Josh Chamberlain Josh Chamberlain

What You Need To Know About Crafting An Agile Financial Plan

Agile financial planning is the most effective method I’ve seen to help people successfully reach their financial goals.

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“Plans are useless. But planning is INDISPENSABLE.”

-Eisenhower

What is Agile financial planning?

Agile financial planning is crafting and iterating a financial plan over time, through an ongoing partnership with clients, so it specifically suits the client’s short/med/longterm goals.

How is Agile financial planning different than the traditional financial planning process?

In a traditional financial planning engagement, a client needs to gather all of their personal financial documents such as bank accounts, brokerage accounts, 401ks, insurance for car and home, etc. Then, they have a brief meeting with a financial advisor, who will create a financial plan based on the data from the financial statements provided. The advisor and clients meet again, where the financial advisor hands off the financial plan for the clients to implement. It’s much akin to your physical therapist giving you a list of exercises to do at home, that you never do. Or a dietician giving you a strict diet plan that doesn’t allow you to eat any carbs, even though your little guilty pleasure is pasta.

What’s the benefit of Agile financial planning?

Your financial statements only captures a snapshot in time and tells the stats of your story. You, your family and your goals are all unique to you and should be reflected in your financial plan. Most people aren’t comfortable pouring out their hopes and dreams to a financial planner in a consultation meeting. As a result “personalized” financial plans often turn out to be just based on numbers and stats and the client doesn’t implement it or stick to it.

In addition, life changes: Children are born, careers change, houses are bought, tuition comes into play, debt becomes an issue, relatives need help, inheritances come your way, retirement comes on to the horizon, etc. If you don’t have an agile financial process in place, your financial plan, no matter how good it was when it first was purchased, quickly becomes out of date and out of alignment with your life for today and the future.

Reaching your financial goals requires three key pieces:

1. Having a plan that will actually work for you.

2. Implementing the plan.

3. Having a plan that adjusts with your family’s circumstances.

A sneak peak Into How I Implement Agile Financial Planning

The first step in my agile financial planning process is to start by building the family Profit and Loss (P+L).

To do this we need income statements and spending account statements: savings, checking, credit cards. I ask clients to send me their statements as they track them down, rather than having to dig around for a massive amount of documentation.

Once I have enough information, I review the family’s cash flow and share my observations. If I am way off… they let me know. If I am close … they let me know. For example, often clients tell me, “Oh, actually much of my spending is on this other credit card and I haven’t given you that statement yet.” Through this process, we start to build an understanding of how we best communicate, a common language and a shared awareness of the family’s financial habits. Based on this collaborative and iterative process, we organically begin to develop a plan for how to handle the P+L in the future, that actually works for the client.

Do you have a partner that you can work with, who will craft and iterate your financial plan over time, through life’s ups and downs, so it specifically suits you? Everyone needs that type of partner.

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Josh Chamberlain Josh Chamberlain

My 15 Goals for 2020

I’m always talking to my clients about setting their goals. It’s only fair to share my own goals as a good example — with the added benefit of external accountability.

I’m always talking to my clients about their goals because without a concrete set of goals it is difficult to drive and sacrifice what is needed to reach financial independence. I also occasionally think that people think that goal setting can be a wasted effort, given either past failures in reaching goals, or the limited value in the results. It’s only fair to share my own goals as a good example — with the added benefit of external accountability.

my 3 areas of development for my life:

  1. Work Hard

  2. Love my friends and family

  3. Have fun and stay fit

Work Hard

For my “Work Hard” category my key objectives are providing my current set of client families with the best service possible and growing the number of families I serve.

  1. With my current client families, I aim to be an even more involved, high touch planner, by having quarterly touch points. The more context I have about a family, the better my advice can be.

  2. My long term objective is helping 100 families reach a level of financial security that allows them to focus on their family values rather than on chasing the almighty $. I currently work with 30 families. I aim to double that number in 2020, to 60 with a revamped marketing plan.

  3. I also believe that Decatur is a great hot bed of small entrepreneurial talent and I want to be a positive influence in that scene. With that in mind, I will continue to hold monthly coffee meet ups for the "Decatur Entrepreneurial Network (DEN)”. If you want to be added to the invite, send me an email.

Love My Family and Friends

My overarching objective is to develop and maintain deep, meaningful relationships based on honesty, openness, investment of time and encouragement.

  1. With my wife, I aim to connect for an hour, just the two of us, outside of the house, twice a week.

  2. With the boys, I want to connect for 30 minutes, individually, three times a week.

  3. With my Dad and sister, I aim to spend a weekend together once every other month.

  4. With our family in different states, we will host cousins week this summer.

  5. We will host Thanksgiving at our house.

  6. Will spend two weeks in Fl with my in-laws.

  7. With our “framily” in the neighborhood, I aim to host “clean out the fridge Friday” or “Sunday supper” twice a month. And link up with my guy crew twice a month.

Have Fun And Stay Fit

For my family, fun is travel. We have scheduled trips to:

  1. New Orleans

  2. Kenya.

Trips that are not only fun, but also give our boys unique insights into the world, and allow Jenn and I unique opportunities to connect and experience the outside world.

Staying fit and healthy keeps me on top of my game in all aspects of my life, especially as I get older. I aim to stay fit (and have fun) by

  1. Working out twice a week at xFit

  2. Playing soccer and/or basketball each week.

There they are, all 15 goals. I don’t want to bore you with all the details. But they are SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time bound. And they are things that you can hold me accountable for over the course of the year- like when you see me at YDFM or at a kid’s sporting event.

I want to help you reach your goals

I have seen great success for families with a shared set of short/mid/long term goals.
Download my free financial goals worksheet It provides a structured outline for your goals with tasks, milestones and accountability. 

Check out the strategies and tactics below for common family goals:

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