174: The Road to Success: Austin Wilson’s Career Journey (Ft. The Maddy Miller Show)

Welcome to the Invested Dad’s Podcast, simplifying financial topics so that you can take action and make your financial situation better, helping you to understand the current world of financial planning and investments. Here are your hosts, Josh Robb and Austin Wilson.

Austin Wilson:

All right. Hey, hey, hey. Welcome back to the Invested Dad’s Podcast. A podcast where we take you on a journey to better your financial future. I am Austin Wilson, research analyst at Hixon Zuercher Capital Management.

Josh Robb:

And I’m Josh Robb, director of Wealth Management at Hixon Zuercher Capital Management.

Maddy Miller:

And I’m Maddy Miller from The Maddy Miller Show. And today we are doing a collaborative podcast. I’m so excited to get to interview Josh and Austin a little bit about their career path, which is what I do usually on my podcast. And yeah.

All right everyone, I am here on the second part of the Invested Dad’s Maddy Miller Show Collaboration.

Austin Wilson:

Part two.

 

[0:55] – Austin’s Fun Fact

 Maddy Miller:

I’m here with Austin Wilson. Austin, thank you for allowing me to interview you for your podcast. And I’m excited to hear your fun fact that you have prepared.

Austin Wilson:

Well, I asked my wife what my fun fact should because-

Maddy Miller:

Oh, Jenna.

Austin Wilson:

Yeah.

Maddy Miller:

Did she come up with this?

Austin Wilson:

I mean, her fun facts are for me because I don’t think I’m that fun.

Maddy Miller:

That’s exactly what Josh said. And you know what? You guys are fun. I don’t know why you think that.

Austin Wilson:

One fun fact is that we just had a baby girl, number two.

Maddy Miller:

Yes. That is so exciting. Every time Jenna posts on Facebook, I love seeing those little goobers. So cool.

Austin Wilson:

So I have two girls now. One is, five and one is eight weeks tomorrow. So that’s been the source of joy in my life for a while. I also ride street bikes and dirt bikes and I’m really passionate about that. And I play guitar and lead worship at our church. The office makes fun of me because I like food so much, those are really-

Maddy Miller:

But you get the best recommendations for food. I remember that about you.

Austin Wilson:

I mean, I hope. I think what I think is good, but if other people disagree, they’re wrong.

Maddy Miller:

Yeah, I remember you telling me about a taco place that you love.

Austin Wilson:

The Taco Shop.

Maddy Miller:

Yeah. And I remember then I went there after.

Austin Wilson:

I’ve been there two or three times in the last week. They know me.

Maddy Miller:

Yeah. Oh, you’re a regular.

Austin Wilson:

Yeah.

Maddy Miller:

I love that. That’s awesome.

Austin Wilson:

Yeah, it’s pretty great. I mean, those are mediocre fun facts.

Maddy Miller:

No, those are great fun facts. I also remember when I first met you, you were either going or coming back from your week long motorcycle trip, which you do.

Austin Wilson:

Yeah. I take a trip every year with my uncle and my cousin and my dad, and we go to a random place where there’s good riding. We’ve done them for many years and we’re headed to western Kentucky later on this year.

 

[2:42] – Where Austin Grew Up & What He Did for Fun

 Maddy Miller:

That’ll be awesome. That’ll be so fun. Love to hear it. Well, let’s get started. So I usually like to just start off asking my guests, where did you grow up? What did you do for fun? What were you involved in?

Austin Wilson:

Yeah, so I am not from Findlay, Ohio, even though I’ve been here for a long time. I moved here in 2010 for college, which we’ll talk about college later. But I’m from a small village, which is about the size of a neighborhood in Findlay, of West Liberty, Ohio. But yeah, very, very small town. I grew up in the country, graduated high school in 2010. I was involved in the musical and the choir, but I was also in sports. So I was a captain of the football team and captain of the track team and did those sort of things. So yeah, back when I was able to work out every day, it was great. I still try but back then, it was easy to be in shape when you’re in a kid.

Maddy Miller:

Yeah. It’s always easier when you’re younger.

Austin Wilson:

Oh my goodness yes. Yeah. But it’s like my metabolism fell off of a cliff in my thirties, but it was definitely great back then. So yeah, that was growing up and just being goofy. We were in the country, so we would just go fishing all the time. My buddy down the street had a pond and the little raft thing and we’d just go shoot guns and go fishing and just goof around until the cows came home. So it was fun. It was a good place to grow up.

 

[4:04] – Austin’s Transition to The University of Findlay

 Maddy Miller:

So you mentioned that you moved to Findlay for college. So you went to the University of Findlay. So tell us a little bit about how you originally picked the University of Findlay first, but then also picked your major.

