Lessons from a Breakaway Attorney with Corey Kupfer

00:03
Charlie Van Derven
Thank you for tuning into another edition of RIA Collective. My name is Charlie Van Derven. I'm the president of Social Advisors and the host of RAA Collective. We're here taking the fear and mystery out of going independent. If you're a captive advisor in our financial services industry and your fiduciary responsibilities on the independent side of the industry, we're a great resource for you. We're here to help you transition smoothly. My guest today, he's different than the other guests we've had on to this point. We've interviewed RAA Leadership, people who have helped a lot of advisors transition into Ras. Today we're going to take the legal approach to that. So, Corey Cooper, you are just such a great guest to have on because you bring different perspectives. Cory is an attorney. He's an author. He is also a podcast host. He's good looking. He's probably got a good golf game. 

 01:03
Charlie Van Derven
He's got everything we all wish we had. 

 01:05
Corey Kupfer
Right. Golf game part that I can't play. 

 01:11
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah. I might write this week, but I know it comes and goes, right? So, Corey, thank you so much for being here. It's great to have a different perspective. We've interviewed to this point, RA Leadership, who, of course, at one time or another made that move themselves, many of them, I think, probably the biggest firm. We've really talked to the CEO of Jeff Concepts. He own a few episodes back. Jeff got about 350 advisers, so he's helped advisers move, but he's never kind of sat on the legal side of this whole thing. So you've got a different perspective. I'm excited for you to share that with our listening audience. Of course, most of our listeners come from that wirehouse space that Morgan, Meryl, UBS, even Jones, and you name it, that captive environment. They're listening to us because, Corey, they want to make a change. 

 02:07
Charlie Van Derven
Your advice from the legal side is going to be so key to that. I want to start off getting to know you . First off, the world runs on networking. I don't know if you share that sentiment with me. 

 02:21
Corey Kupfer
I do. 

 02:22
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah. We got introduced by a mutual friend of ours, Josh Wilson. And Josh is awesome. You guys both have a deal making podcast, your deal quest. Do you remember what Josh is called? They should prepare for this. 

 02:35
Corey Kupfer
I forget the name of it, but yeah, but it's a great deals podcast as well. There are very few out there that are like mine, where they talk about all types of deals, not just M and A. His is one of those and mine is one of those, and I think it's great. 

 02:49
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah. And Josh is awesome. You also wrote a book that I love, the title of Authentic Negotiating right on the Deal podcast. I listen to a few episodes in preparation of our conversation today. You're a negotiator, and it sounds like that's been a significant part of your career. 

 03:08
Corey Kupfer
Yeah, I mean, listen, I feel like I say I do it every day. I don't know if that's quite true, but it's close to true if it's not absolutely true. Because in addition to the breakaway work, which we're going to focus on today, we do a lot of deal work. We do a lot of M and A and tuck ins and advisor onboarding deals for folks in the space. Of course that all takes negotiation and then there's some other ansely stuff. Occasionally we're dealing with partnership split ups and things like that to take negotiation. I much prefer to do it on the positive deal side, but sometimes it's necessary on the other side as well. 

 03:40
Charlie Van Derven
Of course, I want to keep on the word authentic. Right. We serve an industry that I would say compliance struggles with communication. It's a canned communication industry. I think it's evolving out of that, at least from our perspective. We're trying to push that evolution into really personalize and authentic communication. Talk to me about authentic negotiating. What does that mean to you? 

 04:06
Corey Kupfer
Yeah, so I'm going to contrast it and then depends on how deep we want to get into. I have a whole philosophy around it. It's in the book, but there are too many in my mind. Negotiating, trainings books, seminars, you name it out there, that are all around like tactics and counter tactics. Frankly, a lot of them are manipulative and they actually maybe at a lower level, they quote unquote work if you want to talk about temporary results. If you deal with any kind of sophisticated deals and negotiations like I do, people on the other side are also experienced negotiators. That stuff's not going to work and it's inauthentic. It's manipulative, and it's not the way you want to negotiate, I think, ever. Certainly in business where business deals often have an ongoing component to them, an ongoing relationship. Right. Merging your firms you're doing or even if they don't, especially if we're talking in the RA industry. 

