We talked with Preston about:

• The importance of mentorship and accepting we all need help
• Acknowledging each other's personhood and emotions about money
• Letting life lead your money and not the other way around

About Dr. Preston Cherry:

Injecting transformative energy into every action he can, Dr. Preston Cherry, founder of Concurrent Financial Planning, is a prolific speaker and assistant professor of finance at the University of Wisconsin. He helps leaders and advisors start building from the human side of relationships to better understand how money integrates into comprehensive planning. His Life Money Balance approach prioritizes financial wellness to create a transformative experience. 

Featured Resources 

• Dr. Preston Cherry’s LinkedIn Profile
• Dr. Preston Cherry’s Instagram
• Dr. Preston Cherry’s Twitter
• Dr. Preston Cherry’s Website
• Concurrent Financial Planning Website

Full Audio Transcript

Dr. Preston D. Cherry
Yep. All right.

Lauren Hong
All right. Let's do this. So good to see you, Dr. Cherry. Thank you for your time today.

Dr. Cherry 
Yes. Thank you, Lauren.

Lauren Hong
All right. Well, I'm excited to hear from you. I know we were just chatting before about all the busyness of life, and I’d kind of love to start there before we dive into the bio and all of that. We will include links to your bio below and any things we talk about here. I know you're involved in so many different initiatives, podcasts, and all kinds of things. So with the craziness of life, to get back to that point, how do you find the time? Because you're teaching, you're leading your own firm, you're giving back, and so much more. So how do you make it all happen and just do it like it's no big deal.

Dr. Cherry 
<laugh>, <laugh> Well first of all, thank you for having me. I appreciate it. I wouldn't advise doing so many things but that said, they're interlinked because they're all focused on financial wellness, well-being, life well-being, just advancing the human condition. Lauren, that's the common thread. And when through each one of these platforms, whether it be talking to advisors directly, students or clients, or just in general to corporate America, whatever stage, if I'm on stage then people are receiving a message and I want that message to be transformative. That's what it's all about, Lauren, so that's the common thread. I'm hoping that all the threads I'm doing can receive this energy and I can keep going. However, that said, <laugh>, that said sometimes it's not advisable.

Lauren Hong
No, it's fair. I know when you're passionate about something, it's easy to dive into it. And I think you've touched so many folks and their lives with your work, especially the next generation too. And I'd love just to hear why the next gen and when you were growing up, did you have similar mentors or leaders who kind of helped you lift you up to your career and where you are today?

Dr. Cherry 
Right. So mentorship is very important to me. I just made a post earlier, I think it was about three or four weeks ago. I said, rarely is someone self-made. And I know a lot of people like saying, hey, you know, I'm self-made. I worked hard, da da, da, da. And I'm like, somewhere along the line, an individual or a team of individuals helped you in some way—they invested in you, they supported you, they championed you in some sort of way. So somebody did that for me, Lauren, my mentor at Prairie View. As a matter of fact, I had two of them there. My parents. I kicked off the first episode of my podcast with my parents. They took two episodes.

I mean, you're talking about 45 years of marriage and having two adult children but they invested in us. So all that to say I've had several mentors and still have some to this day. They took the time to, to, to say, okay, we believe in you. And my thing is, I tell folks all the time, don't make fools out of the folks who bring you here. And life is not linear. So I've had some rough spots in my life for sure. That said, I kept going, not only just for my inner self but I didn't want to make fools out of the folks who got me here. So I want to pass that along. I am passionate about mentoring others, whether it be career changers, people in school, whatever it may be. I just want to believe in them as somebody believed in me.

Lauren Hong
I love that. So I love the piece too, that you talk about having to be able to give your time, right? And to be present, to be able to give back. For someone who is thinking about or wanting to be a mentor to help bring up that next gen, do you have any recommendations about how to foster that kind of relationship or ways you found to be really meaningful so that individual can get the most out of it? And you can get the most out of it too?

Dr. Cherry 
Yes. It’s to really be present and just to take a listen, be connective, be people. How do you do that? I mean, that's just very cliche. You can be connected by being vulnerable, sharing your story when it's time. We've all been in places where you hear a story, somebody tells a story, and it's like, what, that's me too. And then it's an opportunity, it's an environment, it's encouragement to say, okay, I want to tell my story too. Can I connect with you and can I trust you? And sometimes when you have somebody you connect with through vulnerability and courage, that encourages someone else to be vulnerable and courageous as well and take that first step of engagement. So that's really how you gain someone's trust and say, okay, let's swap stories here. Let me share mine. And then also, I had this saying, when you open up the heart, you open up the mind. And when you open up the heart, people are willing, more willing, to receive education, guidance, instruction. All of that. So that's how you lead with compassion.

