Investment advisors with Toronto-based TD Waterhouse Private Investment Advice no longer have to worry about maintaining their level of commissions throughout their parental leave as a result of a new policy introduced this past September.

Dropping on the grid is a major concern for advisors contemplating parental leave, as their payout ratios are typically calculated on the dollar value of their trailing commissions for the prevailing fiscal year. However, with TD Waterhouse’s new policy, advisors can take parental leave knowing that the payout ratios they had before their leave will be maintained upon returning.

TD Waterhouse is the latest of the major brokerages owned by the Big Five banks to adopt a formalized grid-guarantee policy for child-care leaves. BMO Nesbitt Burns Inc. and ScotiaMcLeod Inc. have had similar policies in place for years, with slight variations.

The TD Waterhouse plans means that advisors earning $500,000 in trailing commissions before their leave would maintain their position on the payout grid for up to 18 months after their return. Upon their return, their payouts will be calculated as though they are still performing at the $500,000 level — even though their sales may not have returned to that level. (This policy also extends to employees who are adopting children.)

The policy is TD Waterhouse’s way of reaching out to current and prospective female employees, says Tracy O’Connor, branch manager and co-chairwoman of the firm’s women’s leadership council: “By [formalizing] a child-care leave policy, we [are aiming to] alleviate the concerns that many women express when considering a career in the investment industry. Our goal is to attract women who are considering a career as an investment advisor, as well as supporting and retaining the women that we currently have in our organization.”

Nesbitt Burns allows its advisors to lock in at a payout level before they leave and maintain that position on the grid until they return. However, if results drop substantially by mid-year, the payout is reassessed.

ScotiaMcLeod has had its child-care grid policy in place for more than a decade. Like Nesbitt Burns, the payout level is locked in at the pre-leave level and for a length of time after the advisor returns. In addition, the advisor is paid a guaranteed income for the first 15 weeks of parental leave based on an average of their trailing commissions for the previous three years.

However, if performance dips substantially over the remainder of the fiscal year upon the advisor’s return, the company could ask for a clawback on the income paid out.

Grid guarantees are important for financial services firms aiming to become more accommodating to work/life balance, says Martha Fell, CEO of Toronto-based Women in Capital Markets: “In the past five to 10 years, the industry has introduced a few great policy changes toward accommodating people during life stages without stalling their careers. Dropping off the grid while you are on a maternity leave could become financially challenging; firms with a lock-in policy give men and women new choices.”

Prior to the new TD Waterhouse policy, slipping off the grid was a primary pre-leave concern, says Kristen Spies, an advisor with the firm in Vancouver. When she began exploring the idea of taking a six-month maternity leave beginning in January 2006, maintaining her spot on the grid was one of the first points she discussed with her branch manager.

“When I wanted to take the leave, there was no formal leave policy,” Spies says. “Being six months out of production, I would immediately fall on the grid and come back to a very low payout. So, I approached my manager to discuss how we could work it out.”

Spies says her managers “jumped” at the opportunity to find a solution, which is how the idea for the grid guarantee first took shape. Although it took three years for the formalized policy to come to fruition, it gives TD Waterhouse an edge it didn’t previously have, O’Connor says: “If you bring the advisor who is going on mat leave, plus the branch manager, human resources and finance all on the same page, it makes it that much sweeter and easier to execute.”

As for maintaining performance and grid levels prior to maternity leave and during the pregnancy itself? Monique Gravel, CIBC Wood Gundy’s regional director for Que-bec and Atlantic Canada in Montreal, says the secret to maintaining grid level was to have an attitude that her pregnancy was no big deal: “The less that you make yourself out to be different, the easier [a physical process] it is to go through.”

@page_break@Diana Orlic, a wealth-management consultant with Winnipeg-based Wellington West Capital Inc. in Oakville, Ont., agrees. “When you draw more attention to being pregnant, you become more run down,” she says, but adds that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t listen to your body. “Prior to being pregnant, I would race from city to city, trying to see three or four clients in one day. When you are pregnant, you can’t keep the same pace.”

However, the fear of losing clients because of a pregnancy is daunting and can push you to do more work than you can physically handle. “You have something extra to prove, but you don’t need to,” Orlic says, which is why relying on your team for support becomes critical.

To ensure clients felt comfortable with her team in her absence, Orlic began bringing team members with her to all meetings. “Having two of us at a client meeting is our rule of thumb in business,” she says, “but it became especially important [prior to my] time off.”

Spies says it’s also crucial to lessen your personal business activity during the pregnancy’s third trimester. “The six weeks before I left, I stepped back from the business, not because I needed to but because it allowed my team to start picking up some of the things they were going to be responsible for while I was away. We could also figure out what was working and what wasn’t.”

It’s important to talk to clients about what they can expect during your leave, Spies says. A few points to include are: how long you will be gone; who will be serving them; and the reasons why you chose your replacements. Spies also spent months drafting short client summaries and inputting them into her client relationship management system for her team members to read before they spoke with the clients. IE