Amanda Koplin & Martin M. Shenkman: Mental Health Considerations for Financial Advisers, Attorneys, CPAs, and other Professionals

This article was originally posted on Steve Leimberg’s Estate Planning Email Newsletter as Archive Message #3041.

Clients want a motivated, ambitious, type-A advisor who will work vigorously for their interests and identify with the challenges clients encounter. These are the people clients seek when it comes to hiring the professionals whose advice will literally determine their futures, and many of these professionals are the personality types who are typically attracted to high stress, high payout, high prestige jobs. They also tend to care an incredible amount about their clients and can over personalize not only what’s happening in their clients’ lives, but also how their decisions impact their clients’ futures, even in circumstances beyond their control.

So, what happens when these personality traits, mixed with the stressors of the professional career, compounded by identifying with difficult challenges clients face, affect a large group of people? As would be expected, the health, performance, and quality of life consequences can be quite negative. These are issues no firm, or practitioner, should ignore. These issues, if not addressed, can have a profound impact on firms and the profession, but most significantly to the individual professional who is affected, and their families.

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