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Beverly Flaxington is a practice management consultant. She answers questions from advisors facing human resource issues. To submit yours, email us here.
Dear Bev,
We received word that one of our favorite clients has recently entered hospice care. She was doing very well after battling cancer of one form or another for many years and overcoming it each time. As a team, we are devastated because she is one of those people we all genuinely like, enjoy talking with and look forward to meetings with. Her partner called to make us aware and asked that we not call her. She said she would like a text or a note, but really isn’t up to talking to us (or anyone) right now.
One of my colleagues suggested we send a gift which I am very supportive to do. The problem is my colleague wants to send a book: “Hospice is a Gift: Never Let Dying Stop You From Living” by David Hugger. I went out to read reviews on Amazon and they were all very good. However, I am struggling, because I feel this is a very personal topic. While I want to do something special and personal, this feels a bit invasive to me.
Our office manager spent time looking for other things — soups, blankets, socks and candles seemed to be the most popular, but the book keeps coming back to all of us as the most poignant. I’m wondering if you have worked with advisors who have had dying clients they truly enjoy. What have they have done to provide some sort of support and care? Do you think the book is appropriate?
J.A.
Dear J.A.,
These situations are so difficult on many fronts, and I appreciate the time and effort (and consideration) your team is putting into doing the right thing by your client. The answer to your direct question is: I don’t know whether the book is appropriate or not. I think it is critical in situations like this to know the person really well. Although your note about how much you care about this person is moving and heartfelt, I don’t know enough about your client and her likes or dislikes to give a recommendation.
That said, I always like to err on the conservative side when I don’t know someone, and that leads me to hesitate at “approving” the book as a gift. However, you and your team do know this client, and one of your team members might have been moved to think of this book because they know it would be an important read for her. In those situations, I believe in trusting your gut. If the team together thinks it is a good idea, then by all means go ahead.
Consider sending a note as well. Say how much you all care about this client as a person and how hard it was for you to think of something that would be special enough for her.
These are times in life where any sort of note, acknowledgement or thoughtful gift is likely to be appreciated. I think if you are still cautious and you have a good relationship with her partner, I might put a call or text into her and ask her for an opinion. You want to be supportive, but you also want to be careful you are taking your client’s feelings into consideration in all ways possible.
Dear Bev,
We recently threw a retirement party for one of our longest clients. We have been around for 32 years as of 2026, and this client joined us 31 years ago. He was a pretty young guy with an outstanding business we helped support and grow, and he recently sold it for $65 million and is now retiring. We wanted to do something to acknowledge the 30+ years as a client and to send him off on his new adventures in a meaningful way.
The party was excellent, with over 70 people in attendance, many of them connections through his business that will likely become clients of ours over time. However, one of our senior team members is of the mind we should be doing this for every client who graduates, gets married, gets a promotion, retires, etc. This party was a one-off for us. In all of our years, we have never done anything like this, but we felt this was a special situation. There are more aspects I won’t go into here, but this client has been meaningful to our firm in many ways and knows it.
Our marketing intern thinks we should promote the party in our newsletter as representative of how much we care about our clients. I think this is a bad idea because it will open us up to questions like, “Why didn’t you give me a party when I did X or Y?”
This is one of those situations where I was on top of the world after doing something really different and seeing how it will likely contribute to future business for us too. But now I am pushed against the wall fighting off team members who want to go in too many directions about this. I’m not sure if I am unrealistic, but I’m the one who oversees our P & L. As a result, I’m not a fan of extreme expenses without good reason. This was a very good reason.
L.C.
Dear L.C.,
Oh, the joys of being in charge — especially with regard to the finances of the firm! I completely agree with you on almost everything you have written. It would be financially imprudent to fund celebrations for each and every client whenever some important life event takes place. I’m sure, after this successful experience, you’ve seen where it does make sense to do this on a thoughtful and organized basis.
You may find additional opportunities to celebrate other clients, but opening it up to every situation sounds very risky — and very expensive. I believe in promotional opportunities and finding ways to show how much your firm cares about its clients, but unless all of your clients were invited to this event, I don’t think you want to be too public about it. That could leave clients wondering about the backstory, which you probably aren’t in a position to tell!
This offers a great opportunity to sit down with your team members — including your marketing intern — to talk about what you learned from doing this event, how it fits into your overall marketing plans and client gifting strategy, and where else you might want to focus efforts. You may have considered this to be a “one-off” because of the good reasons you allude to. But given the feedback you are getting, it gives you a chance, as a firm, to do a reset and look at your marketing calendar overall. Maybe advisors could suggest client names for future celebratory opportunities, or maybe you could find less extravagant ways to honor and recognize your clients.
Sometimes a firm or team will allocate budget to each advisor for their use with designated clients to deepen relationships or conduct marketing activities. They could sponsor an event, take them to dinner, buy tickets or throw a party. It is up to the advisor (who should know their client well) to decide how the money is best spent. Perhaps going forward you could consider something like this?
Years ago, I worked with a phenomenal marketing guru who talked about one-off marketing tactics as a type of “whack-a-mole,” where you do something successfully, but without an overall strategy for the process that allows it to fit together. I’m happy your event was such a smashing success, but the ongoing questions and next steps from your team lead me to believe it wasn’t done as part of a cohesive strategy that made everyone feel involved and included. This isn’t judgmental. Rather, you have an opportunity to identify a missing piece in your process and add it in going forward. Don’t miss the chance to make sure from now on everything you do will be in the context of all of your clients and all of your team members.
Beverly Flaxington co-founded The Collaborative, a consulting firm devoted to business building for the financial services industry, in 1995. The firm also founded and manages the Advisors Sales Academy. The firm has won the Wealthbriefing WealthTech award for Best Training Solution for 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025. Beverly is currently an adjunct professor at Suffolk University teaching undergraduate and graduate students Entrepreneurship and Leading Teams. She is a Certified Professional Behavioral Analyst (CPBA) and Certified Professional Values Analyst (CPVA).
She has spent over 25 years in the investment industry and has been featured in Selling Power Magazine and quoted in hundreds of media outlets, including The Wall Street Journal, MSNBC.com, Investment News and Solutions Magazine for the FPA. She speaks frequently at investment industry conferences and is a speaker for the CFA Institute.
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Advisor Perspectives welcomes guest contributions. The views presented here do not necessarily represent those of Advisor Perspectives.
