Jamie Hopkins on Raising Revenue and Writing Retirement Books

The professional role has also been engaging and challenging, especially since this is the first time that Hopkins has served in senior leadership at a publicly traded company. Carson Group, for example, was owned primarily by its founder and by Bain Capital, the private equity firm, during Hopkins’ tenure.

“I had never worked in a public company before this role,” Hopkins said. “There’s been a bit of a learning curve in terms of understanding the nuances — regulatory wise, reporting wise, etc. There’s also a different feel in terms of what growth looks like as you’re kind of constantly reporting on it. It’s very different from the private world, where you can kind of disappear for a year and then come back and give your update.”

Hopkins finds room for optimism with wealth management in general and WSFS Bank in particular, and he’s eager to help lead the firm into a highly dynamic new year.

Here are some highlights from our conversation, edited for length and clarity.

THINKADVISOR: How have things been going beyond the added work-life balance and the chance to spend more time with your family?

HOPKINS: It’s really been going great, including for the reason you mentioned. A big part of my focus over the last two years has been getting to know the team here and figuring out how we can build for the future. It’s taken some time to ensure we have the right people in the right roles, but I think we’ve done an excellent job on that and I’m thrilled about what comes next.

Our growth speaks volumes about the team and our strategy. As you might recall, I set out the specific goal of growing our revenue by 50% over three years. We’re well on track to accomplish that goal, which is super exciting considering we’re an organization with almost 180 years of history behind us. That’s a big goal for a large, historic enterprise.

Our strategy is all about high-touch service and being that consultative partner to our clients across the key areas of their financial lives. That's the key to organic growth.

THINKADVISOR: Can you talk about some of the big strategic decisions you have made during your tenure? For example, the decision to stop working with Commonwealth following the LPL acquisition?

HOPKINS: Yes that was a pretty big strategic move that is still playing out, our decision to not move forward with brokerage offerings from LPL after they acquired Commonwealth Financial Network.

In the time since, we have launched with Altruist as a custodial partner, and we’re very happy with that decision so far. Their ability to provide an efficient and high-touch client onboarding process, we feel, is truly something unique.

Don’t get me wrong, LPL is a great organization. They do great with scale, flexibility and product offerings, but their approach doesn’t necessarily fit our mantra of super-high-touch client service here at Bryn Mawr Trust. So, when the LPL deal was announced, we said, let’s do something differently and break down some barriers.

We’ve gotten the onboarding process down to 24 hours in most cases. It’s something that none of the other systems we considered could do — even Commonwealth couldn’t provide that.

THINKADVISOR: What kind of prior groundwork went into making the Altruist transition a success?

HOPKINS: That’s a good question. As you said, the decision to move went pretty quickly and the rollout process was only about three months. For a public company to go through all that third-party risk management, contract development and review in just a few months was a big lift.

We were able to make it work because we’re always in the process of being proactive, especially since I came in. We’ve been spending a lot more time on just being strategic in our understanding of the broader industry and what are the technology players who are coming on the scene and doing things differently. So, when the LPL-Commonwealth deal happened, we already had ideas in place and we could respond very quickly — with conviction.

I had actually brought in Altruist the summer before, just to show the team and the board what they were doing and why it might be interesting to work with them in the future. That’s a big part of being strategic, in general. Always looking around and keeping pace with others in the industry.

THINKADVISOR: I understand you’re in the process of publishing a new retirement book. Could you tell us about that?

HOPKINS: Yes, it’s actually a project I worked on with Endeavor Retirement Founder Bonnie Treichel. We’ve worked together for years, and she’s part of the FinServ Foundation with me.

For me, writing a book was about sharing information but also about scratching that creative itch I’ve always had. I think that’s true for Bonnie, and the message of the book also fits nicely into what Endeavor is doing as a retirement consulting firm.

Basically, the book is trying to make retirement seem more fun and less like a statistical question or Monte Carlo spreadsheet analysis thing. We basically tried to flip that approach on its head by taking 125 different retirement planning topics and presenting them in two ways. On one page is an exploration of the topic in approachable writing, and on the next is a fun visual that helps to explain and illuminate that topic.

Our theory is that, because most people are visual learners, this can be a more powerful and personal way to teach people about the ins and outs of retirement. I’m very excited for it to be released to the public next year.

THINKADVISOR: It sounds like an interesting approach. Did you two do the drawings yourself?

HOPKINS: Well, I did do some guiding sketches, but we thought it would be better to contract a professional artist. I used to do a lot of charcoal drawing in my spare time, but I had a big wrist injury some years ago, so that’s not really a thing for me anymore. Plus, doing it alone would have taken forever.

THINKADVISOR: What topics are on your mind as you contemplate what may be in store for 2026? For example, does the potential for an economic downturn worry you?

HOPKINS: It worries me in the sense that I don’t want our clients to go through that, but keep in mind that a majority of our fee-based business is not tied to market performance. So, we’re not really in that spot of asking what we would do if we had to navigate two or three bad quarters in the markets. Other firms might see that differently.

It’s interesting because, the last time we really had an extended difficult period for the markets where we didn’t see things bounce back quickly was back in the 2008 to 2010 timeframe. RIAs weren’t nearly as big of a thing back then, but I think the typical RIA out there is probably positioned to weather the storm pretty well. So much of their overhead is just compensation and advisor payout.

That said, I believe companies in the $30 billion range of assets that have taken on more debt earlier than they perhaps should have — they may face more serious problems in an extended downturn. The same is true for some other types of firms you could look at, I think. For example, CPA firms and others. They could become an opportunity for wealth firms to acquire. The same is true, maybe, for pure investment management firms or outsourced CIO firms.

My other big question for next year is: Will we finally see the first big acquisition of a major acquirer? I’ve kind of been watching and waiting for that to happen.

We did see Edelman and Financial Engines come together, but they were focused on two different areas of the business. We haven’t quite seen the aggregator plus aggregator happen. I’m curious to see if that could happen in 2026.

Likewise, I’m watching private markets and alternatives. There’s just a constant conversation around those topics. But what should the allocations be for a given client? It’s still an open question and I don’t really see much consistency of opinion.

Pictured: Jamie Hopkins. Courtesy photo