When performance reviews go up, down and sideways, all employees are held accountable for synchronizing their growth goals with those of their firm.

Just ask the senior staff at Tobias Financial Advisors, who were informed by ambitious junior advisors that, well, they needed to get out of the way and let the younger employees expand their authority and autonomy.

“It’s hard to let go, but if you want a junior advisor to grow, you have to release the reins,” said chief operating officer Edgar Collado. In 2017, he was recruited into the firm by his wife, CEO and co-owner Marianela Collado. He’d been looking for the right opportunity to switch from his corporate career track, and she’d been struggling with the mechanics of running the firm. Over their kitchen table, they suddenly realized that the solution to both problems was right in front of them.

Structuring performance reviews as ongoing alignments with firm and individual goals is the heart of Collado’s approach. It’s paying off: Since he took charge of operations, the firm has tripled its employee count. Better yet, it is internally cultivating most of its up-and-coming talent: three of its four new wealth advisors were promoted internally, as was one of its two new wealth planners.

— Joanne Cleaver