A seachange in wealth management: From financial planning to comprehensive wealth and life planning:

Financial Planning today is expanding into life and legacy planning. Many clients-whether they be of old or new wealth-want to have skills and strategies to help them deal with important life decisions, so that their choices reflect their most significant values and goals.

A comprehensive approach to planning should help clients make decisions about what they want to preserve for themselves, their children and the greater community. More than the technical aspects of wealth management, families are addressing their children's needs, their death, their legacy and what really matters to them. It is about managing the family assets, which go far beyond the investment products offered by a private institution. Managing the whole picture involves working with family members. Ultimately, a state-of-the-art wealth management protocol helps a family preserve and grow their assets, while simultaneously furthering family relationships across the generations.

Handling the emotional side of money matters

Most financial decisions are also emotional decisions, having an impact on lifestyle, on important relationships, and the legacy we want to leave. How can people make the best financial and emotional choices? First, they need to make decisions about the real meaning and purpose of their wealth, to reach clarity on the guidelines for how financial decisions will drive their lives, now and in the future. In order to find their way, it helps to have a map-one that takes into account a person's very personal money-related issues, desires, and values.

The Money Meaning, & Choices Wealth and Life Planning System is a practical, values-based framework that brings together life planning with financial decision-making. Its five steps enable people to clarify money-related emotional issues, determine operational money values, and then use these values as a basis for achieving lifestyle balance, strategic philanthropy, and legacy planning.

Our system empowers people and their families to reach values-based agreements about money matters. It can help transform emotional conflicts that are divisive into opportunities for family unity and family communication. Our system encourages effective money communication between the generations, enabling parents and adult children to be clear about each other's intentions and perceptions. It helps families make positive decisions about distributions of estate assets. Individuals and families gain consistency about values and goals, providing guidance and a common language about small and large money matters.

The MMCI Wealth and Life Planning System© provides a framework, strategies and tools for:

• Having family meetings about money
• Handling the emotional issues that get in the way of financial decision-making
• Identifying and talking about each family member's short and long term emotional concerns about money matters
• Determining family core money values-a straight forward and smart method that becomes the foundation for making decisions on the saving, spending and sharing of money
• Effective money communication
• Helping people achieve their optimal balance for how they prioritize and spend their time
• Thinking through philanthropic issues and plans
• Creating a legacy plan that passes on important stories and principles