Finance Can Be Fun!

Speaker 1: hi I'm Melanie bar welcome to the she builted experience with Melanie you're here because you want to experience the life and business that you crave join me as I talk to women who have successfully built it a career and business that they love we dive into the topic of how they built it and talk about everything from Having the courage to make career leaps to the details of how to lead effectively create successful teams Implement strategies for growth and Infuse Tech innovation magic happens when we focus on the part of ourselves and our business that brings us joy so let's dive in Jackie Porter is an award-winning certified financial planner in Canada serving thousands of professionals established businesses and families with 24 years of experience her practice focuses on cash flow management and tax planning thank you so much for joining us today Jackie please share with us who you are and what gave you the passion and the courage to launch and grow your business a child of a very strong Fierce single mom who had a larger than life sometimes overbearing presence in my life but if anyone is responsible for me being fearless and willing to take risks and confident is really her unfortunately I lost her really young but if there's a silver lining in that is that she equipped me with so much confidence that I didn't realize how hard it was going to be and sometimes it's easier when you don't realize how hard it's going to be so I I think that all of those reasons of you know being someone who has been on my own I've been on my own since I was 16 my mother passed away of cancer unfortun that's my story and um really at that point I was making a lot of adult decisions around where to live I just happened to have a really good friend that I met in high school who she was from an unstable scenario so we ended up living together and we figured out how to pay the bills but my mother again was the kind of person from the time when I was really young was always drilling into my head and I'm sure you have listeners who had a mom like this she was always saying and echoed in my head never rely on a man always have your own money and she was a serious saver these are the things that you love and hate about a person you grow right but um she really taught me the value of a dollar and she really taught me hard work most of my teens and 20s were working two or three jobs to pay for either High School the bills the university but it really made me become a really conscious saber and because when you realize you have no one to rely on there's no plan B you really make sure you figure out how plan a can work it's just the way it goes so true all of these lessons have taught me that Independence is something that I embraced because I have no choice it's kind of led me on a path where I've been inspiring and encouraging other women to become confident around being independent well even if you're in a relationship it's about mentally and and emotionally and financially knowing you're going to be okay no matter what happens in the future because of my history it was a path that got forged for me and then I realized how much I inspired other people who never had that kind of a an exposure and I could say you know what it's okay I'm not special I've just kind of been doing it longer and and really all that it comes down to is being willing to fors that path ahead even when you don't know for sure how everything's going to turn I love that and I can relate I moved to LA at 19 and I'm an only child and my parents said if you call home for money once you're moving home and I was so I was a little confused CU I knew that they had the ability to help me but looking back I'm so grateful for it because it taught me Independence and I know everyone has different fears and different thoughts around money totally but the only way you learn it's just kind of like that not to promote Nike in your podcast but it's just do it right there's there's no shortcut for just practicing something you don't feel confident about so if you don't feel confident that you can make good financial decisions on your own just start with one small step make one St small step toward that whether it's finding out about something in the the money world that you don't know just make a practice every week just like when you go to the gym and you're making a practice of going regularly I'm talking now about me these are all my issues that I'm going through right now to lose those extra pounds I put on during we're all with you but it's the same thing with money you take you take these little small steps and then the next thing you know you start to get results you mentioned that clients can be intimidated by the technical aspect of financial planning how do you and your team help clients work through those feelings and take actionable steps forward yeah I think when it comes to the technicality I think that's one of the reasons I get so excited to talk to women and I do a lot of work even in the female advisor space in recruiting advisers to the industry because my industry is fairly male-dominated and there's a lot of male presence in how things have been structured the language it's not necessarily intuitive and there's a lot about finance that we don't have to make that way and and that's my passion is to uncover the fun in finance make it relatable make it something everybody can use I know personally for me I'm all about solving problems prior to this life of being in finance I used to be a therapist I thought that's what I was going to be doing with my life was therapy and I realize I'm too practical a gal to do therapy I really like solving problems so when I realized that Finance