Optimal Design Of A Financial Advisor’s Office: Insights from the Financial Planning Performance Lab

The traditional financial advisor’s office is setup with a desk that the advisor sits behind, and chairs for clients to sit across. Alternatively, many financial advisors use an office conference room to meet with clients, but the arrangement is similar: a large conference room table, with the financial advisor sitting on one side, and clients sitting on the other. To the extent that any further thought goes into the office design, it’s mostly focused on which type of furniture to buy, what paintings should go on the wall, and other classic elements of office interior design.

Except as it turns out, the look of a financial advisor’s office goes far beyond just setting the interior design decor, and establishing a sense of perceived professionalism for clients. In this guest post, Dr. John Grable of the University of Georgia shares some thoughts, ideas, and research on how to best design a financial advisory office… all the way down to some specifics on the use of light, sound, smell, texture, and temperature to create a more comfortable atmosphere for clients that is conducive to helping them make good financial decisions!

Because it turns out the reality is that how an advisor’s office is arranged really does impact their ability and comfort level to make decisions. In fact, everything from the color of the walls, to the kinds of artwork that hang on the walls, and even the type and configuration of office furniture, has been found to have an impact on client stress levels, which in turn can adversely affect their willingness to make a decision!

So whether you’ve given a lot of thought to your office environment as a tool in the planning process, or none at all (but now realize that perhaps you should have!), I hope Dr. Grable’s exploration of some of the scientific evidence can help guide you to design (or update) your advisory office environment… and that, in turn, can help you make your office more comfortable to clients, allowing them to make better financial decisions, and increase client satisfaction!

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source https://www.kitces.com/blog/scientific-interior-design-financial-advisory-office-planning-performance-lab-grable/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=scientific-interior-design-financial-advisory-office-planning-performance-lab-grable