Whatever your beliefs on the subject, it seems safe to say that in the cutthroat world of Wall Street, there often seems to be a greater force at work, pulling strings behind the scenes, while many employees “on the ground” sweat day after day over bottom lines, profitability, liquidity, and balance sheets.
This is perhaps the most common working model for financial professionals today: the one in which the individual has his own business group within a massive corporate structure that, in some ways, is not transparent.
The corporation receives the lion’s share of the individual’s production credits, usually anywhere from 32 percent to 68 percent, particularly for old line firms. FPs frequently broker their own deals with their managers and their firms.
Sometimes the company serving as an umbrella organization to the individual’s enterprise appears benign, yet isn’t. Sometimes upper management and the “inner circle” have their own agendas, which they promote and pursue via selfish and at times deceptive dealings. They frequently and mercilessly push company products where the fee/commission/split is larger and more lucrative; and of course the manager makes an override on his staff’s production.
Sometimes compensation packages are revamped in a way that dramatically limits the FP’s share of his own production. Often employees are asked to push company-based products that may not be in their clients’ genuine interest. Rather the firm’s interests are served.
Arguably disingenuous, or even downright corrupt behavior, exists—and yet often these dealings are justified with no words more than these: “Sorry. This is how we do things here.”