7Rita LachmansinghThe Financial AdvisorMy name is Nick Royce and Im a financial advisor for McAdam. I was born and raised in Ann Arbor, Michigan and have spent most of my life there. My parents are both accountants who went to University of Michigan. There was really no question about where I was going to college. I knew I was going to Michigan since about age five. After getting accepted I had to determine if I wanted to follow my parents footsteps or try something else. I kind of had the business trajectory in mind but decided to go the liberal arts route because being an accountant sounded boring to me, I wanted something more flavorful. At first I had no idea what I wanted to study, but after my freshman year I decided to double major in economics and political science. I thought this would give me a better understanding of how the world worked. From there I would be able to go out and do something bigger. Throughout college I had no intention or even thought about getting involved in finance, in fact, I planned on going to law school. During my senior year of college I interned at Brookings Institution. Most of my responsibilities included doing cool bitch work where I was able to do hard political science research for senior fellows. It was like the Harvard of think tanks out there. I expected to return to DC after graduation and continue researching while making thirty to thirty-five grand a year before going to Law school. I took the LSAT and did well so the door was open. But enough people told me going straight out of school was pretty risky, and that I should try doing something else first. Thats why I decided to not go down that road right after college. It was in that limbo phase of not knowing quite what I was going to do that I got a call from McAdam, which was ING at the time. Before the call I had no anticipation of getting into hard finance.I received a call from the corporate recruiter from the Philadelphia office who let me know there were also offices in Chicago. I had never once thought about being a financial advisor but decided to come to Chicago for an interview because I didnt really have anything else set in stone. Despite that my studies were not in finance, I landed the job as a Financial Advisor. I have been working here for about a year and a half and have been promoted to a team lead. I still have clients that I advise, but I also help some of the newer advisors develop comprehensive plans. Its tough for me to say if this is what I consider a real job. I always pictured a real job as a 9-5 with a salary, set tasks, a boss, and a 401k; where as this is pretty much none of that. However, this is a very serious job. I make sure people can reach their long-term life goals by investing their life savings. Therefore the job is meaningful to me. I cannot see myself doing this long term, or even more than four years from now, but it is meaningful.There is no doubt that Im contributing to society which is why I believe my job is meaningful. I ensure people dont run out of money by moving money from one pocket to another. Some people I talk to are completely screwed financially, they would run out of money if they didnt have my advice on where to invest their money. I think its better than most entry-level positions. Part of the reason I was drawn to the job is because of the impact you can make, if you do the job well. My job as a financial advisor has influenced me in many ways including my work ethic, my level of comfortability with new things, and in general how I view the real world. My job is very hands off. There is not a strict time I need to be in the office, or a certain number of calls I need to make by the end of the day. This was difficult for me to adjust to at first because I was use to doing the bare minimum to get by in college. It was a brutal transition to go from a college schedule to working full-time seven days a week, not to mention what the job actually involved. I was never an outgoing person during college, and still dont consider myself as an extrovert. But this job forced me to step out of my comfort zone to make hundreds of cold calls. I got pretty familiar with rejection and eventually stopped sweating profusely for each call I made. Since the job is 100% commission based, I determine how much money I am going to make because it is directly correlated with how hard I work. Im in the office by nine every morning and dont leave until around six. My dedication despite the hands off management shows volumes about my work ethic. Making money gets me out of bed, I have to pay myself by working hard so thats my motivation. I even find myself working at home because it is sometimes easier to get ahold of people after normal work hours. It never really ends. My work life balance has gotten better than what it used to be like. In the beginning I would work normal hours then spend most of my evenings working so I would be available to talk to clients. Work never really ended for me. I have gotten to the point where I have enough clients that I dont have to work as hard to be successful. I have also implemented some structure into my life outside work like working out, but I still believe that my life is centralized around my work. Work definitely dominates my life. But at the same time, I would rather spend a solid chunk of my 20s and 30s working 100% so I can enjoy free time later in life without worrying about my finances. I definitely like the idea of traveling in the future but for the sake of having to make money right now it is not really realistic. I sometimes do worry that Im putting so much into a job that Im not necessarily planning on staying for the foreseeable future. It would be hard to get out of the inertia I have here either to go back to school or get into another area of finance. I would be hard to unwind from this job because I have so many commitments to clients so I can see how people tend do get stuck. But making hundreds of cold calls a week isnt something I want to spend my career doing. Especially considering how much societys perception of a financial advisor has changed in the last seven years. Being a financial advisor used to be glorified. But now, theres a sense of distrust, people think were out here to make money and dont care if we tank the entire worlds economy in that process. I wouldnt say were viewed as the devil, I mean were not stockbrokers, but theres an inherent view that were out here to make money for ourselves. It does make the job hard. I get shut down more often than not, either straight up hung up on or cussed out every once in a while. You have to be creative on how you get yourself in the door. Careful about the language you use because there are certain buzzwords and people will turn