Stepping Out

Wells Fargo acquired Wachovia Corp. on Dec. 31, 2008, the eve of a new year that included historic market turbulence and lingering reputation issues associated with Wachovia’s purchase of Golden West Financial. Dubbed by The Wall Street Journal as “the Deal from Hell,” the acquisition of Golden West — anything but golden — resulted in huge losses for Wachovia.

After a tough year like 2009, Hays says advisors are ready to “get on with it.”

At an annual kickoff meeting for branch managers recently, Hays said you could feel the change in momentum.

“I think if I had to sum up, I’d say advisors want to be positive. They are ready to be in a good mood. The markets have changed, the pace of change has slowed down for us and they feel a lot of relief,” he says. “You could physically see that morale was good and people are ready to move forward.”

Hays, who has a degree in finance from University of Virginia, has worn many hats during his long run in the business. He got his start in 1986, when he and his brother founded an investment banking firm. After that, he joined Merrill Lynch, where he worked seven years as a financial advisor, the last two as a producing sales manager.

During his 18-year tenure with Merrill Lynch, Hays served as managing director of the Silicon Valley Complex in San Jose, Calif., and later as managing director of training and leadership development for the firm’s global private client group. Prior to joining Wachovia as president of that firm’s private client group in 2006, Hays headed Merrill’s private banking and investment group, its ultra-high-net-worth division.

At the moment, Hays is wholly concentrated on his to-do list for 2010. “It’s a big list,” he says. His overarching goal: to grow the business. “There’s a lot of talk around here about client loyalty. That’s our No. 1 objective: to be tops in client loyalty. To do that, you’ve also got to have the highest financial advisor loyalty in the business. The most important driver of client loyalty is their advisor.”

Importantly, Hays isn’t focused on growing revenues by adding advisors — but by helping existing advisors become more productive. If history is a guide, he should be successful. As Hays puts it: “When Wachovia had done a merger, and there were 10 in 11 years, we grew our financial advisor productivity at twice the rate of the industry. It usually happens because you have new products and services that come onto the platform like asset management and lending.” A.G. Edwards, for instance, did not have a robust lending platform. “Now,” Hays adds. “You have 6,000 advisors from Edwards who have the opportunity to grow their business.”

Also on Hays’ to-do list: risk management.

“We can’t eliminate risk entirely, but if we take responsibility for managing risk, being productive and trying to see problems before they become too serious or costly, it goes a long way to protecting our clients and furthering our reputation,” Hays said. “We don’t hope to become the biggest for the biggest sake — but because we’re best.”