 04:59
Corey Kupfer
I think it's true everywhere, but certainly in the RA space. It's a tiny industry. Everybody knows each other. You get a reputation. You don't want to be in authentic. You don't want to be manipulative. I have a whole philosophy where you focus internally on clarity, detachment, and equilibrium to get to a true space of what you really want. We could spend hours just talking about the book, but that's not the purpose of this podcast. I'll leave it down and check it out. 

 05:21
Charlie Van Derven
Maybe that's a later episode. I'll tell you what, I'll be 50 this year, so date myself . Right away I got started working in this industry in a telemarketing position, really. Right. We were doing websites for some warehouses, and as I got into that, I came up with the company. I was with by pounding phones. I talk a lot about the way sales has changed over the years. So that's 25 years ago. A little crazy. It's so long ago, but I was trained in a methodology called spin. I don't want to cut on the spin methodology because I absolutely agree with you. Right. It was like ask the questions in a certain way so you back your subject into the corner. They can't say no, because if they do, they look stupid. It's never felt right. That's kind of traditional sales, and it sounds like traditional negotiating as well. 

 06:20
Charlie Van Derven
So strategic. 

 06:21
Corey Kupfer
Yeah. Like you said, it's never felt right. I think it's never been the right approach, but I think it's less effective and less acceptable now because I think we moved into one of the positive things in my mind about social media and all this stuff that's happened right there's. Some negatives. Negatives. I think we moved into a time of great authenticity. I think people it's harder to hide people, find out who you truly are, and you need to line up your actions with who you say you are and hopefully what your internal beliefs and values are. You're going to get more likely called out these days than you used to if you don't do that. So that applies in sales. It applies to negotiating, it applies how you show up in business generally in life. I think it's just tougher to get away with that stuff anymore. 

 07:04
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, I absolutely love that we're so focused on building relationships now, as opposed to saying the right thing at the right time to make somebody do something they really don't want to do and leave them with a sour taste in their mouth anyway. So I love that. I thank you for your approach to that and for kind of championing that, because a lot of that sales methodology, negotiating methodology, that goes away right. When it's really based on relationship and everybody winning, or at least partially winning in the end. Right. That's awesome. Cory, tell me about Deal Quest. Let's push that out there and make people aware of it, and then we'll talk about the breakaway attorney stuff as well. 

 07:40
Corey Kupfer
Yeah, sure. It's interesting because I started dealing three and a half years ago. At the time, it was actually branded differently about a year. We rebranded it, and I have this the reason for it was that I realized that I travel a lot in the entrepreneurial world, obviously a lot in the RAA world, which is entrepreneurial. Right. All these breakaway brokers starting up new firms, moving from being employees are in some captive space or contractors, to truly being entrepreneurs and running a business where you can build enterprise value. We also ends up being a single niche. We have clients across other industries as well. As president of New York chapter of entrepreneurial organization. I just swim in entrepreneurship, and what I find is that these great entrepreneurs who are building good companies are always focused on organic growth, which they should be. You need to be able to get a customer and a client and another one, or else you're not going to be in business unless you're the zero 1% of companies that are formed just to do acquisitions. 

 08:36
Corey Kupfer
Right. Everybody else has to go get customers and clients. 

 08:39
Charlie Van Derven
Yes. 

 08:39
Corey Kupfer
The problem is that's not the only way you can grow. Right. You have this other way to grow in organic growth, deal driven growth. It's not just M and A, it's licensing deals and strategic alliances and joint ventures and even real estate investment where you can build wealth along with your company. Online affiliate deals and distribution deals, you name it. Right. There are deals to be done. My just observation over 35 years of doing this is that too many companies don't take advantage of this other way to grow, and they have misconceptions about it. They think, oh, you have huge capital, you have to be a bigger company. I'm too small, I'm in the wrong industry. My assertion is that every company can do a deal of some type that can help them grow. I really did the podcast to get that message out there and to show the different types of deals. 

 09:27
Corey Kupfer
I have entrepreneurs on, I have various professionals to help entrepreneurs again across the spectrum, right? Doing deals with competitors. We've talked about white labeling deals, I mean, you name it, any kind of deal, just to give people open up that thought process and encourage them. Being a niche podcast, I never thought it would become this big thing. And it was fine. I said, hey, 5100 people, listen to an episode. Those are great. I'll serve 5100 people. One or two of them may need my services at some point. I'll need some great guests, and it's worth it. Well, in three and a half years, I don't know how it's happened. I mean, I sort of did. We did great marketing and whatever, and obviously people like the podcast, but we're now at the point where we're getting 67,000 listings an episode, 25, 30,000 listings. They might be repeated people, so I'm not saying we have to and with top one and a half percent listen notes, which Frank's reach of podcast says, this is top one and a half percent out of 2.8 million podcasts. 

