of understanding how money grows and with just a push of the button. But we had to learn how to do it by hand first.

Because if you don't know how to do it by hand first or you don't understand what the inputs or assumptions are, it's going to give you an answer. It will absolutely give you an answer, but you have no idea is that answer relevant to me? Right. And I think that's probably where the biggest gap is in many industries that people are saying AI is going to replace this role or this entire industry. I would argue against that in many ways just because of the fact that it's not just about the output, it's understanding what the output means. Right.

I remember taking an accounting class and the accounting faculty said, here's the T and figure out your debits and credits because you need to understand it before you just throw it into Excel. So really, when you're thinking about AI, maybe I'm oversimplifying this. It's probably a great tool to use to get research on what's already happened. But in terms of looking forward, for instance, if it AI only has so much information in it, that's a lot of information, but it only has what people have fed into it. And for the most part, financial planners have said the 4% rule, when you retire, you don't spend more than 4% of your retirement funds. Well, that information is changing and could be different for you. So if you put that into AI and it says, oh yeah, I use the 4% rule going into the future, it may not make sense.

It's the same with. Before we hopped on here, we were talking about Social Security, right? And you can go and ask any one of the AI models out there, when should I collect Social Security? And you can maybe even feed it a little bit of information about yourself. So you're hopefully it's going to get you a little bit closer. But at the end of the day, a lot of the rules of thumb of collecting Social Security, it comes down to, you know, a lot of work behind the scenes of, okay, is does this really make sense for me? Or how do I match these cash line items up? How is that going to impact my taxes? How is that going to flow into Medicare impacts? And so at the end of the day, understanding the flow of all that, I think the limitation comes in, where can you give the AI system all the information it needs to really get you an accurate answer? I think that's usually where the shortcome comes into play. And that's where I come back to this idea that ultimately it's the AI plus the advisor is the ultimate tool. It's not either or by itself. And I would even probably throw that Back up into those questions that we were talking about earlier. What questions do you ask your advisor when you meet with them? How do they use AI? They shouldn't be afraid of it, really.

They really shouldn't be afraid of it. You should hope that they're accepting it and they're harnessing it because it is going to make them a better advisor. At the end of the day, actually,

the question really is not just how they're using it, but are they putting the work into understanding and researching how AI can benefit them and their clients? Brett and I have been having a lot of discussions about AI in different venues and different topics, and it all goes back to the same as everything else. You've got to do your own research.

Yeah.

You have to be comfortable with the information you've got.

And that's just. That's the human element that you're trying to add into this equation. Yep, absolutely.

So one of the things I love going on your website and getting more and more information about all the services and things that you do. And we will put information about your company into the resources because I would encourage our audience to go to the website and see all of the videos and the blogs and all the information that you all are putting out there. One of the services that you have is called Life Planning Initiative, and this includes resources and support for not only wealth building, but employment, housing, healthcare, wealth, lots more. So tell us a little bit about that.

Yeah, absolutely. So this is probably. This is the one thing that I think rounds us out. There's a concept out there that people throw around a lot. They call it comprehensive wealth management. And we felt like we always did that. And several years ago, gosh, probably almost 10 years ago now, we were working with an executive here in Columbus, and she came to us and challenged us with, hey, you prepared me financially, no doubt about it, I am ready, I'm confident, et cetera. But where I am falling short is I just don't know how I'm going to spend my time.

I'm afraid of retirement because other than maybe the first month or two where I'm going to feel like, gosh, I'm on vacation and I can finally breathe, I don't know what my purpose is beyond that. And I'm struggling with what retirement looks like, not financially again, but more emotionally and mentally. And so we knew that we weren't doing everything that we needed to do to help people. And so this is where we come back to this idea that wealth and investing comes in many forms. It's not Just bank accounts and investment accounts to actually steal a line from a friend of mine. He's done some great work in this space, Brian Portnoy, he wrote a great book, if we want to throw this into the resource called Geometry of Wealth. And the idea, in his book Geometry of Wealth, he talks about this idea called true wealth of True wealth is funded contentment. And I feel like that's where we were falling short, that we were focused on the Excel sheets and, you know, numbers and, you know, how people were growing their wealth, but not what that meant to them as, as a person.

Right. And so we really believe this idea that true wealth isn't a mindset. It's. It's a, it's, you know, it is a mindset. It's not a balance sheet. And so, you know, we realized that we work with people, we work with humans, and we want to focus on that human and how can we support them to get the most out of their life as far as what they're looking to achieve? Right. We're not asking someone to do more than they want to, but if you tell me you aspire to do this, spend more time with your family or whatever it might be, we're here to support those missions and help you build the daily habits with those life planning resources, which ultimately come down to a host of coaches that we work with to support people in many of those different roles. And it doesn't just come at that point of transition to retirement, which can be a challenge.

That's a big leap in a life change to grapple with. But even throughout your career. I got a message from a family we've worked with for a long time. Both these folks are doing well in their careers. They're probably in the middle of their career and, and again, doing real well. But they reached out and they said, hey, do you guys have anything? I'm thinking about kind of looking over my resume and reviewing my LinkedIn profile. I said, absolutely, we do. We have an amazing coach that helps do exactly that.

And again, the idea is, is that at that point, we're trying to set that person and that family up to invest in themselves. Right. Because at the end of the day, the great outcome is going to be hopefully a more fulfilling and a more profitable career for them.

Right.

Well, time's gone fast again. Kid Grief, thanks for joining us. As we always do, we ask our guests if they have any last words of wisdom. Not that this episode hasn't been full of wisdom, but it's an opportunity for you to add or reinforce what's already been said. So any other suggestions or advice for our listeners today?

Yeah, I feel like the capstone to a lot of the comments I made would be, you know, take the time to understand what you value and what is truly important to you and make sure that at the end of the day your capital that exists today and where you're investing your money on an ongoing basis is aligned with that. If you don't have that alignment it's going to feel like something is missing in your life.

Wonderful. Thank you so much. It was so good to see you. Ben. Thank you for coming to see us again and talk to our listeners. Our thanks to our expert guest Ben Hoeger, financial advisor and director of private wealth management with the Headley Hoeger Group And a shout out to the Hedley Hoeger Group who are wonderful. They're part of the Robert W. Baird and Company.

Thank you for joining us today.

Absolutely. Thank you.