How are the best independent advisory firms building the next generation of wealth management?
We're interviewing independent RIA founders and managing partners to understand how firms are evolving across growth, specialization, technology, client acquisition, advisor capacity, succession and artificial intelligence.
Independent advice is changing.
Relationships built the independent RIA. What builds the next generation?
Independent advisory firms have historically grown through trust, expertise, relationships, referrals and centers of influence. Those fundamentals remain.
But the operating environment surrounding the advisor is changing. The Independent Advisor Growth Project documents how founders and managing partners are responding — it does not assume the answer is already known.
What we're studying.
Growth
Where will the next generation of advisory clients come from?
Specialization
Are firms becoming more deliberate about whom they serve?
Technology
Which technologies actually create advisor leverage?
Artificial Intelligence
Where can AI help — and where should humans remain firmly in control?
Advisor Capacity
How do firms grow without turning their best advisors into full-time business developers?
Succession
How are founders building firms capable of operating beyond them?
Operating Leverage
Which systems allow firms to grow without proportional increases in complexity?
Conversations with the people building independent wealth management.
Founding Interview Series
We're currently assembling the first group of independent RIA founders and managing partners participating in the project.
Participate in the Founding SeriesWhat we're learning.
These are the questions the interviews are built to answer. As the dataset grows, this section becomes anonymized findings — published with sample size, methodology and date, and only when the data supports them.
Every conversation makes the research smarter.
We combine public industry information with structured conversations to identify recurring patterns across independent advisory firms.
Individual firm information is not publicly attributed without appropriate permission.
Can an ideal client become an addressable market?
Many advisory firms describe their ideal clients clearly: business owners, physicians, technology executives, founders approaching liquidity, partners in professional-services firms.
One area we're investigating is whether these descriptions can be transformed into measurable market intelligence — and how far that translation can honestly be taken.
“Business owners approaching a sale” becomes: privately held companies, $10–50M revenue, single-region, founder-owned 15+ years, with observable transition signals.
AI should create leverage — not replace the advisor.
Technology can assist with
Advisors remain responsible for
Technology should increase the amount of time advisors can spend doing the work that actually requires an advisor.
Add your perspective.
We're inviting a select group of independent RIA founders and managing partners to participate in the 2026 interview series.
The conversation explores your firm's story, the clients you've chosen to serve, how you're approaching growth, the role technology plays in the business, and where you believe independent advice is headed. No presentation is required.
Introductory Conversation
We learn about your firm and identify the topics that could make the interview most useful.
Founder Interview
A deeper conversation about your firm, clients, growth, technology and perspective on the industry.
Research & Analysis
Insights from participating firms contribute to our broader understanding of how independent RIAs are evolving.
From conversation to private insight.
For selected participating firms, we may translate the research conversation and publicly available firm information into a private RIA Growth Blueprint™. The Blueprint is a diagnostic artifact — it is not a service package.
How the Blueprint WorksA living study of the independent RIA.
The project becomes more useful as participation grows. Our objective is to develop a richer understanding of how independent advisory firms actually operate rather than relying exclusively on generic assumptions about the industry.
Growth × Systems × Intelligence
The project brings an operator and technology perspective to studying the independent advisory industry — not a claim of three decades inside an RIA. Two complementary backgrounds, applied to a question we think is genuinely open.
Eric
Orlando
How we approach the project.
Evidence Before Assumption
We distinguish verified facts, participant statements, inference and recommendations.
Firm-Specific
We don't assume every RIA has the same growth problem.
Human Judgment
AI supports analysis rather than replacing professional judgment.
Privacy
Private firm information is treated accordingly.
Measurement
Ideas should ultimately be evaluated against observable outcomes.
Learning
Each conversation should improve our understanding of the industry.
Help us understand where independent advice is going next.
We're assembling the founding group of independent RIA founders and managing partners participating in The Independent Advisor Growth Project.