What happens when a high-achieving law graduate discovers his true calling in the world of finance? Meet Andy Esser, the heart-led financial advisor at Edward Jones whose story is a testament to resilience, purpose, and the power of genuine connections.
In this episode, Andy reveals how Peter Drucker’s timeless wisdom and personal setbacks during the financial crisis reshaped his life, inspiring him to guide others toward financial security with empathy and integrity.
Andy’s journey proves that leading with heart, embracing empathy, and focusing on adding value can create a life of fulfillment and impact. 🌱✨
🎧 Don’t miss this inspiring and actionable conversation! Hit play now and unlock powerful insights to navigate your own journey to success. 💪
Key Takeaways from this Episode
- The influence of Peter Drucker on heart-led business practices
- Navigating career shifts from law to finance during the financial crisis
- The importance of adding value in personal finance and business
- Strategies for heart-led leadership in a profit-driven world
- Embracing failure as a stepping stone to success
- The role of trust and relationship-building in financial advising
- Innovating within Edward Jones to maintain a culture of partnership
About the Guest
Andy Esser, a seasoned financial expert with over 20 years in finance and law, helps families create lasting investment strategies. A magna cum laude graduate of William & Mary, he holds multiple prestigious certifications, including CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNERâ„¢. Passionate about community, Andy is involved in local organizations and enjoys time with his wife and four children in Apex, NC.
Additional Resources
- Website: www.edwardjones.com/us-en/financial-advisor/andy-esser
- LinkedIn:
www.linkedin.com/in/andyesser
www.linkedin.com/company/edward-jones - Facebook:
www.facebook.com/ejadvisorandyesser
www.facebook.com/edwardjones - X: https://x.com/edwardjones
- Email: andy.esser@edwardjones.com
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Explore the Dialogue’s Treasures: Unearth the insights within! Delve into the profound wisdom woven throughout our conversation.
Speaker: 0:01
Welcome to The Heart Led Business Show, where compassion meets commerce and leaders lead with love. Join your host, Tom Jacobs, as he delves into the insightful conversations with visionary business leaders who defy the status quo, putting humanity first and profit second. From heartfelt strategies to inspiring stories, this podcast is your compass in the world of conscious capitalism. So buckle up and let’s go. Let your heart guide your business journey.
Tom Jackobs: 0:35
We’re about to dive into a delightful discussion with the one and only Eagle Scout slash economic expert, the financial wizard with a heart, Andy Esser. Grab your calculators and compasses folks, because Andy doesn’t just juggle finances. Oh, no. He also juggles jingles, pastries, and parenting, all the while fostering family’s fortunes. So brace yourself for an enlightening escapade that’s part Wall Street wisdom, part wildlife survival, and charmingly, all Andy. Andy, welcome to the show.
Andy Esser: 1:05
Oh, thank you for having me.
Tom Jackobs: 1:06
No worries. I’m really excited to talk to you today and get your take on kind of the heart-led business and, you know, making a profit and just the money side of that where a lot of business owners really struggle. But before we do that, why don’t you share with us your definition of what a heart-led business is? One of my heroes growing up, we all come up with superheroes, thinking back to comic book stars. My family was a little bit different insofar as we looked at business leaders and somebody who informed a lot of my understanding of what business is and also what it meant to have a heart was Peter Drucker. Peter Drucker. Not many people know the organization I’m working with, Edward Jones. We actually hired Peter Drucker as our first outside business consultant. And I’ll never forget in growing up, I would hear stories. My dad had been with Edward Jones for about 30 years, 38 years. And so I was raised to hear all of the stories of the wisdom that he was able to learn while he was working the corporate life. Bringing those home to our family life as well. And
Andy Esser: 2:02
one of the lessons that I never forgot that dad passed on to me, that actually got passed on to our company from Peter Drucker was that the products are the by product. of your business. But what you actually need to do is lead with heart. You need to lead with what the value is. And I think the way that we have, according to legend, the way we’ve looked at that is to say, if you don’t worry about the profits, you never have to worry about the profits. Things come together because you’re trying to add value to a person’s situation. You’re trying to bring that genuineness and that sincerity. So it’s bringing that, embracing that spirit and partnering with another individual to help make sure that you’re adding value, not just looking out for yourself, but looking out for all of society. So I think that encapsulates what a heart-led business is. Somebody who’s leading and looking to add value rather than just extract a profit.