Lauren Hong 
That's so fair. And then are the folks who you're mentoring and working with, are they mostly in the financial services or financial planning space? Who is in that circle? How have they found you or you found them?

Dr. Cherry
So I'm reached out to all the time. Obviously I'm in front of students on campus. And for professionals, I've done advisor coaching before and still do when people want to reach out. I have office hours. Matter of fact, I'm about to start posting those in a little while because I get so many emails and people in my DMs and everything, and they're saying, you know, Dr. Cherry, I need some time with you career wise, practice management for senior advisors, all of these things. So then when I'm on stage, I'm talking to people and they want to get five minutes or 10 minutes or schedule a meeting. So it can be students, advisors doing their practice, career changers. I mean, it could be a lot of things.

Lauren Hong
And then are there any kind of themes or trends you're hearing, conversations with, or issues you feel like you're addressing quite frequently? I'd love just to hear if there's anything since you've got the pulse, some questions that are happening within this industry. You know, if there's any kind of commonalities to bring up that next gen or help to shape the current leadership today.

Dr. Cherry 
Well, that's a good question. The big thing now is being more human. Being more people centered, taking account of emotions and people's what I call personhood, which is their values, experiences, attitudes, and belief systems. All with their emotions about money. Yep. Relationship with money. So being more human/people centered, whether you want to call it financial psychology, money psychology, mindset. There's a whole bunch of approaches you take for it. But when you talk about financial psychology in particular, you are talking about considering those additives, or what I explain, which is how do people feel? Because the how, with our relationship to money both past and present, is going to help unlock information we have inside of us that's going to influence the numbers side.

Because all of that information goes into the numbers. I posted earlier it was like, well, what does all that have to do with the money? People were like, when are you going to get to the money? Oh. I said, well, all of that; it has to do with everything, right? So that's the big thing I see now. But that said, it's like a Puff Daddy remix, right? <laugh> There's nothing new. There's always an original song. And yeah, some folks have been doing this a long time—partnering and elevating and empowering people to be more human. It's been done for a long time now. It's just all the rage.

Lauren Hong 
Yeah, I hear you. So there's a transaction of the business and the deliverables, if you will, or what have you, just the hard numbers, the science behind it, etc. But the human side can't be ignored. And that's obviously both if you're on the advisor side, but then of course more on the practice management side of training, growing employees, process management, etc. So I know you've got more of, we'll call it a holistic approach to finance. And I'd love to hear your philosophy or thinking around that, or what you feel makes your approach different? Because I know that word was kind of thrown out a lot. Holistic and wellness and all those kinds of things. What do you feel is your bend on it?

Dr. Cherry
Well, good, great question, Lauren. So first of all, planning is a process. And I guess a synonym to that would be journey—your walk, your pathway, however you want to say it. I want people to experience, or at least aspire. One of my favorite words is aspire. What do you aspire to? What's your aspiration? Let's discover that for a while. What does that look like to you? What are the things you don't want to do anymore so you can get to the things you do want to do? So let's be bold.

Lauren Hong 
Yeah.

Dr. Cherry
And also too, let's retire some things that are not working well, right? So not everything is trial all the time. When you talk about money, money could be happy or joyful I should say. Because you know, happiness is on a spectrum. But it could be joyful, it could be triumphant.

Lauren Hong 
Yeah.

Dr. Cherry 
So to answer your question succinctly, planning, like life, is a process. It is continual. You have life stages, life events. My mom and dad say all the time, you gotta roll and adapt, you know? You gotta roll and adapt. So when you say comprehensive,  it means across life stages, it means handling the ebbs and flows of life. And also how the numbers integrate, Lauren. So one decision's going to affect another. So you have risk management, all your insurances, your employee benefits, your stocks, your restricted stock units, your retirement, your cash management, tax, investments, estate. Okay. So you're going to an integration of those areas along with the other things I mentioned.

Lauren Hong 
Interesting. So I’m going to shift gears a little bit here. I know you've got what you call the Life Money Balance approach, right? And you've been involved in your leadership with the Center of Financial Wellness and at the University of Wisconsin Green Bay. I'd love just to hear a little bit more about how you came up with that Life Money Balance piece of it? And I'm sure that also impacts some of your leadership involvement with these different places as well.

Dr. Cherry
Yes. So thank you for asking this. Life Money Balance is kind of like a child of mine, really. <laugh> It  started through a transformational process. This is what I'd like to share for others; I want them to experience their own transformational journey. I've shared this a few times, so I'll be short with it. You know, life is grand most of the time. I was inputted with a lot of self-worth, self-confidence, self-value, all these things like access to education, and so on and so forth. But there was a period in life when it was not going very well. And so, it was a long season, as my mother puts it, and I had to figure out what I didn't want to do anymore so I could figure out what I wanted to do.