 10:31
Corey Kupfer
I only raised this because I'm totally blown away. I think we've held through our niche very closely. We have been consistent in episode every week for three and a half years. I put together a marketing team, and for me, I get to serve more people, which is my main motivator in doing that. And I have fun. I love doing it because I love. 

 10:52
Charlie Van Derven
Talking about this and what's fun is we're new friends, right? So I come in. I get a chance to get to know you. Today, I will tell you in the limited number of we haven't done the episodes you have yet, but we're getting there. We'll get there. I think we plan on doing a few more frequently than what you're doing, so we'll get there quicker. I love this part of what I get to do because I get to put blinders on. I come to this business because meeting new people is my favorite thing, one of my favorite things. Helping out along the way, if we can. Absolutely. Along those lines in that research and getting ready for today. Cory I came across a nonprofit which I don't think is active anymore. One plus one equals one. I want to give my listeners an opportunity to get to know you outside of just that professional life. 

 11:46
Charlie Van Derven
This is a really cool thing that I saw. Once you tell us about that non profit and where. 

 11:51
Corey Kupfer
That'S evolved into yeah, so, for me, I've done a lot of personal growth and professional growth and internal work. This big question we have, like, what is our purpose? Why are we here? Right? For me, you want to talk about networking and bringing people together in a bigger way. I'm all about bringing people together across perceived differences so we realize we're all one. I've had the benefit of traveling the world, spending time in different cultures. What you find when you do that is that everybody in the world, every average person wants the same thing, right? They want to be able to feed their kids if they live in a place where education is available. They want to educate their kids. They want their kids to have a better life than they did. They want to improve themselves. They want to grow. Forget all the political stuff, all the reasons. 

 12:40
Corey Kupfer
All the people that try to divide us at a fundamental level, we're all connected. Humanity is my belief. That led us to me to do various types of work around that. And then my wife, also. One of the reasons were introduced was because were up to similar things in the world. At some point, we put together this nonprofit, which at the time was called one plus one equals one. The number one plus one equals ome. The concept was, you're one, I'm one, he's one, she's one, and that all equals a big one on e, one humanity. Right? We did two things, mainly in there. We did a lot of race relations and intercultural understanding work, which is consistent with my purpose. Also a lot of young women's empowerment work, right? To work with young women, to have them on their power and their voices. Over time, what's evolved for my wife and I because we knew so many people who run great nonprofits and frankly, we're burning themselves out. 

 13:36
Corey Kupfer
Beyond the big nonprofits that are super well funded, most nonprofits run scrambling for money. All the people are overworked, they're trying to do great work and many of them are. We discovered early on what used to be called the fourth sector. Now they talk about substantious companies and type B corporations and things like that. The legal structure has changed to support companies that want to make a profit and also make a difference. Like you don't use to have to either make a profit or make a difference. Right now you can do both. We've come to believe in that sector even more so to have a sustainable business model around the impact you want to make. You're not dependent upon foundation funding that comes and goes. You're always scrambling for money. You're not being influenced by the money, you're able to sustain yourself. We ended up closing the nonprofit at some point, but that's what we still do. 

 14:29
Corey Kupfer
All of that work around race relations and young women's empowerment and social justice, bringing people together across all kinds of differences, whether it's political, racial, social, and we just do that through various programs that are more in the for profit sector. We have nonprofit fiscal sponsors for certain things. We also have a portion that we give back to all these causes that we believe in. 

 14:54
Charlie Van Derven
That is awesome. We need more people out there fighting the fight, if you will, right? I mean, really making a difference in society. Corey, so thank you for your contributions socially, internationally, it sounds like as well. That's really cool, man. I appreciate it. I want to get into the legal work that you do. Your law firm, as you said, a lot of our representation also segments, but for the purpose today, really helping the people who are listening to set the stage correctly for themselves. Right. Again, we've heard from RA leadership, you have a totally different perspective on this. Really, how do you set yourself up for success and try to not get sued by the Big Brother? You're leaving. Right. Corey, let's talk about the law firm first and then we'll get into some of your tips and ideas and ways to make it go smoothly. 

