In our third annual sales assistant survey, Registered Rep. explores the evolving role of the sales assistant. In our exclusive survey, we detail trends in the compensation, duties and preferences of these essential players in the brokerage business.

Plus, we profile five of the best.

You're the star broker in your branch. Your office looks out on the river and in the evening, the setting sun. The world is your oyster. And yet, deep down you know that without the assistant working in a location somewhat less scenic a few steps away from you, you would hardly be able to tie your own shoes.

“Quite often, the client will call — I tend to pick up my own phone — and an astonishing percentage of the time, the client says, ‘Gee, Bob, I didn't want you, I wanted Lois,’” says Bob Killebrew, managing director at Deutsche Bank Alex. Brown in Baltimore. Lois is Lois Arreguin, one of this year's Outstanding Sales Assistants.

Killebrew says his clients know by now how things get done in his office: “If they ask me to do something, I'm just going to ask Lois, so they just avoid the chance that I'm going to forget.”

Brokers place tremendous value on their sales assistants, so much so that in recent years firms have, in many cases, discarded the term “assistant” for something a bit more weighty, like “associate.”

And it's no wonder. As the broker's job continues to evolve beyond commission-based selling to asset gathering and advisory services, the assistant continues to take on many traditional broker functions. Many assistants — pardon, associates — are becoming quasi-financial planners, and in some cases now are in charge of asset allocation studies, manager selection and other research responsibilities.

Sales assistants usually still have to handle correspondence, schedule meetings, do paperwork and make sure trades are entered correctly. Nevertheless, the trend is toward assistants acting more like brokers — but with one critical difference: They don't get involved in selling.

It's a mutually beneficial relationship. Brokers interviewed for this survey say that, over time, their production increases as they acquire additional help. Freed from paperwork and other office tasks, a broker can spend more time marketing, gathering new assets and working with clients.

Assistants are benefiting by taking on new duties and mastering new skills. Many assistants pursue advanced training and most earn various licenses. As they handle the records of hundreds of clients and oversee the paperwork of their practices, they learn, in effect, how to run a small business.

“One trend we've seen over the last couple of years is, more people are willing to take on more work in that sales support role,” says Susan Rogers, head of client associate training and development at Merrill Lynch. “They're much more involved in the client experience, not just pushing paper and entering trade requests. They're heavily involved in discussions of clients' goals.”

Many assistants have taken on additional responsibilities, such as drawing up investment plans and presentations for brokers to use in the field. More than 90 percent say they're responsible for duties including taking trade orders, advising clients on investments, developing strategies, helping with paperwork and talking to clients on a daily basis.

The “typical” sales assistant, according to the 440 sales assistants who responded to Registered Rep. 's annual survey, is female, 38.2 years of age, has been on the job for seven years, and is involved either directly or indirectly in the development of goals and strategies of their brokers. In addition to the survey, Registered Rep. interviewed numerous sales assistants. (Profiles of this year's five Outstanding Sales Assistants start on page 41.)

Notably, it appears the increasing sophistication of the job is not yet reflected in the paycheck (see tables at right and on page 38). Although some assistants working for top-grossing broker groups earn in the six figures, including bonus, the median reported compensation based on salary and bonus was $39,499, with less than 1 percent earning more than $60,000. Still, total average compensation is up from 2000, when our median sales assistant earned $36,800. Most assistants (88 percent) are licensed with a Series 7, and many have additional licenses. About 29 percent have ambitions of becoming a broker (or junior broker) at some point in their careers.

On the other hand, a significant number of assistants — about half the respondents — said they were either happy in their current position or seeking advancement via a non-sales track, perhaps by becoming an office manager for a group of brokers.

One interesting observation from brokers surveyed for this report: They sometimes see more leverage in adding assistants than brokers. Randy Carver, of Carver Financial Services, in Mentor, Ohio, a member of Raymond James Financial Services, is part of a partnership with another broker in an office with nine assistants. “Every time I've added somebody, my production has gone up,” he says. “I think you need one assistant for every 200 to 300 clients.”

With 2,300 clients, “We need the hands,” says Renee Singer, who serves as Carver's branch operations manager.

Job satisfaction, according to our respondents, seems to be reasonably high. Thirty-two percent of assistants want to remain in their position, slightly higher than last year's survey. More than a quarter cited the interaction with clients as the best part of their job; others prefer the work environment, the variety inherent in the job or the autonomy they receive.