Austin Wilson:

So go Oilers, “Goilers” is what we used to say. So I actually found the University of Findlay on accident. When I was looking at colleges probably about my junior year, I was like, “Oh, I know there’s a college in Toledo and one in Bowling Green.” I knew I wanted to go into business. I knew I wanted to go into some sort of finance-y thing. At that point I just had an interest in it for a long time, really through school growing up. And so I was like, “Okay, well Toledo, BG, let’s go to check them out.” So what do you have to go through to get to Bowling Green and Toledo from where I grew up is Findlay.

Maddy Miller:

Findlay, yeah.

Austin Wilson:

Yeah. I was into looking into those two schools. I looked at them. They were both too big for me because I’m from a Podunk middle of nowhere town, and it was good experience to come back to what I thought was a small home feeling university, felt like someplace I wanted to be. And so I ended up visiting it, not knowing it was a private university. And that was shocking because private universities, if you don’t know, pretty expensive.

Maddy Miller:

Oh, I know. I know.

Austin Wilson:

Exactly. So it was a sticker shock, but they were actually really, really gracious with financial aid and stuff like that, and we were able to make it work. So I ended up going to the University of Findlay and never looked back.

Maddy Miller:

Wow. I love to hear it. And I’m interested in how you picked your major too.

Austin Wilson:

Yeah, so like I said earlier, I’d always been in liking the business-y finance-y thing through school. I took accounting in high school. I liked accounting, but I wasn’t jacked about it. So I actually had done some stock market simulations and things like that growing up and got really interested in the finance side of things. So I chose finance and I really enjoyed it and stuck with it. So I actually have a double major in finance and international business because well, all business pretty much is international to some extent.

But also I was interested in traveling and stuff like that, and that was something that I was able to tie in there and then because of the way classes and course loads work out, I was actually able to add a couple minors to that as well without hardly adding any classes. So I have a double major and a double minor. My minors are operations and logistics because I wanted to open myself up to potentially being able to work in manufacturing if that’s what was available and business economics.

Maddy Miller:

Oh, okay.

Austin Wilson:

So yeah, I definitely have a lot of ground covered there, but it’s actually wasn’t that many more classes to have all of that. Yeah, I picked those and I think it worked out pretty well.

Maddy Miller:

Yeah, I feel like you got the best bang for your buck. Two majors, two minors.

Austin Wilson:

I took 18 credit hours, which is the max all the way until my last semester of my senior year.

 

[7:01] – What Made the Biggest Impact on Austin in College?

 Maddy Miller:

Wow. That could not be me. Wow. Proud of you.

When you think back to your college days, so what kinds of things did you learn or projects you were involved in, organizations or whatever, do you feel made the biggest impact on you?

Austin Wilson:

I was actually involved in a handful of things. So one of the big things I was involved in is, there for a couple years I was the president of what used to be known as Students in Free Enterprise or SIFE, which was a business club where we really focused on… We would do projects with businesses in the community and things like that and help them to become more efficient and to just become a better business and stuff like that. Enable and empower people economically. That was one of the things, was the president of that turned into what was called Enactus later, same organization. So I was the president of that for a couple years, which really gave me some good leadership experience and stuff like that. And then I was also involved in Residence Life for three years, and that was something I really enjoyed. I was a Resident Assistant for one year my sophomore year, and then my junior and senior year I was a Resident Director. So I had my own staff. So I got to learn some good leadership skills with that as well as managing a team and a budget and all of those things. And it was a great thing as well as it really helped financially because those three years I was able to have room and board taken care of because of that role. So super, super helpful.

Maddy Miller:

That’s awesome. Josh also talked about that. Did you guys know that you had that in common? You’re both-

Austin Wilson:

I think so, yeah.

Maddy Miller:

… a part of res-life?

Austin Wilson:

Yeah.

Maddy Miller:

That’s awesome. Great. So similar to Josh, I did a LinkedIn stalking of you just to learn more about your experience.

Austin Wilson:

Yeah. All good things, right?

 

[8:38] – Austin’s First Job Out of College & Getting into Financial Analysis

 Maddy Miller:

Yes, all good things, of course. And it’s up to date, at least I think. So I saw that you worked at Cooper Tire in Findlay before you began working at Hixon Zuercher. So can you explain your different roles while you worked there and what you learned most from your time there?

Austin Wilson:

Yeah, so I started actually in December of my senior year as an intern at Cooper. And I was working in what was known as internal controls, which is very similar to auditing and that sort of thing. So all of the different financial controls you have to have in place to make sure that separation of duties and all of these things are all on top of the table for an audit. That was really what internal controls was. So it was a good foot in the door. It was pretty boring. It wasn’t something I didn’t want to do auditing for the rest of my life. That’s for sure. But then in the spring of my senior year, I was still working as an intern and I actually started asking around my boss like, “Hey, what does working here full-time look like? Because I’d like to stay in Findlay.”

