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CJ Kloss

CEO and Senior Financial Adviser at Klaas Financial (Madison, WI), a fee-based fiduciary retirement planning firm founded by his father in 1976.

Oct 15, 2026

SeanHOST
6:33
So, CJ, can you kind of give folks some real-world examples here?
6:38
Yeah, you bet.
6:39
So let's imagine two financial professionals.
6:43
One is compensated through commissions when, say, a certain product is sold.
6:47
Another charges a fee for advice, regardless of which investment or product that is selected.
6:54
So neither structure automatically makes someone more trustworthy or more ethical.
6:59
But those compensation systems, of course, create different different incentives.

7 MINS LATER

SeanHOST
14:09
Correct on that?
SeanHOST
16:09
So, CJ, what role does confirmation bias play in all of this?
16:15
Yeah, you know, I was laughing at Eric's last segment there.
16:18
It reminds me of my children a little bit where, you know, because Eric was mentioning good decisions sometimes have disappointing outcomes and poor decisions sometimes have good outcomes.
16:30
And I think of like my children, if they work really hard for something, they practice a lot, they...
16:35
I'm thinking of sports now, right? They practice a lot and then they get rewarded for that.
16:40
I feel really good about that.
16:42
But when a child is lazy and they don't show up for anything and then they get lucky, it's almost like worse.

10 MINS LATER

SeanHOST
26:52
I mean, is having a financial plan, is that something that can help folks so we don't have to rely entirely on willpower?
SeanHOST
6:01
How can employers encourage better engagement from their employees? Well,
6:06
Yeah, good question, Sean.
6:07
So again, today's show is all about employer-sponsored retirement plans, which is most commonly referred to as 401Ks or 403Bs or 401As or 457s or simple IRAs or SEP IRAs.
6:18
And by the way, this is why people often don't do this stuff, because there's so many names and complications to it, which is why people like myself and Aaron exist to help you Work through the complexity.
6:30
But the whole point of the show today is around employer-sponsored retirement plans.
6:33
But some things we're going to talk about will apply to the employers themselves, right? And really, that's a big focus of today's show is for anybody who's a small business owner or an employer or even just a key decision maker inside of a larger corporation in overseeing benefits.
6:51
But for those of you who are just participants in an employer-sponsored retirement plan, pay attention because a lot of the things we're going to talk about you can take back to your businesses as well to suggest little modifications.
SeanHOST
8:10
And so, CJ, as we talk about this stuff beyond helping employees save, how can the retirement plan benefit the business owner themselves?
SeanHOST
7:13
CJ, let's get some practical advice then when it comes to tax alpha.
7:18
Yeah.
7:18
So, you know, again, just for everybody who's popping in and out of the show, we are talking about the difference between investment alpha versus tax alpha.
7:27
And in financial planning, actually, it's important for people to understand we have a portfolio management team that manages underlying investment portfolios for clients.
7:36
And then we have a planning team as well.
7:38
And both our investment and planning team would agree on the statement that tax alpha is a much better place to spend your time than investment alpha.
7:49
It hasn't always been this way, by the way.

9 MINS LATER

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