Job Summary:

Mercer Advisors closes 15–18 acquisitions per year. Every firm that joins is making one of the most significant decisions of their professional lives and the promise we make to them during the sales process is that joining Mercer will be better for their clients, their teams and the selling principals. The Senior Director, New Partner Success will be instrumental in keeping that promise.

This role is the single point of contact for new partners: a senior, relationship-driven, commercially minded role for someone who can walk into a room of experienced financial advisors, earn their trust quickly, and guide them through the most complex organizational transition of their careers, while simultaneously owning the business outcomes Mercer needs from every acquisition.

The Senior Director, New Partner Success is a value creation partner, responsible for knowing everything about their firms, driving measurable results, and intervening before problems become crises. They carry a portfolio of 8–10 firms at various stages of integration and are accountable for the commercial, cultural, and operational success of every one of them.

Essential Job Functions for this role include:

What You Will Own

Pre-LOI: Diligence Participation

• Participate in pre-LOI diligence, providing a formal assessment and "vote" on fit: evaluating culture, ease of integration, and organizational readiness alongside Partner Development
• Contribute to the scoring rubric for market and firm readiness
• Flag potential complexities early so they can be factored into deal structure and terms

LOI to Close: Solutioning and Planning

• Introduced to the firm at LOI alongside the VP of New Partner Integration
• Lead the Business Introduction meeting with firm principals: understanding growth history, AUM aspirations, client demographics, team dynamics, key personnel, and local market position
• Build the first draft of the firm-specific success plan before close, including the value creation framework, retention risk map, and first-year priorities
• Project manage issues and complexities identified during the LOI-to-close phase; own resolution of all business-related issues before and after close
• Partner with the VP of NPI on integration solutioning; support assessment of whether Senior Program Manager governance is needed

Post-Close: Business and Cultural Integration

• Serve as the firm's single point of contact from close through full integration
• Orchestrate the introduction of the Integration team, corporate functions, and specialist resources on the firm's terms and timeline
• Monitor integration milestone completion; own resolution of all business-side escalations
• Execute the structured welcome experience: buddy assignments, all-hands meeting, first-month operating rhythm
• Confirm committee participation and Mercer operating routine enrollment for all team members within 90 days
• Identify and activate the firm's Champion (the internal advocate who accelerates cultural adoption from the inside out)

Value Creation: The Long Game

• Own the post-close value creation plan for each assigned firm: repricing, organic growth initiatives, capability adoption, and synergy capture tied to deal terms
• Lead business planning for each firm and advisor: establish baseline metrics, identify share of wallet expansion opportunities, surface retention risk by advisor
• Monitor growth, margin, and productivity metrics monthly; provide qualitative updates to the coverage team and leadership reporting routines
• Identify and mitigate advisor and client retention risk proactively, including succession planning for key personnel and intervention before departure or client loss occurs (leveraging Wealth Enablement and People for support)
• Surface cross-sell opportunities for acquired firm clients (tax, estate planning, insurance, institutional investing) and route to appropriate internal teams
• Activate the RVP (Growth/Channel) as firms mature; coordinate market launch event and growth acceleration plan
• Identify organic growth opportunities and referral acquisition candidates through deep firm relationships

Performance Monitoring and Intelligence

• Maintain the Firm Health Score for each assigned firm across five dimensions: New Clients, Existing Clients, Financial, Engagement, and Integration
• Provide monthly qualitative inputs and validate the quantitative outputs for the Performance Management one-pager
• Trigger escalation protocols when a firm falls below health score threshold; drive increased engagement and executive involvement as needed
• Contribute to post-mortem reviews on closed integrations; surface patterns that improve future diligence and deal design
• Feed structured intelligence to colleagues in New Partner Success, Managing Partners / Executive Managing Partners and Partner Development through defined reporting routines

Voice of the Firm (in partnership with Wealth Enablement)

• Administer 90-day pulse surveys and facilitate annual firm reviews
• Capture exit intelligence when advisors or clients depart
• Participate in the Quarterly M&A Working Group review; contribute firm-level insight to scorecard trends and deal thesis tracking

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities:

• 10+ years in wealth management, financial services, management consulting, or a senior relationship management role, with meaningful exposure to business owners, firm principals, or founders
• Demonstrated experience driving commercial outcomes in a client-facing role
• Familiarity with the RIA or independent advisory space is strongly preferred; understanding of how advisory firms are built, run, and grown is essential
• Experience navigating organizational change, firm transitions, or post-merger integration is a significant advantage
• People leadership experience or readiness; this role may evolve into a team leadership position as the function scales
• Exceptional relationship builder: earns trust quickly and credibly with experienced, often skeptical financial professionals
• Commercially minded: understands AUM dynamics, revenue drivers, organic growth levers, and what a healthy advisory firm looks like
• Operationally disciplined: manages a portfolio of 8–10 firms with rigor, follow-through, and structured communication; nothing ages, nothing falls through the cracks
• Emotionally intelligent: can read a room, navigate interpersonal complexity, hold difficult conversations with care, and remain steady under pressure
• Strategic thinker: connects individual firm dynamics to enterprise patterns; surfaces insight upward, not just status
• Strong communicator: writes and speaks with clarity and confidence; comfortable presenting to senior market leaders and executive stakeholders
• Builder: energized by creating processes, playbooks, and programs that don't yet exist; not someone who needs a fully built system to be effective

What This Role Is Not For

• Someone who wants to manage tasks and check boxes
• Someone who needs explicit direction to know what a firm needs
• Someone who is uncomfortable with ambiguity, complexity, or emotionally charged situations
• Someone who sees relationship management as separate from commercial accountability

Structure and Scope

• Reports to VP of New Partner Success
• Portfolio of 8–10 firms at various stages of integration
• Overtime, may be organized by geography: Eastern, Western, or Central division
• Works in close daily coordination with the VP of NPI, Tax Integration Lead, Sr. Director of New Partner Experience, Marketing, Wealth Enablement, HR, and market leadership
• Participates in pre-LOI diligence, LOI introduction meetings, and Business Introduction meetings for all assigned firms

Work Schedule:

This professional role requires availability during standard business hours of Monday through Friday from 8AM to 5PM. At times, the role may have early or late hours to meet business tasks and deadlines for external and internal client needs.

All roles classified as a non-exempt are required to record working time into the timekeeping system daily at the start and end of each workday plus a 30-minute unpaid lunch period.

Working Conditions:

This position may be in a professional office environment or a dedicated home office workspace which is free of interruptions. Whether position is in a dedicated office space or home office workspace, basic technology needs will be provided to satisfy position requirements. Routinely sitting and standing for periods of time. No heavy lifting over 10 lbs.