Mana’s 4th Birthday
Mana turns 4 years this month, and we’ve been reflecting on what we’ve learned since our fateful trip to San Sebastian, where our business idea formed into a plan of action.
This was a special moment in Mana history. Amy Johnson, one of our mentors and friends, encouraged us to put a business plan together and raise capital to start Mana.
To celebrate how far we’ve come, we thought we’d share some of the most unexpected lessons we’ve learned along the way. Running a business has required us to embrace change and adaptation as a constant, and there are a few heuristics and mantras we’ve developed over the years that others might find interesting or useful.
It’s not how much you make, but rather, how much you save.
If there’s one thing we could have taught our younger selves about money, this would be the lesson. We’ve created hundreds of financial plans for our clients, and time and time again we’ve found that the one action anyone can do to make the most positive impact on your financial future is to reduce expenses. Of course, this isn’t trivial for many people to imagine, much less to execute on, which is why it’s also one of the most fulfilling elements of our client work. Budgeting and determining cashflow based on priorities, dreams and goals turns this sometimes scary lesson into an energizing opportunity.
Spring of 2019, we went to an experiential marketing event all about money. Who knew money could be so Instagrammable?
When starting a business, take the amount of money you think you’ll need…and double it.
When we first launched Mana, a mentor told us that his advice for anyone starting a business was to take the amount we forecasted we needed in the first years of the business and to double it. We were young, naive, and overconfident. We scoffed at the prospect of needing double.
As the months wore on we began wrapping our heads around just how much it would cost to keep a business running. We were a remote business and we saved a lot of money by not renting office space. But there were plenty of other things that we underestimated, including: our tech stack, costs of greater checks and balances (like compliance and bookkeeping as our business grew), and the cost of hiring full time employees.
We couldn’t be more grateful for our friends and mentors who believed and invested in us.
Starting a business with your best friend is a lot harder than it sounds (but totally worth it).
Many of our friends and advisors didn’t think it was a great idea for us to go into business together. There were lots of reasons why we shouldn’t violate the age-old advice stating, “don’t mix business with pleasure”. Almost half of small businesses fail in the first five years. We were asked, “do you think you can spend 24/7 with this other person, your best friend, for the next year?”. We didn’t listen to the doubters, but we did go into our business with our eyes wide open. We created an operating agreement that accounted for worst case scenarios, we continue to work daily/weekly on our communication style with our team and each other, and we hired an objective 3rd party (our amazing business coach) who we meet with regularly to evaluate and improve our business goals and team relations.
Increasing our client’s net worth is an important measure of our company's success, but this data point doesn’t paint the full picture of client success.
Four years, 120 individuals and families, and hundreds of financial plans in, we can confidently report that an increasing net worth is not the key to financial (or life) success. Of course it’s important, and as a financial advisory, we hold this as a top priority. But what we discovered is that there are many other factors that make us whole, satisfied humans, and that part of being a good financial life design partner is finding ways to support the holistic interests and needs of our clients, including:
Health & Wellness: this is a truly underserved part of the financial advice industry. Feeling our best, both physically and emotionally, helps us make better decisions. To help clients dream big, we have learned how to support them in healing and changing negative relationships with money, creating better routines and habits, and identifying general wellness goals in day to day life.
A Sense of community: we have learned the value of empowering our clients to speak confidently and constructively about financial planning topics, and to use this knowledge to strengthen their own sense of community and support systems. Additionally, we have learned the importance of supporting clients in exploring their own interests to work towards finding jobs, service, social activities and hobbies where they feel at home.
Family & Relationships: this is yet another area that we learned is underserved in most financial planning strategies. Many elements of money are personal, but many others require challenging or uncomfortable conversations with family members. Helping our clients tackle topics like estate planning, life insurance, and retirement has been extremely rewarding for us. We also encourage money dates for couples, and to include partners in decision making for new jobs and other major life goals/changes. Simply crunching numbers without helping our clients communicate them would not be enough.
Security and stability: while this one seems obvious, we have learned that it is more complex than a balanced budget and savings plan. Answering the question, ‘what is your enough?” and figuring out how our clients’ can achieve more financial peace means that we deep dive into understanding all of the above values and more. Building financial life plans has been a great way to become intimate with these values and the needs associated with them.
It has certainly been a wild ride so far, but we love the journey and our work truly fills our cup each and every day at Mana. We’re so grateful for everyone who reads our newsletter and blog, works with us, and trusts us as advisors and friends. We couldn’t have done this without you all! We look forward to another year of lessons learned, growth attained, and continual improvement.
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Stephanie Bucko and Cristina Livadary are fee-only financial planners based in Los Angeles, California. Stephanie is the Chief Investment Officer and Cristina is the Chief Executive Officer at Mana Financial Life Design (FLD). Mana FLD provides comprehensive financial planning and investment management services to help clients grow and protect their wealth throughout life’s journey. Mana FLD specializes in advising ambitious professionals who seek financial knowledge and want to implement creative budgeting, savings, proactive planning and powerful investment strategies. As fee-only fiduciaries and independent financial advisors, Stephanie and Cristina never receive commission of any kind. Stephanie and Cristina are legally bound by their certifications to provide unbiased and trustworthy financial advice.