The First Hint
Although the firm officially began with its RIA registration in the state of California in June 2019, its true origin story is decades earlier at the end of 1991 when Elisa Ordona – the founder – was at a career crossroads. She was leaving her position as a Systems Administrator in the Development Department of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) mostly for personal life balance/flexibility needs as a new mother, but also to find a more satisfying job/career. In that search, she took a test that told her the professions best suited to her interests and abilities were college professor and securities analyst. Unfortunately, she found the information unhelpful. Although her academic and work experience were mostly in the Humanities and the non-profit sector, she felt strongly inclined to stay outside the world of academia – so college professor was not an appealing choice. Turning her attention to the Securities Analyst occupation, she too felt disheartened about this career because the financial field sounded so foreign. Imagining herself in that world seemed absurd because she knew in 1991, she wouldn’t fit in, much less thrive, in the world of investments and securities analysis. Someone with her background – young, second generation Filipina-American woman from a poor, working-class family of thirteen children with little knowledge (one college accounting class) or exposure to finance and investing – had no reference much less any guidance in the investment world whatsoever. How could she become a securities analyst? It was almost laughable. Her hope of discovering a satisfying profession seemed to be a dead end. So, she moved on.
Wait a minute, if she decided not to be a securities analyst, how is this the origin story? Because it’s the first hint those two careers may be right for her. Perhaps more striking is the comment made decades later at a National Association of Personal Financial Advisors (NAPFA) meeting when a fellow attendee would point out to her that the combination of those two occupations – professor and securities analyst – is a financial planner, but back in 1991 the profession was barely out of its infancy, and no one she knew was making that connection. Consequently, she had quite a long winding way to go before coming to this conclusion herself, and eventually hearing that remark in 2017. Want to know more? Choosing to become a CFP®.
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