Tom Jackobs: 2:48
Yeah. Wow. I love that. And I’m a big fan of Peter Drucker’s as well. And just, And what you said there, it is totally worth repeating several times, is you, if you’re not worrying about profit, you don’t have to worry about profit. It’s such, such a good phrase for people to remember that it’s not just about the numbers, it’s about that value that you’re giving somebody. And the more value give, the more value receive. So that’s, thank you for reminding me and reminding us about that. That’s great. So tell us a little bit about your business and what inspired you to start a heart-led business?
Andy Esser: 3:20
Well, my path, as I mentioned, because my dad had been involved in the company, I was very familiar with kind of what the role was, what the business was. And I was young upstart and talked about being the millennial. And I thought it was special. So I could just kind of blaze my own trail. I had seen him be worn down sometimes by extrinsic circumstances outside of his control, the market, the clients, the regulators. And I decided. At an earlier age, at a formational age, coming out of college, that wasn’t the life that I wanted for myself. I wanted to blaze my own trail, try to forge my own path. I read a couple of books, like the Rich Dad Poor Dad series, coming out of college. And I decided, you know, maybe what I should do, instead of going into the plain vanilla investments, go into real estate. They’re making a lot more people that aren’t making any more dirt. So in the mid two thousands, I came out from college and went into law school, getting my hands on every real estate course that I could. I had the highest grade of my law school class in real estate transactions, tried to master real estate tax, property law. I wanted to go all in with real estate. And I came out in the mid 20 mid two thousands found a job in, with a North Carolina based law firm that had a satellite office in Chapel Hill. And I thought I had the brass ring. I really was it was a real estate boutique law firm that was doing some property management, development, real estate transactions. And nothing the firm had a sterling reputation in North Carolina. It wasn’t my fault or the firm’s fault that I tried to launch a real estate practice in the middle of the great financial crisis where, you And what I came to appreciate about the financial crisis, it wasn’t, nobody appreciated the crisis at the time, but it did lead to some lessons that got learned. And one is that business and the world, frankly, can be a very ruthless environment. It doesn’t care about your feelings. It doesn’t care about your backstory. It doesn’t care about how special you might have been. And As a result, despite all my credentials, despite all the work that I put into it, I came to appreciate that it’s the connections that you make with people that matter. It’s how you’re trying to pour into somebody else and how they can pour back into you. And the, you know, call it a force of nature or The spirit of it, that law of reciprocity can come back around as long as you’re actively participating in it. You’re trying to add value to other people’s lives. Other aspect of that is I realized that, well, so long story short, I ended up getting fired from the law firm. It poor performance. It wasn’t I ended up finding that because the business cycle wasn’t as conscientious or heartlit as I had thought it would be I ended up losing a lot of my enthusiasm for it. And as a result, I’ve encountered one of the first significant failures of my life. And as conscientious, as thoughtful as they were there nobody defies the law of gravity. Gravity sort of pulls us all into one inexorable direction. And when you’re not adding value to the place where you’re working, you’re going to find yourself asked to leave that organization. They have since gone on to great things. I have no bones against them because I actually learned a tremendous lesson as one, If you think you’re all that, with all your credentials, that doesn’t help you. What you actually need to do is find that way to take that bit of your soul and pour into other people which led me to finance. It was during the financial crisis, people had their 401ks turned into 201ks virtually overnight. Upset a lot of people’s apple carts. Frankly, pushed back a lot of people’s goal posts by 10 years for the goals that they wanted to accomplish. Be it retirement, or moving, or second properties. I was an economics major in school. I was not a slouch student, graduated magna cum laude, had this law degree. And I said, is there a way that I can take what I feel people are longing for, which is someone to believe in them, someone to counsel them, someone to partner with them and walk one step along the path with them to help make sure they’re pointed in the right direction, have some good balanced common sense approach to their investment philosophy to their stayed plan to their tax mitigation strategies, and ultimately. Find a way to safeguard their legacy for their families and the causes that are important to them. So this ended up unwittingly being my dream job, because I was able to take what I felt inside And help other people feel that.