What could make life better? The greatest desire assistants reported was for additional training — 84 of 440 assistants responded that this was the one thing brokers could do more to help their assistants. According to our survey, the level of actual training was, for the most part, low: Only 9.3 percent said they received formal, structured training, with an additional 16 percent saying they received informal training from their broker.

To fill that void, two longtime sales assistants, Ann Boyd and Kim Benefield, have struck out on their own with a Nashville-based company called SA Training. For an annual subscription of $105, the company provides tips and educational ideas for sales assistants by e-mail. Between them, Boyd and Benefield have spent nearly 30 years as assistants. They also hire themselves out as freelance assistants to brokers who are in transition mode and may not have taken an assistant with them. To Boyd, being an assistant is “the best job in the industry.” But, she adds, both assistants and brokers could benefit from more in-depth training: “It's one of those jobs that is not closed-ended, like an operational job — not open-ended, like a brokerage job, so it's kind of in the middle.”

Brokerage firms, feeling the pressure of intense competition, are paying attention; many have found it smart to increase their training programs for assistants. Merrill's training program, for example, is Web-based and expands yearly, according to Rogers, who says sales-assistant training is becoming more extensive as Merrill's brokers focus more on the complexities of wealth management.

As more assistants — and more firms — recognize that the job of the assistant is approaching that of “a junior broker,” in the words of Chuck Bean, a registered investment advisor at Heritage Financial Group in Norwood, Mass., they want those efforts to be recognized.

Sales assistants reported that the two downsides of their jobs are the drudgery (i.e., the endless paperwork they say could be handled by someone else) and a lack of recognition that their jobs have grown more sophisticated. A pet peeve? “Being referred to as secretary, being called their ‘girl’ by clients,” wrote one assistant.

Many assistants say they want more pay and are willing to tie their pay to a broker's production: If production increases, they say, they should receive a greater bonus, too. Of the 252 assistants who said they receive a bonus based on broker production, the median payout was 1.5 percent of the group's gross.

Brokers themselves might also benefit by offering incentive-based pay for assistants. Our survey did not ask whether a broker's production increased as a result of having an assistant, but many brokers interviewed said a good assistant helped boost production significantly. “It's like night and day,” says Bean. “I've increased anywhere from two to three times my production with the help of an assistant.”

Currently, wirehouses pay the most to assistants, a median of $41,020 for firms with more than 2,000 reps; firms with between 200 and 2,000 reps pay $39,038; and the smallest, local firms with 20 to 200 reps, pay a median salary of $34,166. Clearly, assistants who do more highly skilled work make more: Those who focus on client service (paperwork, talking with investors) have a median compensation of $37,840; those who do research (suggest investments, for example) have a median salary of $41,935; those intimately involved with the broker's goals and strategies take home about $50,000, including bonuses.

Assistants clearly see the link between greater skills and higher pay. Assistants frequently mentioned a desire to be taught more about varied topics to help them increase their expertise so they can be more specialized and, therefore, more valuable to their firm. In Carver's office at Raymond James, the various staffers have different licenses, and Carver encourages assistants to specialize, in areas such as mutual funds or insurance. “We have someone here who we got right out of school, and she's finding that she really likes this, and we're encouraging her to go for other licenses,” says Singer. A 10 percent raise is awarded when an assistant receives a Series 7 license.

Not every office can have nine assistants for two brokers, Carver says, although he says the more the merrier. “We're a bit top-heavy on that formula. Obviously, if you can do more, that's even better,” he says.

About a quarter of the assistants work with one broker, while nearly 30 percent work with two; 25 percent work with three, while less than 10 percent work with more than five brokers. From the assistants' perspective, opportunities for career advancement and greater recognition for their efforts, either through increased compensation or being treated as a partner, are the main ways brokers can recognize their sales staff.

This past summer, Registered Rep. mailed out 1,500 surveys to subscribers who indicated “sales assistant” as their title. Registered Rep. received 440 responses to our survey. Data collection and analysis was conducted by Primedia Business Marketing Research in Overland Park, Kan.

Randy Carver, with Raymond James Financial Services in Mentor, Ohio, and his partner have nine assistants. Nine. Why? “The very successful reps, whether at Raymond James, A.G. Edwards or Merrill Lynch, consider the assistant an investment, not an expense,” he says.

