83% of advisory practices miss their annual revenue targets. Not by a little, by an average of 34%. And before you assume these are struggling producers grinding it out at $200K, think again. The failure rate is nearly identical across revenue tiers, including practices north of $1M.
The problem isn’t ambition. Private Wealth Managers are nothing if not ambitious. The problem is architectural. Most annual planning resembles wish-making more than engineering, a collection of aspirational numbers untethered from the operational reality of how practices actually grow. If your 2026 plan fits on a napkin next to your January 2nd resolution to “finally get serious about marketing,” congratulations. You’ve got a napkin.
This is the planning methodology that separates elite Wealth Advisors from the perpetually frustrated, the ones who wonder why effort never quite translates to exponential results.
The Planning Paradox
Here’s what most Wealth Managers get wrong about annual planning: they treat i…