 15:50
Corey Kupfer
Sure, yeah. In the RA space, I work with the first client I ever helped break away from anywhere over 23 years ago. 

 16:01
Charlie Van Derven
Okay. 

 16:01
Corey Kupfer
In fact, we're in the process of working with a client to actually exiting at this point. It's been representing them all these years and certainly over the last 12, 13, 14 years. Obviously the movement has independent adviser movement has really accelerated the infrastructure around. As I'm sure you listeners know. The independent space is so increased with the capacity of the custodians and the tech players and the other platforms and services and players out there. Consultants. You name it. To the place where I believe that there is nothing that's not at least competitive with and certainly often superior to what you can get at the warehouses and private banks and even many of the IBDs. It's been interesting to see over these 23 years or whatever the industry evolved, we do literally have done hundreds and hundreds social advisors transitions over that period of time. We're one of the leading firms in the country that do that. 

 17:04
Corey Kupfer
You can count on your fingers on both hands, probably, really, if you talk about the top firms maybe one hand that have done that many. What distinguishes ourselves from our competitors out there and it just makes us very different is that pretty much everybody else who's done the kind of volume AI transcription do, really is a compliance firm that does these transitions and then is running people into the compliance program, which is nothing wrong with that. Compliance is important. We come up at it from the other side. We do everything that's not compliance. Right? So we do the transition. We get people out clean, give them a whole road map on how they don't get sued from Mother Merrill or Morgan Stanley or UBS or Goldman Sachs or Wells Fargo, whoever it is. Because of my team's background in corporate structuring and equity structuring and deal structuring. 

 18:01
Corey Kupfer
Because one of the big differences right now from when I started was it used to be somebody coming out. They sort of practice, right? They make a very nice living. Maybe they have one other person with them. Now you got major teams coming out, right? I mean, we do teams in a multi billion dollar teams. We also do ones that are a few hundred million under management, but even the smallest, they're coming out with this mentality of, okay, I'm going into business myself. Yes. To get away from the compliance, quote, unquote, the oversight, the decision, the lack of decision making, the lack of being a fiduciary and all these other things. Also they're moving towards something, and they realize they can build something in their own vision and also grow it and build enterprise value. Certainly over the last five, seven years, I mean, the valuations and the money that's coming to the space has gone crazy. 

 18:52
Corey Kupfer
So they see that. What they need is they need some more sophisticated equity structuring, corporate structuring anticipating different classes of equity, maybe. What if I want to bring in other advisors and give them a piece, phantom equity, things like that are much less to get a corporate structures, and they're anticipating the deal work. The compliance is sort of a given. You need it. It's important. I'm not putting it down. We partner with compliance consulting firms and compliance law firms who handle that piece of it. We do all of that sophisticated legal work not only to get them out but then also to get them properly set up for their and then we become growth partners with them from the start all the way through their own exit. 

 19:29
Charlie Van Derven
I love that. I love it. How far in advance of a departure if I met Morgan Stanley today and I really know I'm going independent and I'm struggling with all kinds of things. We won't get into details there. How far ahead of my departure? Should I be sitting down with you? 

 19:48
Corey Kupfer
Yeah. We can talk about ideal time frame then we can talk about what can be done if necessary because that comes up. 

 19:55
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, for sure. 

 19:56
Corey Kupfer
We usually say, hey listen, if and whatever, great reach out to us six months in advance, even longer. Right? Because here's the thing, even if you're going to leave in a year, right, some people are hanging around because maybe they are deferred comp or something that's going to hit where they're waiting for that money to hit. We don't have to do the full scope of work upfront, but this employment transition work, this roadmap that we write up to you and this consulting we give you to tell you exactly what your agreement say, what state law says, whether you're under the protocol for broken recruiting or not, all of these things that can't be done too early. Reason being that there are mistakes people make while they're still there that run them into trouble. The earlier you understand what you can and can't do, the better off you are because the less chance you make mistakes in terms of forming the entity and doing your operating agreement, chills agreement, your contracts or whatever, we can do that all way later. 

