Diversified’s Vision
Doubling Down on Your Well-Being
I’d like to take time out from my regularly scheduled blogs to address you, our wonderful and loyal clients. I believe as partners of ours, and the reason for our existence, it is nice to slow down once in a while to address you directly. More specifically, I think it is nice to share with you the direction and vision of Diversified, LLC. To properly do so I’d like to take a look at where we have been, where we are currently, and where we are going as a company. Sound good?
For starters, let me describe my “corporate” role at Diversified as the President. We currently have a well-laid out executive leadership team comprised of my partner & Chief Compliance Officer David Levy CFP®, CEO Michael Fisher CFP®, Chief Investment Officer Mike Horwath CFA®, Head of Operations Jay Levy, Director of Marketing Sarah Thomas, and Head of Client Experience Kelley Seeney. My role on the leadership team is the big picture and to drive the direction and vision of the company in conjunction with these impressive individuals. More on the vision in a moment.
Where we been:
I’d be remiss if in a blog about our firm I didn’t take a moment to talk about its humble beginnings. Diversified was founded by David Levy’s father, Frank Levy, in 1982. However, he started out as most financial professionals did back then by selling insurance in the mid-’70s. As his insurance practice grew, so did his want to help out his clients (mostly folks working at DuPont back then). In the 90’s he did something that was basically unheard of and about 20 years before his time. As “stockbrokers” took off, Frank saw the value in true financial advice. He started charging for this advice, way before anyone else did, and put a heavy focus on comprehensive financial planning.
Again, back then this was almost taboo. You either sold insurance or you sold investments, Frank decided to sell advice! This began the building block and foundation of this firm that I am proud to be a part of today. The firm continued to grow and invest in infrastructure through its remaining years until the next-gen took over. There is immense pride (especially from his son David) for us all to have taken this firm, built on the hard work and sweat of Frank Levy, to the next level.
Where we are today:
This all leads us to where we are as a firm today. I know I mentioned our incredible executive leadership team, but we are only as good as the team of individuals who support us. This comprises 23 total employees, across several departments, all dedicated to your financial well-being and we are fanatical about your client experience because you deserve to be treated as special as you are. This is very unique in our business as we are running a real company dedicated to your financial needs. Most firms out there are either one or two people supporting their clients or a big conglomerate that knows you by an account number rather than the fantastic individuals you all are.
We believe these things, combined with our dedication to fiduciary advice all under one roof set us far apart from the competition. This is the bedrock that has landed us caring for well over a billion dollars of our client’s hard-earned life savings, ranked the 9th fastest growing independent financial planning firm in the country, and one of the 300 largest. I don’t say this to brag, as it actually makes me feel a little uncomfortable saying it, but rather to let you know our dedication to you living your best life has led to remarkable growth. Truly, our success is your success as we vow to continually reinvest in our clients, our staff, and our process in making this the best firm it can be.
We know what else is out there and truly believe our dedication to challenging the status quo, providing as much as possible under one roof, along with an unwavering commitment to helping our clients realize and achieve their life goals so they can live their best happiest lives, makes us a special place.
Where we are going:
Now here comes my unique specialty and where I truly geek out. We couldn’t have gotten here without every last one of you and our incredible team. Where we are going, however, albeit the very same, is an extremely exciting thing for me. You see, much like Frank Levy did some 30 years ago, we are on a mission. A mission to be ahead of the curve and drive the direction of our industry. At the core, we want to be the most value-based financial service company around truly offering a white glove, one-stop-shop experience.
To do so we want to be progressive and think differently. For starters, what is the mission of this company, and what is our unique ability?
Mission
Mission: To help our clients uncover and realize their life goals so we can bring true happiness to as many people as possible.
Unique Ability
Unique Ability: We believe that financial services aren’t just about making our clients the most amount of money. It is the why behind it. This money and planning lead our clients to achieve remarkable things. They take care of their family, their community, and themselves. It allows them at the end of the day to live their best and most fulfilled lives. This is serious emotional stuff. We don’t look at our clients/partners as account numbers. Rather we look at them as loving, special individuals who deserve to be happy and deserve to live a life of true fulfillment. Our way to spread that into the world is what we are best at, financial planning and guidance.
As we have grown, we continue to invest in our infrastructure. We have a robust investment team, and financial planning team always staying on the cutting edge with new technology and strategies. We truly believe we communicate more than almost any firm out there with weekly market commentary, weekly blogs, monthly newsletters, daily social media content, monthly investment education series, quarterly investment updates, regular webinars, and monthly wealth/health/happiness interview series. Ultimately, we want you to feel empowered and educated about your life and finances.
As we continually grow, it is our promise to keep investing in more and more value for you, our clients. In doing so we are making strives as a company, most recently with the acquisition and complete integration of our in-house Tax Firm to deliver what we believe will bring a fantastic client experience on the tax side of things as well. We want that “Diversified Experience” on anything we touch and/or offer. We have our eyes set on more and more expansion but remain committed to not losing the personal client experience that you’ve come to expect. Rather, these are all things to simply enhance your value, because again we believe you deserve it and we will continue to build on being the most value-based financial service company we can be.
What’s with wealth, health, and happiness?
OK – let me take a moment to clarify and speak to our wealth, health, and happiness tagline (and direction). This came from an epiphany that was had. We realized that, again, we believe we deliver excellent financial and investment guidance already. We also believe we have to keep reinvesting in these things to stay cutting edge and always better ourselves. That said, as I stated earlier, it is about the outcome for our clients.
As we’ve dealt with thousands of clients through the years something jumps off the page to us. Everyone wants the same thing, to live a stress-free, enriched, and fulfilled life. We also realize there are 3 key components that everyone comes back to on their journey there. They want to have no financial worries (Wealth), want to be healthy enough to enjoy the fruits of their labor and best lives (Health), and we all want happiness (Happiness).
It may sound cheesy, but I think if we all step back at the end of the day and are able to honestly say we feel great health-wise, we feel great financially, and we are simply happy it is all most of us really want. Through our experience, over four decades, in working with individuals and families it became abundantly clear to us that there seems to be a direct correlation between one’s wealth, health, and happiness.
So, as we turn the page to our next chapter, that is our philosophy. How can we not only be a preeminent financial and wealth planning firm in the country but in addition meet our client’s needs to live their best overall lives? That is what we believe we can deliver and that is why we are continually adding value on the financial side (like adding additional staff, additional financial planners, additional office locations, tax services, etc.), and IN ADDITION trying to offer, free of charge, resources to achieve our optimal lives.
Final thoughts
I’m not sure how this blog will be received, but we made two promises to each and every one of you when you became clients. One, to continually invest in your ability to live your best life. Two, to always be transparent about everything we do.
I apologize in advance if any of this has not been clear, as we are constantly figuring things out on our end. I believe the sign of a good company is one that is not afraid to try new things for the benefit of the most important part, our clients. But please remember this, we will never lose focus on trying to be the best financial planning shop ever, as we recognize that is at the forefront of who we are and what we do. Also, the more things we offer are for you, not us. Although you may not appreciate every last one of them, someone else very well might, and that to us is a noble cause. We are dedicated to continuing to try our best!
Thanks for indulging me today and wishing you all a great day filled with, you guessed it, wealth, health, and happiness.
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