Pros
Don't know where to start! Very professional. Great training. Great culture. Great peers. Great support from the home office. Great technology. Great approach to saving and investing for retirement. Great culture. Always putting the client first. Investment offerings always vetted for quality. No proprietary offerings. Reasonable performance expectations. The business is theirs but the relationships are yours. Profit sharing through partnership shares. Bonuses once your branch is profitable. Great approach to transition branch for your retirement. Great benefits. Lots of flexibility. Great banking services for your clients. Great compliance risk department. Great marketing and educational resources to use with prospects and clients. Etc. Etc. Etc. There really are too many good things about this company to list them all here.
Cons
There's going to be attrition. Lots of attrition. Most of the veterans won't cozy up to new FAs until you've been there a while because what's the point of getting too close if you're likely not going to last? It's a very difficult business and most never break through. By "most" I mean the vast majority will never make it (90+%?). They won't reveal the numbers but starting out as a "New/New" is next to impossible without an incredible amount of hard work, amazing skill set, lots of luck and a robust warm market to get your ball rolling. It's weird - those in your cohort that you think don't have a prayer eventually take off. Those that you think will make it sometimes don't. You may think you've got what it takes only to discover that you're surrendering your branch office key to the person that's going to take things over. Sometimes all it takes is the market you're in. Sometimes all it takes is a brother or uncle that feeds you referrals all day, every day. Sometimes it's a complete mystery why some make it and all the rest fail. Sometimes it simply boils down to timing. It's a bit cultish. You will be asked to drink the Kool Aid. It's delicious and not at all difficult to swallow. Those that have it good have it really good and they like what they've got. It's approximately a 30%/70% or 40%/60% split on commissions. That increases once you get partnership shares but those don't come for a decade or more, depending on your production. If your branch is profitable,there are additional bonuses. It's as good as LPL or other similar broker dealers long term. Not so much short term. You'll always be a prospector. You always need to ask for referrals. You spend months knocking on doors of households that have no money to begin with and aren't home anyway because husband and wife are both at work and the kids are at school. You'll be turned away from CPAs, tax preparers, estate planning attorneys, etc. because they're already in bed with a relative or buddy from high school. I wouldn't want to do it again. I didn't try to take my book to a competitor because I was convinced that if I couldn't make it at EDJ, I sure as hell wouldn't make it any place else!