 20:53
Corey Kupfer
Don't hesitate to come to us early. Now, in terms of how long it actually takes, from the time social Advisors says I want to go to the SEC has by law 45 days to approve your new firm, assuming you aren't fully independent and you're starting your own firm. In practice they approve the firms in 30, 31, 32 days depending on if you had a weekend. Obviously you need time beyond that to prep for the ADB, get your custodian, place your tech in place, all that kind of stuff, whatever. We usually say try to give us at least a minimum of 90 to 120 days and that's tight. If you're six months out plus that's great. You've probably spoken to a custodian already and gotten some information from them and are starting to research your tech stuff. On the legal side, we can get everything done within the 60 day period that you're working on your adv. 

 21:44
Corey Kupfer
There's reasons to do it early, especially on the appointment transition side. 

 21:48
Charlie Van Derven
Now, I've seen a lot of not the front row seat that you have, but we've seen a lot of advisors move out of that over the last 20 plus years, out of that captive space into IBD or RIAA. Corey, I've seen people do it well. I've seen people do it terribly. I've seen people leave the wirehouse with the objective of starting their RIAA. Never get to that stage. One of the things that we're trying to uncover with RA Collective is what's the difference? Right. Why does one adviser leaving wells Fargo Advisors? Why are they more successful than the next advisor? Any insight into that question? 

 22:25
Corey Kupfer
Yeah, let's start outside the legal realm, right? I mean, the first question is what model are you in and what is your relationship with your clients? Right? Because, Charlie, you brought up relationships earlier. This is one of the ultimate relationship businesses, right. People are much more tied in most cases to social advisors than to the firm. Right. That was proven during the Great Recession when the Independent Advisor movement 2008 nine and ten actually accelerated because the credibility of the big firms oh, wait, Lehman's gone, bear's gone. Meryl got gobbled up by the OA, did great research, didn't prevent me from being 30% down. Like that was actually a boom for the Ramon. The thing about it is that it does depend upon your relationship with the client. Most certainly warehouse advisors have those kind of relationships where they're going to bring over 85, 90 plus percent of their business. 

 23:25
Corey Kupfer
A lot of times the only reason they're not at 95 and they're at 85 is because they use it as an opportunity to trim their client base and leave behind the ones that are less profitable or paying or whatever, not totally fit the model. In certain other environments, like private banks, for example, or some of the firms like the Alliance Bernstein type firms used to be, whatever, where they have much more of somebody's asset gatherer and then they really hand them off to relationship manager and they have a much more team approach and the relationships are stickier. Right. In those cases, sometimes the percentages are lower and you really got to understand who's going to come with you. In your typical wirehouse, wilget Stanley, Maryland GBS, Wells Fargo Breakaway you got to take a high percentage of your clients if you've been in the business for any period of time and have relationships. 

 24:18
Corey Kupfer
If we get past that hurl, then the main next thing is the legal mistakes. Right. Usually that I can get into some specifics around them, but I will say on a high level that usually comes from either ignorance or arrogance. 

 24:33
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, I love that, actually. And I know where that fits in. A couple of people I know across the board. One of the things we talk about going back to relationships, right? One of the things we typically recommend is, to your point, you can never start too early in fact, I would recommend, if I'm talking to social advisors at UBS who's talking about independence, I'm like, well circle this data a year from now because that's the most important thing in retaining the assets is moving that 85%, 90% over where your relationships at with the clients. Especially if you're part of a team to your point, right, you gather the assets, turn over to a relationship manager. Now that client service associate or whoever's in that position really owns the relationship. Twelve months in advance is usually the recommendation we give is you got to start forming some social relationships. 

 25:31
Charlie Van Derven
And it's not about business relationships. It's about getting to know them. Family, next generation, surprising to like gifts, things like that. We really got to beef up those relationships so that people are going to come with you because what's the typical non communication, right? What's that typical time frame? That's months that you can't speak to your clients. 

 25:55
Corey Kupfer
Yeah. That's a great point on the earlier you start that because the thing is even legally if you start stepping up efforts that are outside the ordinary course of business very late in the game, that's one of the ways you run yourself into trouble. Because advisers, every employee advisers have a duty of loyalty to their employer for as long as they're there. If they're at Morgan Stanley, they're supposed to do what's in the best interest of Morgan Stanley until the day to resign. That doesn't mean you can't prepare to compete separately. Get your firm ready, file the SEC, find office space. You're supposed to do that all outside of business hours. What you can't do is call your clients in advance, things like that, right? One of the things that they will look for in addition to the first thing they're going to do is a forensic review. 

