Making Magic

“The million-dollar producer will always be a million-dollar producer. The guy who goes from $300,000 to $350,000, that’s a big increase for him,” he says. “I wanted to give some of the younger producers a track to run on.”

Born and raised in Michigan, Hilgendorf started out in the finance department of a small manufacturing company that made fasteners for Ford and GM. When business began to sour, he turned to financial services, joining IDS American Express in 1984. Twice he joined firms, E.F. Hutton and later Thomson McKinnon, which underwent mergers that resulted in the shuttering of his office. In 1990, he joined Roney & Co., becoming a general partner in 1992. The firm’s CEO? Bill Roney, Hilgendorf’s boss today.

Hired initially as an assistant manager at the Auburn Hills, Mich., branch, Hilgendorf was later recruited to turn around an office in Fort Wayne, Ind., that had some serious management challenges. Over a two-year period, he doubled the troubled branch’s revenue to $3 million. Roney & Co. merged with Raymond James & Associates in 1999, the year Hilgendorf took over the Grand Rapids branch.

It, too, came with challenges. The week he started, one of his advisors, in his mid-80s, died. Five of the 10 remaining brokers were over 70. Hilgendorf politely refers to the make-up then as “a bit more old school,” with the office serving some brokers “just as a place to go.” He spent the next several years supporting a core group of advisors in their late 40s and replacing retiring brokers.

Successful recruiting has become a Hilgendorf hallmark. Last year, he recruited two teams representing assets in excess of $300 million and annual production of $2.5 million — one, a team of three women CFPs from Wachovia/A.G. Edwards, the other a National City bank team in the firm’s private client group.

Over the last three years, Hilgendorf’s branch has grown its assets by 30 percent and revenue by 10 percent. It’s also got an amazing happy quotient. As Roney views it, “The challenge in any organization is to have good camaraderie. It may be more difficult in an industry like ours where, by definition, successful people may have stronger personalities. The fact that Dave is able to blend a group of high performing, highly motivated financial advisors into a pretty cohesive group speaks volumes.”

In addition to overseeing the office, Hilgendorf maintains a President’s Club-level practice of his own with $100 million in assets under management. He says he’s able to manage both jobs as a result of “organization” and “delegation.” But clearly, his passion lies in management.

“After working for four or five managers in my career, I adopted the Ritz-Carlton model. I know it sounds clich?, but I want our office in Grand Rapids to be the Ritz of the Street,” he adds. “Advisors here know they’ll be treated fairly and appreciated. No one’s a number.”

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