Whether or not you’re a Growth-Driver or C3D, this is a big tent and all are welcome. October 5-6-7 here in Charleston SC.
If you’ve been to a Growth-Drive Summit before, you know it’s not your typical conference. No death by PowerPoint. No talking heads droning through slides you’ll never look at again. It’s immersive, it’s hands-on, and you leave with ideas and tools you can put to work the moment you’re back at your desk. This year, we’ve turned the dial up.
Our planning committee has been putting in serious work, and it shows. The agenda is sharp, the structure is tight, and the format is built around one thing: making sure every participant walks away with multiple techniques they can apply to their practice immediately. Valuable? You bet.
Are you wondering why you are a “participant” and not an “attendee?” Because there will be ~2,000 years of collective experience in the room (!!!). Everyone contributes, everyone benefits. Growth-Drivers, Exit Planners, Business Advisors, Coaches, CPAs, Investment Bankers, Fractional CFOs and PE Operators: this means you, imagine collaborating with this diverse professional community solving aspects of a client case. Roll up your sleeves, it's workshop time.
There are several roles that folks in the room can play: participant, panelist, moderator, table lead, and more.
Here’s your Summit Journey, starting with the pre-show on Monday morning. The Summit follows the Growth-Drive “Analyze - Design - Execute" client action cycle.
Monday Morning: Hands-On with CLARITY (Optional, open to all participants)
We’re kicking things off with a pre-show that sets the tone for everything that follows. George will lead a live, hands-on walkthrough of the CLARITY platform using a real client case. We’re talking an actual engagement, scored in real time, walking through what the data reveals and what it means for the advisor and the business owner. If you’ve wondered how CLARITY works in the real world, Monday morning answers that question.
Monday Afternoon: Summit Welcome; ‘Analyze' aka Client Acquisition and Discovery
The working sessions are built around Growth-Drive’s core framework: Analyze, Design, Execute. Monday afternoon opens with Analyze.
But first, a foundational question: where do you play? The “Are You a 1 or a 5?” advisory roles spectrum defines the range from client educator at one end to full strategy execution guide at the other. Most advisors in the room are 2s, 3s, and 4s: educators who help clients understand what they’re looking at, architects who design the strategic roadmap, and general contractors who coordinate the people and resources needed to execute it. This is a spectrum, not a grade: we honor every role, recognizing that the Wealth Advisor/Exit Planner ‘2’ plays a critical role and needs the 3s and 4s to make sure their client gets the success they want. Knowing your role going in, and who you’ll need as collaborators, shapes the engagement from the first conversation.
With that framing in place, a panel of experienced Growth-Drivers will get into the challenge points every advisor faces during the analysis phase: the panel will dive into these questions, and you’ll have the opportunity to pick their brains:
“How do we find ideal clients?”
“How do we move them from the first meeting to being our client?”
“What challenge points do we see during Discovery? During the first phases of an engagement? …and how do we move through them?”
The panel will share their experience about where clients hesitate, where engagements stall, and how to anticipate objections that can torpedo a relationship before it gets traction. This is sales, business development, and peer learning rolled into one. Table exercises follow, where participants work through specific challenge scenarios and bring their solutions back to the room.
Tuesday Morning: Design
Tuesday is the heart of the summit, and in the morning a new panel discusses ‘Design’ best practices: how do you create a strategic plan that is actually executable? This is critical intel for 2s, 3s and 4s: we must start with the end in mind.
This is where the Integrated Strategic Capacity Doctrine comes to life. The Doctrine is the operating framework in which the CEO, the SLT, YOU the advisory team, the software, the Ai, and the data are all integrated and aligned around a single goal: increasing Strategic Capacity. When this alignment exists, delivering your client’s wins is assured. When it doesn’t, even the best plan can stall.
The second panel will dig into what it takes to design an engagement that achieves this alignment, from the first session with the owner to the SLT moving the business towards the asset class. Ai is woven in here as a design accelerant. Table exercises challenge participants to build from what they’ve heard and apply it to their own client situations.
Tuesday Afternoon: Execute
Good design becomes reality through execution. Tuesday afternoon tackles the hardest part: leading clients from where they are, to higher Strategic Capacity, growing profits, and maximized value.
The goal of every engagement is to maximize your client’s options. The clearest path to that goal is helping the business owner improve their Strategic Capacity score to 85 or above, the threshold that qualifies a business into the Strategic Capacity Asset Class. At 85+, the business commands dramatically better outcomes in the capital markets, whether the owner is pursuing a transaction, a recapitalization, or simply building a business that runs without them and from which they can accumulate wealth, diversified as AUM.
Getting there requires execution discipline. A third panel of practitioners will share what happens when execution breaks down and what they’ve done about it. The whirlwind, shiny objects, leadership drift: we’ve all seen it. Table exercises dig into accountability structures, engagement rhythms, and the practical tools that keep CEOs committed and moving. You 2s, imagine hearing real case experiences as businesses implement strategy. This is priceless intel, right? The committee discussions on this were fantastic.
Wednesday Morning: The Future
Wednesday morning we’ll open the aperture. You’ll get a first-hand a look at the next generation of the CLARITY platform, including the CEO dashboard and the BusinessFlow scorecard, learn about the engagement score (aka “Is the client DOING?”) and how delegating accountability to the client creates the data loop that makes your engagement deliver ROI. When the CEO can see their own engagement score and connect it directly to outcomes, the dynamic of the advisory relationship changes. That is the Integrated Strategic Capacity Doctrine working at full strength. You are about to be able to show your clients and prospects the real-world impact on growth, margin and value they are getting from working with you. Biz Dev and stickiness, anyone?
Before we wrap up, we’re going to have the conversation the room always wants to have: how do we get paid, and how much? Fee models, success fees, hybrid pricing, and what the market will and won’t accept. This is a perennial favorite, and this year we’re giving it the time and structure it deserves.
Why Should You Participate?
The Growth-Drive Summit is where we all get better, where we all learn tips and techniques that are proven to help bui;d a thriving advisory business based on delivering client wins. It’s where you hear from peers doing this work at a high level, wrestle with hard problems at a table of smart people, and leave with a clearer picture of how to grow your practice and deliver better outcomes for your clients.
Whether you’re a 2 who wants to sharpen your ability to educate clients on what Strategic Capacity means for their business, a 3 who wants to design more executable plans, and/or a 4 who wants to run tighter engagements with better client accountability, this summit is built for you.
Every participant is guaranteed to walk away with multiple immediately applicable strategies, tactics, and tools. That’s not a marketing line. This is a promise.
See you in Charleston! Heck yes.
Register here - only 11 seats remain at the early registration rate.