could be around practical things like solving a problem that excited me and I I think that's very true for people who come in to see an adviser they're trying to solve a problem they don't necessarily need to go into the weeds they just need to understand how the weeds relate to they're not going to grow back again give me the big picture and then give me how it relates to my situation and how it's going to solve my problem that's when people get excited people come in and they they feel a lot of Shame that's that's something that if you're speaking to someone where they don't feel relatable they don't feel approachable they don't feel like someone you can have a real conversation with and that's one of the reasons I call myself a confidant because that's the beginning right that's where we need to start is you need to feel like I'm someone or someone that you're sitting with who's going to talk to you about Finance if you have all these fears and intimidation and you think Finance is technical what are the odds you're going to have conversation about a problem you're trying to solve it's so great that you can marry those two because with your background and therapy you can work with all of those feelings around money and figure out what they are that someone has because money is driven by our feelings at times no it's it's 100% about that right like people need to feel like Confidant is really two things right people need to feel they can trust you they can talk to you they can tell you because there's so much in our society that's rooted in money and even in therapy when I was doing therapy I realized so much of what someone might be going through on the emotional side might already be tied to money like their family history how they grew up Financial traumas that they might have had I know that some of the reasons that I'm really good at what I do is I'm a worrior by Nature so I have to solve problems and I'm really good at seeing the risk in somebody's situation because I've had to see the risk in mind but people don't necessarily recognize what their financial traumas are and probably Co has open the floodgates of people needing to solve problems because it's bigger than when are you going to retire and it's bigger than how much life insurance do you need I think if anything the pandemic has illuminated the importance of having those real conversations that people potentially never thought they could have with an adviser before and and then they really see the value it's not so commoditized and a lot of women have left the workforce too I mean if you were in a situ all of a sudden I was a first grade teacher to two six-year-olds and I can't imagine I mean I work from home thankfully but the people that had to go out and work that's a real challenge so I'm sure that I mean in addition to the to divorce and people losing jobs it's great that you are there to help people through some of these things and I've been thinking a lot about money and I think if we believe in abundance there is abundance and if we believe that it's scarce it is scarce that goes back to that whole financial trauma right because I'll talk to these people who have dealt with some kind of trauma so they worry about being bad ladies but they are really worriers and they're amazing Savers so they have all this money that they have saved sitting in a savings account and they're holding the for it they're just like I don't know what to do all my money is sitting in cash but I'm worried that's my mindset so you know you kind of have to uncover like what is this right and the great thing about finance and why it marries so well with mindset is you can show people you don't just have to tell them the numbers don't lie let's look at what the numbers say and how they relate to your circumstances let's look Year bye at your lifestyle and let's look at how much cash you have coming in taxes we can actually plot it out and use really low returns and are you okay yes or no and if not why and what can we do about it and that's what gives people peace of mind I love telling people the numbers tell the story what are two or three initial steps or tips that you think are the most important that you can share with us about financial planning the

Speaker 1: think through for women out there who may or may not be because families are busy if you're not involved with the family's finances Now's the Time to start having those crucial conversations with your partner figure out where stuff's located first and foremost right do you know where all the accounts are do you know how they're being managed I would highly recommend for your females and males who may not know about Finance P do a financial date night once a year where you kind of just put everything out in the open you have all the statements out look at where you are you look at the household expenses put the budget out there you look at it you talk about what goals you want to accomplish if you're in a relationship and then you have a nice meal but you commit to doing that at least once a year so you're on top of what's going on the worst thing I see happen is two scenarios that that make me sad one is women who are going through a divorce have no idea where anything is so they're in these crappy situations where they're settling in a settlement scenario because they don't really know what's going on they know nothing about Finance um they don't actually even know for sure whatever they're being offered is going to be enough to carry them especially if they were not the primary bread winner maybe they worked part-time because they had kids at home so Now's the Time to empower yourself Empower your relationship by having those conversations you