And that was aspiration. So it was a process, it was a process admitting where I am, acknowledging how I feel about it, and taking some action. I call out the awe moment. So it's more than taglines. All of these—the Life Money Balance, the transformation, the awe moment, the process, let your life lead your money not your money lead your life. That is Life Money Balance. So your money is working concurrently—the name of the firm—to create your life's design. All of that came from an internal feeling and transformation. I wanted to put it down on paper and put it into the firm. And I'm like, wow, if this feels this way, then by golly, I want to pass that on to some other folks so they can experience their own version.

Lauren Hong
Yeah. That's so fair. I feel like in life there's so many distractions, right? And what the world's telling us we should be, or other people or this or that in your own head. And so being able to sort of put that on paper so you can say, okay, this is my story arc, or this is where we're going. And then like you said, let that actually drive the money, the money kind of follows after it. Because like we were talking about when we started too, right? Passion. If you're passionate, it will just sort of come out, kind of oozes out, right? And then other things attract, like positivity attracts positivity often, and like things attract like things. So it's a good thing.

Dr. Cherry 
Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely.

Lauren Hong
So one more question for you here. Because you've got a really unique vantage point, being at a firm with an education hat, speaking, podcast, all these sorts of things, are there any trends you are seeing or shifts in this industry? I know you talked earlier about the human side of it, right? And being able to talk through it. Do you see any other more service-based trends or practice management trends or even education trends, things that are happening with courses, new coursework that's happening? I'd love to hear about that.

Dr. Cherry  
Yes. I mean, so our profession, our industry, is capturing a lot of things, right? You can do financial services, right? But financial planning in and of itself, like financial coaching and even financial therapy, all of those aspects that you can use within the process as an advisor, giving advice, those are professions, particularly financial planning. Because financial planning is a profession that follows a process and so on and so forth. So you can break that down to personal finances too. And when you break it down to personal finances, you bring in elements like financial coaching and financial education and financial wellness. And when you bring all that in, then yes, our profession, how we help people attain financial wellness so they can have a better well-being, is changing. You're seeing interactive platforms like on social media, IG, Twitter, TikTok, all this stuff. Folks are utilizing those platforms to invite people and at scale to receive information.

It's incredible actually. And you're seeing financial planners as well with kind of like the old school or even newer school process. They're adapting their platforms to become more inviting and  the like, so the way we are connecting with the audience and inviting people in service models, all of that is changing rapidly, very rapidly.

Lauren Hong
Yeah. So much more accessible.

Dr. Cherry 
Mm-hmm.

Lauren Hong
Yeah. Very good. Well, this is so insightful. I appreciate you taking some time during your day and just sharing some insights about your philosophy and process and those you work with. And also thank you for your time to give back and uplift the next generation that’s excited about getting into this space and for them to hear your experience, but then also to serve those who are currently in this space and to hear from your vantage point as well. So any final thoughts?

Dr. Cherry 
Well, first of all, thank you for having me. The torch needs to continue to be passed. Younger folks have a whole bunch of energy to do their thing. And then people forget about Gen X, by the way. And I'm a Gen X myself. I'm like, why are you just skipping over folks? So my last piece of advice, Lauren, is for anyone listening to begin your journey. Even if you're an advisor and you want to do something different for your practice, just start, get your small wins. I know some of that may be cliche too, but I've had a little bit of trouble here lately with self-doubt. And I'm like, no, just take little bitty steps and get you some wins. Yeah. So that's for everybody. Start, be courageous, be vulnerable, and get you some wins.

Lauren Hong 
Absolutely. Yeah. I, I hear you. Because it's like, okay, you got that little win, then you just put yourself out there a little further. You got that little win, but then that little win turns into a little bigger win. And so it just snowballs. So yeah, that's good advice. We see that on this end too, because sometimes, you're working with folks and they go, I don't know if I really want to pick that target. I know I kind of should, but I might be excluding these people. Sometimes you have to just push or just sort of go in and lean into something, right? And it opens up other doors and opens up other doors. Leadership isn't easy, right?

Dr. Cherry 
No, it's sure not. <laugh>

Lauren Hong 
Goodness. Well, thank you again for your time. And like I shared earlier, we'll share links below and take it from there.

Dr. Cherry 
All right. Thank you for having me. It's been fun.

Lauren Hong 
Oh, absolutely. Have a good one. Thank you.