Tom Jackobs: 7:12
That’s awesome. That’s wow. What a journey. I didn’t realize that you were an attorney as well. So that’s or ex recovering attorney, I guess. What, like the 2008, like that I’d started my first my fitness business in 2008 as well. And that you know, that really, what I found is there was the same amount of money just floating around the world. Like the money didn’t disappear. It just went in different places. And people were more picky about where they spent their money. And so they were looking for that value that you’re talking about and who’s adding value, who’s not adding value. Well, it got rid of the weaker companies that weren’t adding value, which I think, you know, we need to go through those cycles every once in a while so that we get those heartled businesses, the ones that really care about the value. So that’s really interesting. So shifting over to the business side, because you’re a money guy, probably deal with a lot of business owners as well. What are some of those pitfalls that business owners that are heart-led, maybe you’ve gone through these as well, that, that come up often for heart-led business owners that they need to be careful about?
Andy Esser: 8:13
I can’t speak to all businesses. I don’t know all businesses. One of the things I’ve come to appreciate is I actually counsel a number of family business owners who know the infinitesimal details about their business in a way I can’t even comprehend. It’s actually breathtaking how little I actually know about some But what I do understand if it’s a family business, for example, they’ve created some real value there. They’ve created value along the dimensions of what I call the four P’s. The people who are involved, the proprietary processes, the perception they have in the marketplace, and ultimately their profitability. Those are things that can be, if they’re properly packaged, if they’re documented, if they’re replicable, that’s value that can be passed on to another business. But then you think, consider what are the threats to those things? Well, people, you could have somebody who’s a key person in an organization, but if the bus comes for them that day, then how does that maybe upset their business as apple cart? The process Those need to be defined, but they also need to be flexible because, and we’re encountering this right now that we’re going through kind of a heady time where the world is changing. We have this new thing called AI and how is AI going to be a disruptor? How can we leverage it? How can we make sure we’re not replaced by it? These are some of the pitfalls and dangers that businesses, all businesses need to look at regardless of whether they’re heart-led or profit-led The perception. We live in an age where we are inundated by these little things we carry in our pockets. And these can be incredibly helpful tools, but any tool can be misused. So you talk about branding, reputation, perception. One false fake news story out in the media is, can be the downfall of you. And in the age of fusing AI with fake news, I’m frankly staggered that we haven’t had more things just kind of run amok that have really caused people to sort of question what their sense of reality, what’s real in the world today. And finally, profitability. Comes back to what you say, we’re always trying to add value and it’s not the, it’s not the I think Jeff Bezos would say, your margin is my opportunity. This is a matter of finding out where’s the next opportunity that hasn’t been tapped into. And for me, for personal finance, I’ve talked to a lot of people I’m dealing with, I’m not dealing with, I’m actually helping people in their most tender moments of their lives. They are dealing with the death of a spouse, frankly, a death of a child. I mean, nothing more gut wrenching than trying to help a person walk through that journey together. Dealing with people who might have had their entire business mode changed. I have some, several successful realtors who are clients and with the new realtor commission settlement that’s come out in the United States, how that might change their revenue model entirely. First time in 60 years. That the standard 6 percent rate on commissions for mortgages has really been kind of upended in court. So how are we working through that to see to their profitability? But to your point, Tom, and to the point of your book and the thrust of the podcast, it’s all about how can you still find value to add. And put that out there. And for me, as I’m working one on one with clients, I am, my upfront commitment is for people who have met with success and they’re looking to safeguard their family’s significance forever, really see to their preserved wealth across generations. I’m going to invest a few hours in the first few bits of our relationship, not billing by the hour, not billing by the conversation to get to know them. Understand where they are at the crossroads in their lives and provide them some common sense, wisdom, and guidance to make sure, A, they’re pointed in the right direction. B, that if they are working with not even a financial entity, but if they have tax mitigation questions, real estate or risk questions, that they’re working with the expert in our particular area, or if they have a national concern that we have a vetted panel of experts that we can turn them to, so they know that they can trust it and basically give them peace of mind and reassurance. And if it turns out that there’s a need that they have, and we’re actually the best organization to solve it. I’ll show them what onboarding looks like and answer their questions. Those are the upfront commitments I’m willing to make before any money changes hands to make sure that I’m adding value and it’s a person where my time can be best leveraged to help accelerate somebody’s journey.
