This week, I’m returning from Texas after some travel hiccups. A minor inconvenience for me as I checked into a hotel in Houston, thinking of all our clients, friends, and industry members who were in Milton's path this week. Our thoughts and prayers are with you and your families.

In a way, my detour through Houston is a normal part of life. It’s full of pathways that we didn’t necessarily intend, but its the path we found.

This week, I’m going to dig into the history of Ohio State’s campus and why shortcuts deserve our attention.

Here’s this week’s Connected Advisor.

1. Forget the Map—Follow the Shortcut: Why Desire Paths Are Your Firm’s Best Friend

2. Building A Firm To Be A Super Regional RIA 🎧

3. Bookmarks

   1. Harvard Prof Speaks Sense into AI Craze

   2. CS Lewis on the Ultimate Good

4. Milemarker On the Road ✈️

Let’s go.

Forget the Map—Follow the Shortcut: Why Desire Paths Are Your Firm’s Best Friend

Picture this: A perfectly paved path winding through a park. It’s beautiful, symmetrical, meticulously designed. But, it’s not getting used the way it was intended. People are walking straight through the park instead of staying on the path.

Instead of staying on the paved road, there’s a dusty trail cutting right through the grass—it’s not the planned route, it’s the route people actually take. It’s quicker. More direct. Sure, it’s not what the designers intended, but guess what? The designers got it wrong.

Of course, this isn’t just about parks. It’s about your business. The same thing happens every day in your workflows—whether you want it to or not.

You can spend months (years?) designing the perfect process. You can write (and rewrite) standard operating procedures documents ad infinitum. But your customers, and team? They’re going to find and carve out their own path.

In the world of trails, they call these desire paths.

Ohio State University learned this the hard way back in the early 1900s. Students weren’t following the fancy paved walkways. They were taking shortcuts, walking wherever they wanted to take more direct paths.

Instead of resisting and posting signs or planting shrubs to keep them on the predesigned paths, the university architect, Joseph Bradford met people where they were.

They paved those desire paths, and boom—“The Oval” was born. Function gave way to form and what was once a system of dusty trails has matured into formal, beautiful spaces.

So, what does this mean for you? Your team is already creating their own shortcuts, or attempting to. Your customers are, too. The official process, with all the checks and balances? Yeah, they’re probably skipping over some pieces to get to a minimum viable version of ‘done.’

It’s not rebellion. It’s efficiency. They’re showing you where the path should be.

3 Ways to Embrace Desire Paths in Your Business:

1. Find Your Shortcutters

Ask the people who aren’t following your process why. Don’t judge. Just listen. They’re the ones who’ve found a more direct way, and if you’re ready to receive it, you’ll learn so much.

Early in my career, whenever I had a dissenting client who had strong opinions, I wanted to disengage or fire them. I was running away from the fire.

Later on, though, I realized the path makers are one of the best assets I can have for improving my firm.

2. Talk to the Receivers

It’s not just about the people taking the shortcuts. Ask the ones on the receiving end: Is the current process helping or slowing you down? Odds are, they’ll tell you where necessary work is getting skipped over or where the efficient ‘desire path’ is actually better.

Be careful to listen and empathize, while looking for ways to use automation to fill in what’s necessary so that humans can keep their streamlined processes. Remember to let feedback influence the paths we build, but not wholly define them.

3. Turn Shortcuts into Express Lanes

Don’t fight human nature. Instead of forcing everyone back onto the “paved” path, take the desired path and solution around behavior to automate what humans are refusing to do. Design the process they want to use.

Keep in mind that your team and clients will continue to create new desire paths. The process of refinement isn’t static, it takes time and it takes ongoing iteration. You will always have the ability to tweak it but when it’s done correctly, your organization will be improving all the time.

Here’s the Truth:

Your carefully designed path? It’s a good start. What really matters is the path people choose. And like Ohio State, if you lean into those desire paths, you’ll end up with something better than what you planned.

So, what shortcuts are your employees or customers taking?

And how can you turn those into the express lanes of your business?

Your move.

________________________

On the Pod: Building A Firm To Be A Super Regional RIA

In this episode, Eric Diton, President and Managing Director, and Robert Conzo, CEO and Managing Director of The Wealth Alliance, discuss their multi-channel marketing strategy, the opportunities of using social media for business, and how technology helps independent RIA firms achieve their goals and dreams.

They also talk about their firm's culture, charitable initiatives like “Songs of Love”, and vision for becoming a super regional RIA.

Key Takeaways:

1. The Wealth Alliance's approach to organic growth includes building relationships with referral sources, leveraging social media and PR, and providing exceptional client service.

2. Technology is important in streamlining operations, improving client service, and staying ahead of industry trends.

3. The Wealth Alliance envisions a future where super-regional RIAs play a dominant role in the industry.

Episode Breakdown:

• 02:30 - Money moments

• 08:28 - The early days of The Wealth Alliance

• 10:52 - Strategies for organic growth

• 16:20 - Building referral relationships

• 20:05 - The power of social media and PR

• 26:48 - A multichannel marketing strategy

• 28:58 - Navigating record growth and building a strong team

• 31:35 - The future of RIAs

• 35:41 - Embracing technology and AI in wealth management

• 42:22 - Milemarker Minute

This episode highlights the importance of technology, AI, and the role of social media and PR in building a successful brand.

Speaking Sense to the AI Craze

So often, when a new technology sweeps across the plains everyone is drawn to the bombastic headlines that hype it up. AI is certainly at a fever pitch. Gianluca Mauro speaks a bit of sense into this current craze and emphasizes the fact that we can hopefully stop hyping AI and just realize its a new feature along the way.

CS Lewis on the Ultimate Good

I came across this quote by CS Lewis from his book The Four Loves this week. This quote is powerful to me because it’s easy to forget that truly caring about others is fundamentally transcendent.

Milemarker on the Road

Catch our team on the road at the following events or cities:

1. October 6-10 - Arlington, TX

2. October 23-24 - Nashville, TN

3. October 25 - Charleston, SC

4. October 28-30 - San Francisco, CA

5. November 4-5 - New York, NY

6. November 11-12 - Charleston, SC

7. November 12-13 - San Diego, CA

8. November 12-14 - Arlington, TX

9. November 18-20 - San Francisco, CA

10. November 21-22 - Omaha, NE

11. December 4-5 - New York, NY

12. December 9-11 - Las Vegas, NV

If you’re in any of those cities and want to arrange a meeting time, reply to this email, and we’ll get something on the calendar.

Jud Mackrill