Reflecting on 7 Years of Kings Path Partners
Mike Mulcahy, President & Founder
It has been 7 years since I left a great role with a great company to start Kings Path Partners. I often get asked why I did this. Why did I take the risk to start a new company? I had many reasons but the largest was my desire to serve people directly. In my previous role as President of an investment firm, we produced financial returns for our investors, we gave away 50% of our profits to charity, and we had a great team of people. It was wonderful in many ways.
However, I missed working with clients directly helping them solve problems and make critical decisions. My early career at McKinsey & Company was all about providing quality, unbiased advice to clients. It is an important part of who I am, and that need to serve in a more personal way was not being met. When three different families invited me to help them with their financial affairs, Kings Path was born.
Have my expectations been met? Absolutely!
The other day I was standing on the back porch of the house of a widow, and we were reflecting on our journey together these past few years. We remembered sitting on the floor going through nine banker boxes filled with years and years of financial records getting them organized so that we could get her late husband’s estate settled, picking up where the estate attorney and CPA had dropped out of the process and where her previous advisor would not dare tread! We reflected on sorting through multiple property, investment, and tax records to get them straightened out since the estate settled. We talked about many discussions and tutorials as she dived headlong into learning about investments, estates, and taxes – most of which had been managed by her husband during their long marriage. While she was apologetic for the demands on my time, I expressed my sincere gratitude for being invited into her life to help and serve. Creating investment allocations is challenging and fun, but helping clients in their time of need is “priceless” (to steal a phrase from MasterCard commercials.)
As I reflect on 7 years, we have served clients in many and often unexpected ways through difficult divorces and long mediation sessions, the loss of family members and the tedious process of estate settlement, the complete review and re-write of estate plans as life goals changed, life transitions from work to retirement, the sales of businesses, and the creative pursuit of charitable structures. Serving clients with their financial needs isn’t just about putting together an investment allocation. It is about knowing their vision and values, putting together a plan, anticipating their needs, working side by side to prioritize and implement, and guiding them along their journey with care, always putting their needs first.
Every day I get to work is a blessing where I get to use my talents and passions to serve others. It has been a wonderful journey and I look forward to many more decades of service.
I am very grateful for a team of very smart (check out their growing list of designations!) and caring people at Kings Path who also share this passion to serve.
Several years ago, I wrote a blog challenging our industry to step up its level of servant leadership. I still think this is relevant today, and perhaps more than ever. Sadly, I think most still drop the ball and are missing out on the real joy of our calling.
Read “A Higher Calling” blog.
