Integrated Partners, a CPA-focused hybrid RIA and supervisory jurisdiction office of LPL Financial with over $18 billion in AUA, has named Andree Mohr, currently its chief implementation officer, as its new president.
Paul Saganey founded Integrated in 1996, serving as president and CEO until now. Saganey, who will continue as CEO, said Mohr's promotion allows the firm to bring in the next generation of leadership. The change does not signal that the 61-year-old is close to retirement, and he said he plans to be with the firm for at least the next 20 years.
“When you look at the rest of the industry and how they're thinking more short-term with what they want to do with their firms, with equity partners that don't have a long-term view of what everybody's trying to build,” Saganey said. “We are the exact opposite; we don't have equity partners yet, no PE (private equity) firms, nothing like that. We want this to be a lifelong company. To be a forever company means you have to have that future leadership in place.”
Mohr, 35, joined the company in 2015 as director of business development. She said the move realigns her and Saganey's responsibilities into three areas of focus: helping the firm's advisors work with more of Integrated's CPA partners, moving into the market to work with higher net worth clients and training members of the technology advisory team.
Mohr will focus on the CPA partnerships and technology pieces, while Saganey will focus on coaching advisors moving to market.
“By aligning our roles, it gives Paul the opportunity to dream big, to think big, but also to train our advisors,” Mohr said. “It allows me to be able to implement some new technologies that we want to do and drive business operations, and then also realign the team to really focus on the CPA story.”
Integrated has built much of its business through partnerships with accounting firms. There are currently 188 accounting firms in its CPA Alliance. The model is based on providing resources and training advisors to take their practices to the next level. The CPA Alliance offers a very rich client pool that integrated advisors can tap into while giving CPA professionals the tools they need to address increasingly complex client needs.
“Many advisors want to work with CPAs, but they've had a hard time making them successful,” she added. “That's really the secret to our sauce—it's about how we position ourselves when we bring in CPA firms, for the problems we're solving for our highest net worth CPA clients and business owners.”
Saganey believes they are chasing accounting firms at the right time.
“The average accountant is reaching an age where their higher-income clients, which are small businesses, are preparing to sell their businesses,” he said. “In the next 10 years, the accounting community will be such that many of our ideal clients will go through what are called 'liquidity events.' That offers planning opportunities; it gives us assets to manage.”
At the same time, many integrated advisors have never worked with such large clients and need help along the way. That's where Saganey comes in.
“Because of that, advisors who join us, for the first time in their lives, are seeing $50, $75, $100 million clients,” he said. “Our program would crash and burn if we weren't out there coaching and developing and mentoring and holding the advisor's hand every step of the way.”
Mohr's appointment coincides with the launch of her new book, Center stage: How to become the star of your practiceco-authored by Saganey and Matt Ackermann, Chief Content Officer at Integrated.