Paul Kingsman finishes a medal-winning race in the 1988 Olympics.
INTERVIEW
What The Olympics Can Teach Advisors About Success Olympic swimmer PAUL KINGSMAN tells how to get your head in the game to win
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hat can an Olympicmedalist swimmer teach us about working with clients? Then you went on to your work life and were convinced that the older generations really needed to get out of the way. It’s the same story for every generation, right? How to win, obviously. That is universal — it just takes a plan, a team and intense focus. And, let’s face it, most insurance agents and financial planners are lousy at doing that for themselves. We tend to go it alone and go after the next thing and not look at the long haul. Sure, some do it well, but don’t we all wish we could plan, team-build and focus a whole lot better? Paul Kingsman knows about it because he took his medal-winning ways to the world of financial planning to build a successful practice. Then he broadened into writing, coaching and speaking at events 10
AN INTERVIEW WITH PUBLISHER PAUL FELDMAN
such as the MDRT annual meeting to help others learn how to do it. Among his many awards, Kingsman won a bronze medal in the 1988 Olympics for New Zealand. When he retired from swimming, he went into financial advising. He is now based in South Carolina, using the lessons he learned from two decades of athletic training. He has shared his methods of attaining focus in his book Distraction-Proof Advisor. In this interview with Publisher Paul Feldman, Kingsman tells how to create the conditions for success by getting the right mindset for planning. FELDMAN: How did you go from Olympic swimming to financial planning? KINGSMAN: I was over here on a swimming scholarship at the University of California at Berkeley from 1986 to 1990. During that time, I met my wife, who lived in the Bay Area. We got married and moved back to
InsuranceNewsNet Magazine » October 2019
New Zealand until 2001. In 1997, her mom sold her real estate company, and began a new career with Morgan Stanley. For three years, we kept hearing about how wonderful this industry was, so we came back to the U.S. in 2001 to join her in a partnership at Morgan Stanley. She had her CFP and was far ahead of the curve at that point. I think a lot of that was due to her owning her own business where she was super focused on financial planning. Most places were talking a good game about financial planning, but they were really still focused on pushing stocks and trading. In ‘01, we started a partnership and that’s how I came into the industry and came to love it. FELDMAN: In your book, you say that the steps to winning Olympic gold medals are the same steps to building a successful practice. What lessons do you take from those years of athletic training and apply to the financial services industry?