Revolutionizing Executive Benefits: Design, Funding, and Administration Insights

Most executive benefit conversations start with the funding vehicle. Michael Cowart Jr., NQPCTM starts with whether the plan actually does the job it was built to do.

It's a small reordering with significant downstream consequences. A SERP that vests at 65 for a 35-year-old executive isn't a retention tool. It's a deferred liability the company will eventually pay without getting the retention work it was supposed to do in the first place. That's the kind of design problem that gets papered over by good funding and good administration, until the executive walks at 42.

The Cowart Group has worked this way for two generations. Michael R. Cowart founded the firm after starting in the career-agency system at National Life of Vermont. Michael Jr. joined in 2017 from a Jackson National wholesaler role in Nashville. They walk into most client meetings together, and the discipline they share (design, then funding, then administration, in that order) is what most exec benefit conversations skip.

This month's Tier One interview:

👉 Why "impactful and affordable" is the test, not the slogan
👉 How they match benefit design to what executives actually value at the stage of life they're in
👉 The family-business dynamics that complicate succession and benefit planning for closely-held firms
👉 What full partnership looks like across a generational handoff

For advisors working with closely-held business owners and the executives they're trying to keep, the interview is worth your time. Link below.

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