may have a spouse who wants to get you involved but they don't know how right so really important thing and and then the other thing I see along that is just widows losing a spouse right and again not knowing where anything is located so my biggest message to all of you is get involved get involved in your finances take charge of your finances and get that mindset that this is something that you can do you have got this ladies it's exciting such good advice and I love how you bring the confidence and the grace you know it might not be perfect in some areas but that's okay we can work to get you to the place where you want to be absolutely the last thing is just seek help like get help where you think you need it that there are people like myself that can help you always figure out who you can work with that you can trust always go with your gut if you sit down with someone and you get an icky feeling chances are you're not going to have those conversations you need to have like I said these days people are going into second third marriages and you need you need real talk you need real advice how to manage your finances how to make sure everybody's needs are being met especially the people who you're bringing into that relationship there's a lot of conversations that need to be had another thing I I see is women are getting married later having kids later and they're coming into relationships with money so ladies love is not enough right let me tell you right now love does not conquer all it just doesn't I wish I could say it does I used to be a therapist so I'm saying this as a therapist and a planner right it's just not enough so if you're coming into a relationship with money and you're older and keep in mind when women live longer than men they take off more time for caregiving they're in a scenario where the the pension benefits the benefits that they have access to in retirement don't tend to be as much so if you come into into a relationship and for whatever reason it doesn't work and you have to give away 50% of that what's that going to do to your financial Independence and your ability to take care of yourself down the road so get a prenup or at least have those kinds of conversations and and the reality is if you're with a partner who you can't have these kinds of conversations with that might be a red flag right there so true and such good advice your team helps to build well by looking at a 360° snapshot of your client's current and future financials how does your team help someone do this well we give a complimentary assessment so if if you've got people out there who are thinking you know I really there's a lot that's happened in the last two years my goodness the pandemic I've lost track of time things have gone fast at times and slow at times and a lot of us realiz that maybe we didn't plan enough for a big one if like this who knew Co was going to happen did you have enough in your emergency fund and maybe now you're thinking I don't want to be in this situation something like this happens in the future I want to be prepared here's your opportunity to take advantage of our complimentary assessment what we do is we give you that 360 degree look so we look at how much debt you're carrying what are the dangers in your circumstances that we were talking about what are what are you doing well how can we help you emphasize the positive what are the opportunities that you're missing out on will'll give you that blueprint and then you can decide from there how you want to proceed if you want to move forward and you know do a full financial plan if you want to use this to start thinking through what you're going to do next we we really want to empower as many women as possible over the next decade to embrace their financial future so great and it's so needed what is your strategy for management for staying on task to accomplish what you set out to do as well as motivating your teams the people around you I'm actually wearing my sweatshirt tonight you might see it it says cheerleader I'd love it um I love I love cheerleading my clients I actually joke all the time with my clients that you know the first thing we do when we start working together is we make some commitments to the things that we want to accomplish so my job as an adviser is no different than what a coach would do is keeping you honest so I call myself a professional nag to my clients you told me these are the things want to accomplish you given me a timeline we meet on a regular basis to check in to make sure that that's the direction you're going and if you know Things Fall Apart things happen my job is to reach out to you to make sure the things that you told me you wanted to see happen keeping them honest we're gonna do everything we can to get you there so I'm going to cheerlead you to that and I I love cheerleading my clients to help them get to their goals my team members to help them see how we can make an impact and show them the possibilities of what we can do as a team to really help the next generation of women over the next decade you know what I mean so that's really and and really my industry I'm a Cheerleader in my industry on what's possible when we can actually shift The Narrative on what Financial Empowerment can look like it doesn't have to be technical it doesn't have to be cold it can be relationship based it can be fun and it can be approachable and those are all the things I love talk talking about in my industry magic happens when we focus on the part of ourselves and our business that brings us joy what is one tip that you can leave with us today about how you find and live your joy I love laughing and I love bringing the fun to everything that I do so the