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What lured you to Broker Dealer Financial Services?

The firm I was working for got purchased a year and a half ago, and it’s actually the fourth time a firm that I have been associated with has gotten bought out, so I was looking for some differences from where strategically I thought a company was going. I had known (Michael Sherzan, former BDFS CEO) since 1989, so we’ve kept in touch all these years and kind of followed each other’s ups and downs, and he was talking about some succession planning. He told me that he wanted to go back to build the business, but the administrative part was somewhat keeping him from doing that. So we had been talking about this for a little bit more than a year, and it just started coming together in the fall of last year.

Your first day was April 1. Do you feel settled in?

No, I have a lot to learn. It will take a few months to get used to the people and the style of marketing and things like that. We have a conference coming up at the end of the month that I get to emcee, and so I will get to meet a bunch of our advisers and they’ll be able to put a face to a name and I’ll be able to do likewise; that will be nice.

What is your first objective as president and CEO?

I think it’s to find out where we are. It is hard to start making any plans for any improvement in the future if you don’t know where you’re at in the first place. So I need a little bit of study time, and I need to meet everyone. I’ve held meetings with senior management, and I’ll get to meet many of our representatives at the end of the month, both formally and informally, and that will give me a better feel for where we’re at, what we’re doing and where we’re going. I need that input from our field force; that’s the best feedback loop I have.

Do you think your leadership style is similar to Sherzan’s?

I think so. I think that is why, in many ways, the people at BDFS will not feel a big change. I’m not a micromanager. If training is needed, I like to find a way to train that person to do what they need to be successful, then I stand back and let them do their work. I will never be the expert in one functional area; that’s what we have people around those areas for. And from what I am able to tell, they are great people, so we have a good foundation to build from.

Has the economy changed the way BDFS does business?

From just walking in the door, it’s hard to say what was common before. I’m still reading reports and asking questions. But generally in the industry, I think investors are more conservative, even if they were pretty aggressive at the time – maybe the late-2005/early-2006 time frame. People are realizing things that used to be safe, like your home and some of those things, are giving people the most worry right now for a lot of different reasons. The things that were safe are, in many cases, not that safe anymore. I think consumers are justifiably concerned about all of the upheaval, and I think it is going to take some time to get past some of that, to get some things in place. The general operation of the economy will come back, but then again, the economy is going to have to take the lead. It will be interesting to see what comes out of Washington in the next few months.

Do you have a general piece of advice for people?

I think everybody is different. I think the advice of watching what your neighbor does, or what somebody else does, when you have total different circumstances in your life, doesn’t work. That’s why dealing one-on-one with a financial adviser that you trust is the core of how this business operates. Each individual circumstance has to be identified and worked through with a financial adviser for it to be successfully completed, whether it’s time to retire or just when you need money.

Any hobbies?

I have a commercial pilot’s license. I learned to fly seaplanes for fun. I have about 460 hours, and I’m rated to fly a lot of things. And I play a lot of golf. I love the outdoors. One thing I missed in Florida was snow skiing, so we will probably get back to some of that.