Tom Jackobs: 12:08
Oh, that’s great. Like that’s, you don’t hear that too often for a lot of businesses that invest a lot in the prospect before they become a client. And I think that is really beneficial for both parties to understand, is this a good fit? Is this not a good fit? Cause that, I mean, that goes along with like my whole theme with heartled and especially in sales, you know, you don’t want to sell something to somebody that doesn’t need it because that’s not being heartled, you refer to them out. So how do you handle like. You go through one of these long consultations, you spend, you know, two hours and at the end of it, you’re like, you know what, I don’t think I can work with this person. Like how does that kind of fit into the emotion about, you know, boy, I want to grow my practice, but I also don’t want to bring on somebody that’s not a good fit or I’m not a good fit for that person. Like how does that kind of go through your brain?
Andy Esser: 12:55
This is where the advantage of being in a network of high caliber advisors helps. And one of the things, frankly, I’ve appreciated about Edward Jones is it strikes me as a heart-led organization rather than a heartless organization. There’s several heartless organizations out there, but Having known Edward Jones since I was young, and to know not just the people who are involved, but the key leaders who are involved, who take it very sincerely and seriously to keep this culture and this spirit of partnership alive. That we are, we’re encountering a world that I wasn’t trained to thrive in. I was trained to thrive in a world that no longer exists. I just happen to be trying to find my way in this and provide some common sense to find a way forward. And so too with Edward Jones has a lot of things to be proud of. And one of our most recent commitments is to innovate and to try to be the place where people can come to get financial advice among a network of 18, 19, potentially 20,000 financial advisors in North America. So the advantage of us having this culture and the spirit of partnership is I know people who are at the organization. I have helped onboard people in the organization, and I’ve been able to make sure that they have the right mindset first, before they’re ever invited to become an advisor. And so if somebody I imagine would gel well with me, I can show, and I think it’d be a good investment of both of our times to continue a relationship, I can show them what onboarding looks like at my practice. But I’m not so mercurial to think that I’m the only person they can come to. I can realize where my limits are. For example, there are a certain select group of people who I know that I’ve had a history and not been able to really connect with and add value to, and because I know some of my peers locally and really frankly, across the country, if I suspect that they would gel well better with another advisor, I can facilitate that relationship. And I have in the past, I’ve helped to take, to carve off a portion of my book of business relationships that were hard fought to earn their trust, to realize as we’re getting on with this, you know, I’ve brought them to this point, but where they really need to go is this direction and I’m going this direction. But I’ve been able to find the people who are going that direction to help facilitate that introduction and create a trust bound relationship. So you can’t commoditize a relationship. Every relationship is a function of making sure you’ve got a blend of personalities, values, interests, and goals. That’s the clearing space for all of this, especially because ours is a trust based business. So to try to find somebody who can accelerate that trust rather than someone who’s just kind of hanging on and you hope that the trust is still there. So it’s a delicate balance, but one that thankfully, Edward Jones as a platform has allowed me to lean into so that I can continue going in a direction and finding people who can be on the bus with me.
