Fiduciary

The word "fiduciary" works as both a noun and an adjective. A fiduciary is a person or organization that is legally bound to place the interests of another over his or her own. A fiduciary relationship is the legal relationship of trust and confidence that the fiduciary has with that other person or organization. A trustee has a fiduciary responsibility to the organization he or she is trustee of. If you violate this trust by acting not in accordance with the other's best interests, you can be prosecuted.

A skilled entrepreneur will act as though they are a fiduciary of themselves and their family and their business and their partners and their market and the greater society. If your actions aren't aligned you should look into yourself and see where the problem lies.

I once put together a board of advisors. I wanted this board to mentor me and treated them as though they constituted a board of directors. They didn't have any authority to make me do anything and I didn't have to do what they advised but unless there was a good reason not do what they advised I followed their advice. After all that's what I had them for. If I hadn't wanted to listen to them I wouldn't have asked them to help me out. And if I'd asked for their advice then not followed it they would have stopped advising me.

I invited my lending officer to serve on it but he said he could not because it would posed a risk to the fiduciary responsibility he had toward this bank. We remained good friends. And I still asked his advice when I met him at the bank. He had a serious case of the yeabuts. I'd have a good quarter, and when I pointet this out he'd say "Yeah, but look at {whatever}, you'd better do something about it." He did his best to make sure I didn't get too comfortable.

Act always as though you are upholding your fiduciary responsibility to the the three entities listed above and you'll be okay.

My second novel is out. Go to amazon.com and plug in my name and you'll come up with both mysteries, The Case of the Kearney Music School Murders and No Stop on Red. Neither is ready yet for the Kindle but will be.