two things that that um I try to do in my practice with clients with my team is use humor I take what I do very very seriously but I don't take myself seriously and I think that's the levity we all need when it comes to our finances is how can we bring the fund so when clients sometimes are stressed out cracking a joke putting fun at the situation making things so that they don't feel insurmountable I I had a conversation the other day with the divorce a and we were talking about you know she was married to a very wealthy individual and this transition to a divorce a being single was going to mean you know for her financial circumstances were were going to change quite a bit so we were talking about downsizing and moving into this house and she was going to need furniture and she was telling me how she was gonna have to spend all this money on Restoration Hardware furniture and I'm like really Wester asan like this is what your kids need are you sure about that right I'm like do you think that your kid knows if they're sitting on Restoration Hardware or just furniture with mom and dad like let's just figure this out and we just had an nice to laugh about it and it was just really a a nice way to say you know what it that's not the stuff that your kid cares about right they care just that you're going to be in their lives and that you're like their North Star that's really it that's all the kids care about and so it's just reminding people they don't have to take the circumstances seriously they don't to take themselves seriously let's just deal with how we can make the circumstances better let's use humor let's use levity and just let's have fun as much as we can life's short and at the end of the day the more fun you can inject in someone's day to make them feel good the more you can motivate them and give make them see possibility I if I can do those things and leave this earth i' I've lived my my best life so true I love it because when you think of financial planning you don't necessarily think of fun but who doesn't want to have fun when they do anything totally absolutely I think most people think of going to see a financial planner like going to see a dentist and folks it doesn't have to be that way it just doesn't Real World Finance and real talk around Finance is changing and you just have to demand um more and expect that you deserve better so seek it out seek out someone you can have fun with because if they're going to be in your life you're going to have a relationship with them the circumstances around life life can be really challenging so having someone that you can have a little bit of levity with while you deal with your life just makes life that much easier so seek it out Jackie this has been such a fun and informative conversation thank you so much for joining me and joining us today can you please tell our listeners how and where they can find you yes our contact information is ask jackie.com the city uh lady are you from a financial perspective if you want to know check out our quiz it's right on when you go on our website and um just FYI I am Samantha from a financial perspective I I think my friends would say I'm Samantha too and I have something I have to admit I can't believe I'm going to admit this but when I was 21 or 22 I had just moved to LA I had graduated college from La Mar mount with my business degree and I was a dancer ballet and from when I was little and I performed in front of thousands of people but I wasn't confident speaking in front of people so I decided to go into acting and try to get my sad card and get into acting classes because it would force me to get up and speak in front of people and get me out of my comfort zone so I didn't have a speaking role but one of the things that they booked me on I had to be 21 was the Sex in the City episode when they when I can't believe I'm admitting this when the uh girls came to LA and did the episode in LA and when they're at Saddle Ranch I'm standing right behind Sarah Jessica Parker no way that's amazing so when I saw your website I thought oh I think I'm gonna have to tell the story when we talk that is amazing well I you know I'm a huge fan of the show and I know it's coming back and uh they're doing some wor of it and when I was watching the show again my background therapy so I'm like these ladies aren't just personalities they all have Financial personalities that um I think would be really interesting and would resonate with people um to figure out who they were from a financial perspective so ladies gentlemen if you want to find out what type of personality you are Financial personality you are as they relate to the Sex in the City ladies because that was a pretty comprehensive group of ladies from that perspective so check it out we have had a lot of fun doing this qu so we'd love your feedback on it as well and when I looked at your website I thought oh how fun and now that I've I've met you and we've had our conversation I can see where it resonates from I'm a fan so thank you so much Melanie this is amazing if you are new to she built it we'd love for you to join us we offer Community memberships masterminds Innovative virtual events and meaningful connections to entrepreneurs and corporate leaders please also check out our she built it shop curated products from women-owned businesses who put their heart and soul into their beautiful and Innovative products we offer Sheil it business Consulting and the Sheil it blog thank you to everyone around the world who joined today thank you to my editor Rich stalino please download And subscribe wherever you get your podcast and until next time together let's let nothing stop us from experiencing the life that We crave