Tom Jackobs: 15:28
That’s cool. But how does it feel though? Having, you know, you have the clients that are going this way, but you’re going this way, like, how does that affect, you know, kind of just your thoughts and beliefs about the business and, you know, you’ve worked really hard to bring that person up to a certain point and you’re like, gosh, I really don’t want to lose that client, but I know this is best for them. But like, is there a angel devil that are like talking to you?
Andy Esser: 15:48
I can appreciate those who would feel that, but for me, I live by the mantra of I can help anyone, but I can’t help everyone. If I’m able to help accelerate that relationship and that trust building timeframe with somebody who’s better suited in a better position in life, I realized I have my limits as well. I didn’t start out in the business with four children, but now I have four children. And so I have, I get to pour into them as well. And so there are greater demands on my time and attention and frankly, things that I’m trying to help make sure that our families, we’re safeguarding our significance as well, because they have their host of blessings and we all have our host of challenges. For example, I have one child who is on the autism spectrum. So to help make sure that she is able to lean into her talents without fear that something that her own body and mind is going to sabotage her success, how to give her the guidance, especially as she’s becoming in her teenage years, where there’s a whole host of physiological changes that are taking root right now, where she needs And I mentioned to some clients, especially those who have kids, they get it, that sometimes as an advisor, I’m doing a little bit of low-key parenting with them as well. Sometimes you need to be told to eat your vegetables. You need to be told to contribute to your retirement account. You might be told that you need to offload this risk by paying a life insurance premium. This is not meant to be a specific financial advice context. Everything is situational dependent, but what it underscores is that if we’re trying to understand where a person’s going, and clear that path for them, multiple different paths. Then that’s a person I can add value to. There are frankly some people who need financial help. They don’t yet need a financial plan. And I realized that they’re better connected to a resource who can help take care of some of those foundational, formational things. But even the people who need a financial plan, sometimes they need to be told, Hey, you’re spending way too much in your budget. Let’s kind of sort out some of the junk in the budget. A little belt tightening never hurt anybody. But these are the conversations where I feel activated. Where I can thrive if it’s a good person, but, and they’re providing terrific things to the bottom line. That’s not the end all be all. The end all be all is to say, is this somewhere where I feel energized and activated by the relationship?
Tom Jackobs: 17:46
Yeah. You know, a hundred percent agree with that because you know, when I had the fitness business, you know, I would get clients that weren’t committed to doing what they wanted to do, or there just wasn’t a good fit. And while, especially in the beginning part of the business, it was difficult, obviously making a profit and you’re trying to grow the business and all that. And you get a client that, you know, is not a good fit and it’s like this, how do I. Kind of manage that. And I always thought, well, if I do work with them and they don’t get the results because they’re not doing the work, it’s just going to come back on me. And they’ll go and tell their friends what a bad experience they had. And I was like, you know what? That’s not worth it. To go through that. And so the growth might be a little bit slower, but at least I felt good about it. And I think a lot of heart-led business owners struggle a little bit with it, but because we are centered in the heart that it’s like, you know what, I’m going to go the path that I believe is the best for everybody versus just, I’m in it for me, screw everybody else. This is the path I’m going. And I, it might be a little bit slower, but it’s, you know, the tortoise and the hare, the tortoise is going to win. Instead of steady and true.