There is only one problem: Most brokerage firms will only pay for one assistant per broker. “If you want more,” says an executive for Prudential Securities, “you'll have to dig into your own pocket to pay for it. And that's pretty standard on the Street.” But, adds the Pru exec, “Most brokers don't mind paying for it themselves. They know it's worth it.” (Salomon Smith Barney says it will pay for more than one, if you're a star.)

The rule of thumb is standard and straightforward: One sales assistant is assigned per broker who produces $750,000 or more annually, according to Kim Benefield, of SA Training, a sales assistant consultancy based in Nashville; below that threshold, you're sharing.

There are variations. At Prudential, for example, a broker who generates around $300,000 in production annually has to share a sales assistant with only one other broker, and when he reaches the $500,000 level (or thereabouts), he gets his own. Prudential also considers a branch's profitability (the pretax net margin), meaning the more profitable the branch, the more support staff the firm will pick up. Wachovia Securities' formula is for each $575,000 a branch produces, it gets a nonproducing support person — not necessarily a sales assistant (called an “account administrator”) — for whatever task the branch manager thinks the office needs.

Some firms, including Merrill Lynch and Raymond James, have firm-wide bonus programs for their sales assistants, or, as Merrill calls them, “client associates.” But not every firm has a bonus structure in place. Either way, it's common practice for brokers to give their sales assistants some type of financial compensation, but it's each rep's choice as to if and how he wants to fatten the assistant's check.

“Compensation is dependent upon their relationship contract with their advisor,” says a Merrill spokeswoman. “Some FAs can allocate a set amount of their personal compensation to the CA each year, others are compensated directly from Merrill Lynch.”

Our survey shows an estimated median bonus in 2001 of $6,052, with only 5 percent enjoying $25,000 or more in bonus compensation. About 62 percent got a bonus of $7,499 or less.

Responses from the sales assistants at local brokerage firms and independents were too few to get an accurate assessment of their compensation practices, but if they are anything like Carver, they are generous with their bonuses. Bonuses account for at least 70 percent of compensation in Carver's office; last year he and his partner paid about $200,000 in bonuses to their nine sales assistants. The one incentive that seems to be most successful? The promise of $10,000 to each assistant if their office is one of the top three Raymond James offices. Carver says it's working. This is the second straight year his office made it to the top three.
Betsy Riley

• The opportunity to learn presents itself every day.
• The brokers I work for truly appreciate my efforts. I wouldn't work for anyone else.
• I have never met a more giving, thoughtful employer.
• Broker respect provides the freedom to work on my own without a manager hovering over me.
• Variety of tasks, assisting clients, problem solving.
• The business planning and investment strategies I put in place for my clients.
• Support from branch management.
• Feeling like I have accomplished something.
• Pleasing a client, bringing in new accounts, the potential for success (unlimited).

• The paperwork! Do you ever feel that you've used a forest's worth of paper a day?
• Arrogant brokers who think they are better than you.
• My firm keeps me clerical and doesn't let me grow as an associate.
• Secretarial duties, surrogate wife duties, i.e., making hotel reservations, ordering gifts, picking up cleaning.
• Brokers don't realize the level of importance an SA plays in their success.
• No respect, no career advancement opportunities or guidance, treated like a secretary, blamed for everything but everything that is done right is completely disregarded.
• Dealing with unhappy clients in a down market.

• Teach, teach, teach!
• Give me more advice and opportunities to advance, realize I don't want to be an SA forever.
• Treat me like a partner and compensate me for what I bring to the table.
• Acknowledge my value and worth instead of seeing me as an unavoidable expense.
• Respect me, trust me, realize I am not a punching bag.
• Listen. Provide backup and go to bat for me with upper management.
• Be a friend as well as a co-worker.
• Leave me be.

The role of the sales assistant has changed dramatically over the years. No longer glorified secretaries scheduling meetings and shuffling papers, assistants are much more sophisticated contributors to an advisory practice. It's not uncommon now for assistants to be registered reps themselves. In the pages that follow, we feature five women who are the epitome of the new (and future) sales assistant. See page 47 for a story on the “other 10 percent” — the sales assistants who happen to be men.

Sueanne Schulman is much more than a sales assistant, group administrator or, as her business card identifies her, consulting group analyst, says David Sack, her boss at Salomon Smith Barney. She's a detail-oriented, logistics person who turns his “big-picture” ideas into realistic goals for clients of The Sack Group, an office of five in Smith Barney's midtown Manhattan office.