 26:44
Corey Kupfer
I say this to my clients so many times and 99% of them follow my advice. Every once in a while you have that cowboy or arrogance where the arrogant is coming. Trust me folks, you cannot beat forensics these days. You cannot. Anything you download email to yourself, put on a zip drive, copy, even, print even, right, it's all digital. It's all tracked. Beyond that, the other way people run themselves into trouble is they breach the studio loyalty. Some of the ways they do that is they start scrambling too late to make sure they have relationships to the clients and they do a bunch of stuff they weren't doing before and then the firm can try to show that you only did that in anticipation of leaving. Now if you start that way in advance to just continue to build better relationship clients being a better communication, then the odds of that being seen as doing it in anticipation of leaving a lot lower because that's good business practice. 

 27:35
Corey Kupfer
Anyway. Listen, if you're not leaving for five years, you should. Be doing that. Right. So it's just good business. 

 27:40
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, that's awesome. It's something that we even if someone's not planning on making that move to independence, right. That social relationship, that social intelligence around who they know and what they know. That's all good stuff for growing the business too. Corey, you're a wealth of information, man. I'm so lucky to know you. Our listening audience is so lucky to know you. Any other tips? I mean, we touched on a couple of things from a legal perspective. We touched on relationship and making sure that you're putting your planning out months and months, if not a year and a half in advance. What am I not asking you that I should be? 

 28:17
Corey Kupfer
Yeah, I mean, I would say two things. One, on the legal side and this may sound self serving, but I will tell you what I tell my clients. It is so crucial that you get somebody who really knows this stuff. What I say to prospects when I get referred to whatever, they may have their local corporate council, their local employment council and they want to use somebody and they may even think it's better locally because they know the local law, industry knowledge is so cruel and industry reputation, right. One of the things we do is on the resignation letters for our clients, they say, I resign. I don't expect there to be any problems. If they are contacted by council and they put our name on there, that carries weight because they know, right? The reason why I say this is not just self serving is I actually say to prospects, listen, if you're not going to use us for any reason, right, I want your business, I love to work with you. 

 29:07
Corey Kupfer
If you're not going to use us for any reason, go to the four or five other firms that have done hundreds of these like we have. I'll even give you their names because I'd rather have you go to my direct competitor then use your local person who has not done this or go to somebody who's done four of these, right? It's crucial to work and this is not only on the attorney side, it's crucial to work with experienced folks. If you're working with a consultant, you want people who have really done it. You want accounting help that understands this space. Some of you may choose to work with some of the service providers or platforms out there, like a Dynasty Financial or somebody like that, right? You want to get whatever you need for your infrastructure in place and for your support in place to be able to do this right. 

 29:51
Corey Kupfer
Listen, it's probably the biggest move you ever make in your life with the exception of maybe eventually selling your independent Ram, right? So that's one big piece. The other thing for me is totally outside the legal realm is I mentioned before that most folks now do have something they're moving towards as opposed to what they're running away from. But make sure that's the case. Right. It's super important. I get it. Right. You might be frustrated by the fact that you're at a place where they're making you push product or you're at a place where compliance is driving you crazy, which, by the way, at the big firms, what they call compliance is X percent true compliance, meaning what's wrong and what's not. A much bigger percentage that's actually risk management. Right? It's not compliant, it's not illegal. It's just risk management. By the way, I don't blame them. 

 30:41
Corey Kupfer
If you are in a model where you have thousands and thousands of advisors, you have to manage down to the lowest common denominator. You can't run that business any other way or else you're going to run yourself into trouble because some yoho somewhere is going to get you in trouble. Right? That's the model they have to run. The great thing about the risk of the independent space is that you get to make your own risk management decisions. You still want to be in compliance with the legal or not, but you get to make your own risk management decisions. My point on that is this is that it's easy to find out what you're running from. I mean, that's the initial thing. A lot of people say, I can't take my manager anymore. I can't take the compliance. They won't let me serve my clients the way I want to serve them. 