Andy Esser: 18:47
Well, as you’re mentioning this, I think it comes back to, is it a me focus or is it a we focus? As a business leader, I try to take that servant leader mentality that I’ve grown up to the point where I realized that especially in parenting, I have created some success, but it’s not for me. I think one of the most beautiful stories I was chatting with a community contact who we were talking a little bit about my business and the value that I’m trying to add. And he clarified it. He said that when his, when he was still a teenager in his house, his parents sat him down. They were having that one of those quiet, intimate family moments where they got a chance to kind of consider what is this all really about? And his dad of the family, I think they had just had some sort of grandparent pass away. But dad said, we received. an inheritance from them. And we want to caretake that inheritance because we want to pass that inheritance on to you. And we want nothing more than for you to make sure that you pass that inheritance on to others. So, to help raise people’s mindset from it’s out of me versus the world. It’s not even we versus the world. It is where can we work to create a better world. That’s what I try to do with my heart-led business, to help pour into it, to add value to the people with whom I’m interacting. It’s an investment of their time as well, too, to screen things out. So, if I’m not at my best, then I’m shortchanging not myself or my future, but their futures as well. So it comes back to having, for me, it’s that having that client centric focus. How can I be sure that I’m bringing out the best of this time so I’m the best supporting character in their movie.
Tom Jackobs: 20:11
Yeah, that’s great. And I’m glad you brought back around the value proposition as well, because I think at the center of a heart-led business is that value exchange that we need to provide that value for the client, the best that we can, and. That value will sometimes come back and sometimes it won’t, but it feels really good when we’re providing that value and somebody is actually benefiting. You know, in my own experience, it’s always come back tenfold anyway. Maybe not today, but you know, at some point it will come back.
Andy Esser: 20:39
Well, at the end of the day I’ve got to look at the person in the mirror at the end of the day and at the beginning of the morning. And there are several things that I want to be able to look that person in the eye in the mirror and echo what I was told when I was sitting in the church pew is like, well done, good and faithful servant. It’s not well done, good and faithful financial advisor. It’s not well done, good and faithful business leader. It’s well done, good and faithful servant, because we’re all in this together and it is us trying to make sure that we’re adding not just that value, but really raising other people up so that they can live their best lives.
Tom Jackobs: 21:08
Yeah. And I love too that you’re really thinking and prepping people for that generational wealth as well, because that’s just going to help everybody on the lineage as well for that whole family. So Andy, how can people learn more about you and all the great work that you’re doing and potentially work with you?
Andy Esser: 21:25
Well, it’s just a quick internet search of Andy Esser. Thankfully if you search Andy Esser, I do come up both my Edward Jones professional profile page, my LinkedIn page. And just coming to our website and getting a chance if a person wants to have that one-on-one conversation to understand a little bit of what our deep dive discovery process looks like, make sure they’re pointed in the right direction. I’m happy to make myself available as a resource to them.
Tom Jackobs: 21:47
And are you available across the nation or is just in North Carolina?
Andy Esser: 21:51
I’m licensed cross country. Got some fun clients in California, some in the Midwest. Some on the Eastern seaboard, Florida, Texas. And regardless of whether we become a financial advisor relationship, advisor client relationship, I am trying to help make sure that people have the best resource and get cleared to the people who are going to add the most value for where they are in their journey.
Tom Jackobs: 22:08
Awesome. Well, thank you for that. And thanks for coming on the show today and sharing your wisdom about your own heart-led business and your observation of other heart-led businesses as well. I certainly appreciate it. And I know our listeners appreciate it as well. So thank you very much.
Andy Esser: 22:21
Hope to do it again sometime. Thank you so much, Tom.
Tom Jackobs: 22:23
Absolutely. And to our show listeners, thank you so much for checking out the show today, listening or watching on your platform of choice. I appreciate it. I know Andy appreciates it as well. Make sure you’re checking out everything that Andy’s doing. We’ll link all of that down into the show notes so you don’t even have to go to Google. You can just go to the show notes, click on the website and check out Andy’s profile and everything that he’s doing there as well. And then if you could do me a favor while you’re on the internet, just go ahead and give this show a rating and review that really helps spread the word and tells the systems to show the show to more people that could use the advice that was shared on today’s show. And until next time, lead with your heart.
Speaker 2: 23:01
You’ve been listening to The Heart-Led Business Show, hosted by Tom Jackobs. Join us next time for another inspiring journey into the heart of business.
