Edward Jones Employee Reviews about "door knocking"

Pros

Work life balance, Flexible working hours, run your own business, they pay some of your expenses.

Cons

Lot of door knocking, if you do not inherit a book of accounts then make sure you have a good territory, program is designed to weed people out since only 25% make it past the first year, base pay is barely enough to live on since they pay you 75% of your previous income, you pay for your gas, marketing materials, client dinners, etc... Unless you move to St. Louis the train stops at FA. You can assume leadership positions but they barely pay you extra.

Pros

Flexible work schedule, company values

Cons

In my 3 years as an advisor with Edward Jones, the only successful advisors I have seen all received offices and/or assets to manage immediately. The rest of the people they hire are thrown to the wolves. Nepotism, a term I hate to use, runs extremely high. Friends of leaders get good offices, Spouses too. I was given nothing, started from 0, and was thrown into a level 1 (meaning very new) advisors office. It was not a good environment. The way they train you to bring in clients is by knocking on doors. I was ready for that and I’m actually fairly good at it, but the tension with the advisor whose office I was in just ruined the whole experience. The advisor told me I basically couldn’t go to the nice neighborhoods near the office, those were hers, and I had to go “south of the tracks”. If I had been told this, no way I would have taken the position. I was recruited in, which now feels like I was just a number, and then immediately had my hands tied by the advisors office I was in. There were many days when I was knocking on doors and wanted to cross the street into “her area” but my conscious wouldn’t let me. It was truly a bad experience that I tried to make the best of but ultimately could not. Then when Covid hit, these problems I mentioned above started to stick out more and more. The company is so behind with their tech, it made working from home nearly impossible. I can’t access any info on my home computer because it has to have the best of the best security software that they won’t pay for, and they won’t supply me with a lap top to make things easier. I wouldn’t bother applying here for a couple years while they work out the kinks and transition into the modern era. Last thing, stop promoting the guys you gave huge offices to into training positions within their first 4 years in the company. They have no idea how to grow a practice from scratch.

Pros

Unlimited compensation potential.For most people starting new (Level-New), the onboarding and training process is head and shoulders above what you'll see at other large firms. During the hiring process, you'll do a business plan; a 'virtual day in the life' assessment, and at least three phone/in-person interviews. Edward Jones will then extend an offer. Day one, while studying to take the Series 7 and 66 exams, you'll be paid an hourly wage. 40 hours is recommended for study time, but you can do extra hours and get paid time and one half for additional work you put in (wink-wink). Once you pass the exams, you'll go to either St Louis, MO or Tempe, AZ for your "Know your Customer" training. Following this training, you'll be expected to hit the streets, making 25 contacts per day. At this point, you'll be on salary, but ineligible to earn commissions until you complete a requisite number of contacts over a 5-6 week period. You'll be told that you can make these contacts any way you deem necessary, but the only true way you'll get 25 quality contacts per day is by going door-to-door. In order for a contact to be considered "quality", you must have a name, a phone number, and permission to contact them. This last part is very important because these are the people you'll be calling on when you go back for "Launch your Practice" which is essentially a glorified graduation where you can officially call yourself a Financial Advisor. After evaluation-graduation. you still won't know a whole lot about being a financial advisor, though you will have mastered making contacts, handling objections, and setting appointments. Then, over the next 17 weeks, you'll work under the mentorship of an experienced Financial Advisor. You'll have a home-office coach, a field trainer, a level-leader, and anyone else you decide to take advice from. This firm is really well known for its helping culture. Just about any other FA will help you...but you have to ask.

Cons

Lead generation is cold-calling; primarily door-to-door. The decision on how you will start will be delegated to the leadership in the region you join. Here are a few examples: A. You start new. Nobody shares anything. You create your book of business. You keep what you kill and watch others joining the firm after you pass you in earnings. This is what we call New-New and it is very difficult to start this way, though the home office swears that many successful advisors build their business this way. B. Somebody quits because they've started as type "A", and you take over that book. You'll spend a great deal of time convincing clients that you aren't a quitter, but you'll be held to a higher production standard since you received these assets. Might as well be A. C. If you are lucky, perhaps you've demonstrated your determination during the 17 weeks and another FA (or several FAs) pool some assets and clients to get you started. By the way, these won't be people they enjoy working with; however, you may have better chemistry with the clients. That doesn't mean you've made it though. You'll need to continue door-knocking and asking for referrals until your business is profitable and sustainable for you. Keep in mind that your salary will drop off at year 5 and your highest ever commission will be 40% of revenue. There is a suggestion that you should have gathered $26 Million in assets by year 5 to be successful. Here's some math on that: 1. $26 Million (assume that half is in Guided Solutions) 2. $13 Million X 1.35% = $175,500 x 40% = $70,200 to you 3. There may also be residuals from the other half of your book, but keep in mind that stocks, bonds, CDs, and other investments only pay once. So, once you sell a $1M in 30-year municipal bonds, you're never getting paid on that asset again. D. You are the chosen one. EDJ recruited you from another firm where you might be able to bring assets over. (By the way, Edward Jones will sue you if you leave and try to take clients, but they'll darn sure poach from other firms.) You'll never knock on a single door. FAs in category C will resent you a bit, but those in A or B will hate your guts. E. You are the family member of a retiring FA, or you come from a line of Edward Jones royalty. Don't worry, you'll never knock on a door, you'll advance profitability levels very quickly as you are handed tens of millions of $ in assets to work with. You'll quickly surpass people in categories A, B, and C, even though you joined the firm three years after they did. You'll be lauded for the business you've built and encouraged to mentor those beneath your level of production. You'll make over $200K per year to start and those poor schleps who were 'successful' at building a business will be happy with their $70K at year 5.

Pros

Training was top notch. The firm pays you while you are studying for licensing exams. Some folks in the region seem to genuinely care about one another.

Cons

You must be excited about going door-to-door in residential neighborhoods trying to "sell" your services and the firm's services. If you are not passionate about this process, you will struggle. Be prepared for long days with the hope of getting a handful of phone numbers each day (if you're good and lucky enough to catch folks home). Hopefully, of the phone numbers you get, some will answer when you call. Of those that answer, hopefully a few will agree to meet with you. Of those that meet with you, hopefully a few will open accounts and move assets. Then you continue this process for 3-5 years until your book of business is built. Other FAs will tell you that they built their business without door-knocking. It rare, especially at the beginning.

Pros

Hourly pay was 15/hr Co-workers were so nice 40/hr weeks 10-week program Potential offer at the end Good experience for the financial industry Very trust worthy company

Cons

I wish the program was more guiding. They put a lot of responsibility on the intern to ask for learning opportunities instead of the Advisor being in charge of when to teach. My advisor was new to the intern thing and didn’t seem to know what he was doing either. Wasn’t in the office much. And the door knocking task made me very uncomfortable/feel unsafe. Was not offered a job at the end.