Sack says he couldn't have gotten to where he is — about $300 million to $325 million in assets under management — without Schulman. He likens their 10-year working relationship to a “long, good marriage.” Their strengths complement each other and one can tell the other when one has overstepped his or her boundaries.

Schulman, 37, who has her Series 7, 63 and 65 and bachelor's degree in business and economics from Lehigh University, says she learned the business by listening to every conversation Sack had. Today, she can answer nearly all clients' questions, and they seek her help as much as they do Sack's. “Having an extra layer of trust is very comforting to the clients, which just adds to the strength of the business,” Schulman says.

Schulman, who says Sack compensates her well beyond her firm's base salary, bringing her annual compensation up to six figures, wants to get the business to the point where Sack won't have to come into the office — so he can spend all his working hours getting new clients, and taking real vacations, too. For now, she says, “I feel good that he can go away for two or three weeks straight and feel the business is in good hands.”
Betsy Riley

Lois Arreguin has been around Bob Killebrew, managing director at Deutsche Bank Alex. Brown, for 23 years. She knows his habits — both the good ones and the ones that could get him into trouble. There are certain things that get Killebrew steamed, and his first impulse is to scratch out an angry letter and demand that Arreguin send it immediately.

She doesn't. A couple of days later, she'll ask Killebrew if that letter needs to be sent. The answer, invariably, is “no.”

Killebrew's grateful — he says he went through a few assistants at Alex. Brown & Sons early in his career before getting matched up with Arreguin. She's stayed with him through two decades and two mergers.

Arreguin currently works with four brokers in an office that has $3 million to $4 million a year in production. The other brokers are John Elmes, John Devine and John Wasilewski, whom she collectively refers to as “the Johns.” She handles the logistics of setting up accounts for clients using outside money managers. When the group started doing fee-based management, she learned to use Advent's portfolio management software, adding to her expertise.

In the past, the firm would send new assistants to the Baltimore office, where Killebrew and Arreguin would work at orientation sessions; Arreguin, 45, who holds Series 7 and 63 licenses and has been a sales associate for 24 years, would be asked to share her wisdom.

But her main focus is the team. In addition to her salary, which she wouldn't disclose, she receives a commission, or revenue-sharing, based on the group's production. “I'm here to grow our business as much as possible — that's what I want to do,” says Arreguin. The others know it. Killebrew says, “I don't worry about my health. I worry about her health. Life goes on if I break my leg.”
David A. Gaffen

In her 25 years in the securities industry, Sue Waldo has done it all. She started as a part-time new accounts clerk with Dean Witter in 1977 and worked her way up to branch operations manager in five years. She's spent the past 15 years as a client associate for Steve Kus, branch manager of RBC Dain Rauscher in Birmingham, Mich. Waldo and Kus first met when they worked together at First of Michigan, and when Kus moved to Tucker Anthony Sutro, later acquired by Dain Rauscher, Waldo accompanied him. Along the way, Waldo, 57, picked up her Series 7 and 63 licenses and became branch operations manager.

Kus says Waldo's ability to personalize service, to walk clients through the complexities of investing, sets her apart from other assistants. It's a quality that's especially important in these difficult times, when customers are increasingly anxious.

“Handholding has become more of a part of my job than ever before,” says Waldo, who gets 90 percent of her compensation from the firm and 10 percent from her boss.

Waldo doesn't want for new challenges. “Every day, new responsibilities are popping up.” She oversees compliance guidelines, helps to bring in new clients and recruits new reps. “My next project is usually waiting on top of my desk,” says Waldo.

“She's of the old school,” says Kus. “She really cares about our clients. You can't fake that. People smell that out today.”
Ross Tucker

Amy Tamblyn was working in receiving at a Melbourne, Fla., department store when a co-worker mentioned an opening at Dean Witter's Stuart, Fla., branch for a receptionist. Tired of opening boxes of jewelry and tagging them, she went after the job at Dean Witter and got it. Five years later, she became sales assistant to broker Pete Navaretta.

She went on to earn her Series 7 and 63 licenses and follow Navaretta to the Stuart branch of Prudential Securities. She has since obtained her Series 65 and insurance licenses and is pursuing her Series 9 and 10 office management licenses. “Raising two kids and still being able to get my licenses on my own time is an accomplishment I'm very proud of,” she says. And she's achieved all this without a college degree.