off immediately. Especially with your middle market people who dont have a lot of experience with finance outside of their 401k. The job has taught me a lot. It would be nave to say it hasnt shaped my values and beliefs about work in general. During college I had such a clouded conception of what the real world or working outside of college was like. To be honest I really had no idea what to expect. And then with coming into this job, which is so different than anything else, its been interesting. The change has happened gradually. It is hard to put my finger on it. I have started to realize other peoples job, well I guess this is kind of arrogant, are a lot easier than I thought they were. Like your average person whos working a job in their forties making between ninety to one hundred and twenty thousand dollars; I use to think those jobs were super hard and those people were really skilled. Im not saying thats the case but the real world seems a lot more doable now. I dont think I could just step into an engineers job and do their job for them just like they probably couldnt step in here and do what I do. But Ive come to realize that regular people stay people stay regular people, and regular jobs are regular jobs. Getting away from Ann Arbor and The University of Michigan where youve got this heightened sense of competitiveness and a lot of smart people and being around regular people with regular backgrounds has showed me the real world is not as daunting as I thought it was (N. Royce, personal communication, May 20, 2015). Nick Royce works for McAdam, the company I intern at. I have shared an office with him and my boss for a few months now. Therefore, I have gotten very familiar with the script he uses when making his cold calls. I was unsure of what exactly a financial advisor did until I started working for McAdam. The sales aspect of the job took me aback and has honestly shown me that occupation is not for me, not to mention the amount of math that goes into it. Aside from helping people achieve their long-term goals, it was hard for Nick to talk about how he found meaning in his work. There is also a degree of emotional labor and surface acting that was inferred throughout the interview. Reflecting on the interview has allowed me to further explore the difference between a job, career, and calling. Nick aims to make about twenty-five calls a day (N. Royce, personal communication, May 20, 2015). In each one he has to sound interested, genuine, and sincere in his requests to help people manage their finances. Money is taken very seriously in our society simply because of how dependent we are on it. College funds, retirement, mortgages all have the capability to be beneficial or very detrimental to ones livelihood. Therefore there is a large amount of emotional labor in being a financial advisor. Emotional labor is typically a set of behaviors, facial expressions, and attitudes employees are expected to project that is determined by company management (Shenoy-Packer 2015). Nick is expected to be cordial, polite, and good-natured in each conversation he has over the phone and in person. This brings in the surface acting he touched on during the interview. Surface acting is depicted as the need to put on a forced character that is not a part of the individual (Shenoy-Packer 2015). Seeing as Nick is an introvert, the job makes him go out on a limb and talk to people he wouldnt normally be comfortable talking to. He also had to get use to being rudely rejected, and hold back his true feelings when people assume he has corrupt and dishonest intentions (N. Royce, personal communication, May 20, 2015). However, because his salary is commission based, most of the surface acting is good faith acting. Good faith acting is done when workers truly believe that the front they are putting up for clients and customers is a justifiable part of their job (Shenoy-Packer 2015). Nick is well aware that he will make more deals and close them in faster if he is kind, warm, and patient with his clients (N. Royce, personal communication, May 20, 2015). Interviewing Nick about his meaning and work and the aspect of emotional labor taught me how surface acting with good faith can work to ones advantage. It became clear that he did not enjoy the job enough to make it a long-term career. But he was able to rationalize how he was with clients because the acting made him more successful. Once created this persona for clients he was able to switch frameworks depending on the situation. The interview showed me that not all emotional labor can be negative, in this case it was financially positive for Nicks career.I used the term career to describe the work Nick does because it is just that. It is not just a job because he derives meaning from what he does (Shenoy-Packer 2015). It is also not a calling because Nick cannot see himself staying at the job nor does he think it is what he was meant to do with his life (Shenoy-Packer 2015). A calling takes the connotation of work out of the job. It is not done to pay the bills but rather to contribute to a greater good (Shenoy-Packer 2015). Nicks position as a financial advisor is considered a career because he has adopted the organizational structure of the company, and strives to climb the hierarchy. He is there primarily to make money, and aside from that does not find it fulfilling (Shenoy-Packer 2015). His ideal future did not involve managing clients and creating financial plans. He felt that in order to do what he actually wanted to, he had to spend some time working hard at a mediocre job (N. Royce, personal communication, May 20, 2015). Writing a narrative as I was Nick Royce made me realize that having a job you consider a calling is a true blessing. I have always associated a calling with finding meaning in ones work. Nick found a lot of meaning, he was able to meet people and help them reach their long-term life goals. This was not enough. Despite how meaningful it was, he still had to force himself to act a certain way while on the job (N. Royce, personal communication, May 20, 2015). A calling would not require this. One would truly feel purpose from their work, and not have to convince himself or herself why they enjoyed what they do (Shenoy-Packer 2015). Ultimately, I learned that not only do I not want to be a financial advisor, but also that I strive work that I will consider a calling. Deriving meaning in what you do is simply not enough.

ReferencesShenoy-Packer, S. (2015). Emotion Labor - Cruiseship [PowerPoint Slides]. Retrieved from Desire to Learn. Shenoy-Packer, S. (2015). Emotions 911 [PowerPoint Slides]. Retrieved from Desire to Learn. Shenoy-Packer, S. (2015). MOW and Flow [PowerPoint Slides]. Retrieved from Desire to Learn.