 31:24
Corey Kupfer
I want to be a truth fiduciary, whatever it is, but have that vision to what you're running towards. This is an opportunity for you to create something in your own vision, your own values. Build the team the way you want to treat clients the way you want it. The firms that I've seen most successful have taken the time not only to figure out what they don't want, but also to create a vision for what they do want. That also then dictates how they create their branding and how they create their messaging and how they go out there. Because there are a lot of firms out there and you want to distinguish yourself and your story and your vision and your commitment to what distinguishes you. The firms that do that really do the best. So that's my other non legal piece. 

 32:03
Charlie Van Derven
Of advice that's a little plugin for social advice will help you create that vision. Corey I'll tell you what, it's a lucky day for me. We got to know each other a few weeks ago. Brief conversation is the right fit. And absolutely it was immediately. As soon as I met you, I knew it would because I trust with Josh. I trust Josh implicitly. This is a lucky day for me because I feel like I have a new resource in an industry I've known for more than 20 years that I talked to a lot social advisors all the time. I coach a lot of Maryland, Morgan and Jones, and some of them are trying to make a move. Right. I love your advice on know what you're going to I love that. 

 32:47
Corey Kupfer
Right. 

 32:48
Charlie Van Derven
And I've never positioned it that way. It's always about yes, compliance, this or the Fiduciary thing we talk about, right. Where I can't be a true Fiduciary to my clients or whatever that might be. I love the advice on moving towards something as opposed to running away from something. I also love the knowledge that you just dropped on our listeners and the knowledge that I know that I've got a resource to send people that I can absolutely trust not only has their best interest in mind, and some of that is not just the work you've done with our agents and advisers over the years. A lot of that stems from the book on authentic negotiating. Right. Just the fact that we're talking about authenticity, a lot of that stems from the nonprofit work you've done in the past and the initiatives are pushing there. Those are marks of a quality person, not only a quality attorney and helping your clients, but a quality person as well. 

 33:38
Charlie Van Derven
I'm excited to be able to refer people to you. Now, my question to you and if you say no, I'm going to edit this out. My question to you is, are you okay for our listeners who have some questions and potentially, I'm sure we've got some prospects for you as well, are you okay being a resource if they've got questions outside of this interview? 

 33:58
Corey Kupfer
Absolutely. Listen, I'm a resource all the time and certainly people who come through trusted referral sources like yourself, I'm going to get on the phone. We're not the kind of law firm that says you've got to pay us for an initial consult, right. We don't do that. Right. 

 34:13
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah. 

 34:13
Corey Kupfer
We're not going to spend hours and hours with you happy to get on an initial phone call, answer some questions, talk about our experience, but also give you some information on the things that if you're an adviser looking to leave, you have questions that are burning on the top of mine. I'll always take a call like that from a trusted resource. No question. 

 34:31
Charlie Van Derven
That is awesome. I appreciate that. What's the easiest way for people to get in touch? 

 34:35
Corey Kupfer
Yeah. First of all, they want to just find out more information on the firm. The website is kuffferlaw.com. That's Kupferlaw.com. By the way, on there, I've got a video on the RAA page that talks about how we differentiate ourselves. I've also got a ten tip series for breakaway brokers who want to leave. Right. A ten step process video series on there that's free so they can reach out through there. My email is ccupfer ckupfer@cupforlaw.com, and you can always just ping me an email and my assistant will get something out of California. 

 35:16
Charlie Van Derven
Awesome. We'll get the ten tips on the Raclectic website too, so we can find it there. Corey, I got to thank you so much, man. All the things you're doing, you've given me some of your time is awesome. I appreciate that. Your knowledge, your insights, your advice, it's all golden. I appreciate it, man. 

 35:34
Corey Kupfer
Well, Kelly, I appreciate our relationship building here and also what you do, social advisors as well, because that's crucial and being on the show. Thank you. 

 35:43
Charlie Van Derven
Awesome. Thank you. So, for all of our listeners, I want to thank you for listening to another episode of RAA Collective with Corey Cup for Law and Charlie Van Durbin, president, Social Advisors. If anybody that you think we should interview that has good advice for those breakaway advisors who are looking to go independent, please send them over to Raacollective.com. Of course, I'm always available, too, if you need me, easiest reach on LinkedIn. Charlie Van Durbin is a very easy name to find. So, Corey, thank you so very much. Our listeners, thank you very much. And this concludes another episode of Raacolective. 

 36:20
Corey Kupfer
Thanks, Charlie.