She's equally driven at the office, says Navaretta, now assistant branch manager. She works with four brokers, opening new accounts, reviewing and updating portfolios and performing administrative tasks. What's more, she handles trades for the trust departments of 15 bank clients. “Maintaining and monitoring clients is a big part of this business,” says Navaretta, who manages $60 million, up from $13 million when Tamblyn joined him more than seven years ago. “When you have someone like Amy to do that, it frees me to focus on new assets.”

Tamblyn, 36, earns a base salary from Prudential and commissions from the brokers. She would like to see additional compensation at the branch level.

Tamblyn says she's ready for her next challenge — sales. She hopes to enter Prudential's FA training program next year.
Alex McGrath

When clients call the San Juan Capistrano, Calif., office of A.G. Edwards with investment questions and concerns, Michele Jung provides the answers and, when necessary, the solace. Recently when a client called wanting to liquidate her portfolio, Jung spent time reviewing the long-term potential of the stocks and funds the client was holding; by the end of the conversation, the client agreed to stick with Edwards. “Just hearing the relief in their voice is very rewarding,” she says. What's more, Jung frees up three brokers, who manage $165 million in assets, to build a strong client base.

Jung's tenacity in getting the right answers and solving problems enriches the firm's client relations, says Dave Almquist, vice president of investments. “It shows that we're out there battling for the client,” Almquist says.

“Personable” is a word often used in describing Jung, 41, who has a Series 7 license. “Michele never acts like she is in a hurry, so you always feel she has time for you,” says Sonia Lavitt, a client since March.

For her work, she receives a monthly salary from the branch, shares commissions with brokers and gets a share of any production bonuses the brokers receive. She wouldn't reveal her annual compensation.

Jung, who started as a sales assistant for First Affiliated Securities in 1984, has been at Edwards for seven years. As operations manager, she handles most of the office's administrative responsibilities, “the work that keeps brokers away from the phone,” says Jung. They rely on her to take care of business when they're away from the office, too. “You can't put a price on that,” says Almquist.
Alex McGrath

Don't call it a woman's job: Men are assistants, too .

They're just like every other sales associate, except that they aren't. They're men, and they're a minority, representing about 10 percent of the total pool.

On average, according to our survey, they make less than women. The median salary for men was $27,500, compared with $32,500 for women; however, the small sample size — less than 40 respondents were male — skews the numbers somewhat.

Either way, these guys aren't bothered by people's perceptions that it's a woman's business. And, like their female counterparts, they bristle at the notion that they're mere “assistants,” rattling off the varied tasks they encounter on a daily basis and the disparate roles they're asked to fill by the producing broker for whom they work.

“The job has grown to the point where I'm comfortable advising on portfolios and bringing business into the firm,” says Allan Budelman, 34, who goes by the title of director of operations at Emerald Asset Advisors in Weston, Fla. Budelman spends a lot of time analyzing the firm's managed account business. “You can't just have an assistant that does one thing — they have to be well-versed and wear many different hats.”

What the men are saying, essentially, is that they're often called upon to do just about everything a producing broker does except gather assets. Like other associates, the brokers they work with view them more as junior partners than assistants. “We see him as someone who is someday going to own a piece of this firm,” says Carol Rogers, president of Rogers & Co./Wachovia Securities, in Clayton, Mo., of Omar Qureshi, her 25-year-old associate.

Qureshi's path to the firm was a strange one. His previous employer accidentally sent the “I Love You” virus to Rogers's firm through e-mail, and Qureshi volunteered to spend a Saturday getting rid of it. Eventually, Rogers discovered that Qureshi had a significant interest in financial services and managed to bring him over to her firm, where he's worked for the past two years. He was recently promoted to associate vice president.

Proud of what Rogers calls his “geekiness,” Qureshi's tasks range from running Monte Carlo simulations to asset allocations and selecting asset managers for accounts. His ambition is to someday own a piece of the company, although, like some others in his position, he's less interested in the sales aspect, preferring to crunch numbers.

Budelman's more interested in sales — he eventually wants to be a junior investment officer, building a business himself. He currently oversees smaller accounts that have been handed off to him by Rob Isbitts, his manager.

Chuck Bean's assistant at Heritage Financial Group, Kevin McGrath, isn't much different. He's responsible for putting together presentations, proposals and allocations for Bean, who then presents them to clients. McGrath, 25, usually waits for Bean after the presentations, interested to hear how his efforts paid off. “I want to know how I've done with matching up the clients with investments, the proper client goals and objectives,” says McGrath, who wants to be a broker. “It's a constant learning process.”
David A. Gaffen