And so my boss was like, well actually go talk to this guy. So I talked to my soon-to-be boss, his name was Luke Belo, great guy. And he said, Hey, well actually we just had an opening as a financial analyst in our global financial planning and analysis department. And so I interviewed and I got the job, and I actually started during my senior year doing that job. And that job was great. I was actually the point person for bringing all of our global company… two operations in China, operation in Mexico, operation in England. Consolidating all of the global forecasts every month and presenting those with my team to really the executives, the CEO and the CFO of Cooper.

So that was a really cool job for a 22-year-old. I also became the liaison for Cooper at that point owned Mickey Thompson, which is a racing tire off-road tire brand. So I got to do a lot of traveling between Akron and Findlay and go work with them on certain projects and things like that. And I was also the financial planning liaison for our Mexico operations at that point. So I got down, got to go to Mexico a couple times as well. Actually took the jet one time, which was pretty sweet.

Maddy Miller:

Wow, that’s awesome.

Austin Wilson:

Out of Findlay. That was really, really fun. But what I learned a lot was just the importance of financial statements. We were a publicly traded company at that, so I had to understand how all of these financial projections that we’re doing go to project, what the managers are looking at in terms of giving guidance for forecast and stuff like that for Wall Street.

So I really got good at financial statement analysis, much more than I would have just from my education alone. So that was really cool. And then just learning how a global company operates with trading and stuff like that was huge. So really enjoyed that. It was a great experience. And then got out of that job in 2015 or 2016, I don’t remember. And I went to become a plant accountant in the tire plant here in Findlay, Ohio. I did that for a couple years as well. Worked with a great team and really as an accountant, I was actually an accountant. Which I loved the team. The job was pretty boring. I knew I didn’t want to do accounting the rest of my life, and a lot of the opportunities from there on out would’ve been bouncing back between finance and accounting. And it wasn’t necessarily something I wanted to do the rest of my life because I thought that I had been trained more on the investment side of things. And that was more intriguing to me over time.

 

[12:04] – Transition into Austin’s Research Analyst Role at Hixon Zuercher

 Maddy Miller:

That’s cool to hear. So then after that, I believe you started working at Hixon Zuercher, which is where you work now. Tell us kind of how you made that transition, how you started working at HZ, and then how your role has changed in the years that you’ve been there.

Austin Wilson:

Yeah. Well, it’s actually a funny story. So my wife Jenna, actually worked at Hixon Zuercher before I did. So we got married in December 2015, and when we were on our honeymoon, Josh’s wife, Steph actually emailed Jenna that there was a job opening for the client service administrator position at Hixon Zuercher. So she applied, ended up eventually getting the job and worked here for a couple years before we had our first daughter.

So then we had our daughter and she decided she wanted to stay home, be a stay-home mom with Juliana. And she did. And I was still working at Cooper. The end of 2017 rolls around and we go to the Christmas party because she’s still invited. We’re clients and stuff of Hixon Zuercher, so we go to the Christmas party and I just catch up with Adam and Tony, the partners of the firm at the time… The only partners of the firm at that time. Josh and everyone. And I started telling Jenna, I was like, “Wow, that’s a really cool company. Those are really great guys who run it and own it. And I could see myself working there someday.” So she says, well, hey, why don’t you just shoot them an email? And so I did. So I sent Adam and Tony an email, and they got back to me and said, “Hey, let’s get together and talk about what this may look like. Let’s grab a beer or whatever.” So we went to Logan’s and we sat down and talked about what that may look like. And at that point, they were looking to hire their first research analyst. They had never had one at that point.

And so they presented that and I was super interested in it, and I was just really excited. So I started in January 2018 as our first research analyst, and it has been a wild ride since then in the markets, obviously. So it’s like you have to learn trial by fire the whole time. Been a couple bear markets and a lot of uncertainty. But it’s been fun. I’ve learned a lot. And how my role has changed over time is really, I’ve gotten a lot more in-depth understanding of how the markets and the economy work together. I know a little bit more about what to look for in a company. We’ve obviously looked and evaluated a lot of companies over the years and what works and what doesn’t work and what we’re looking for in our investments. So I’ve definitely fine-tuned that. As well as, you know, just get a lot more technologically savvy with your tools at your disposal over time. So one of the tools that we use here in-house is Bloomberg. So we have two Bloomberg terminals. And you remember probably seeing my crazy screens and stuff like that.

Maddy Miller:

Yes. Oh, I remember.

Austin Wilson:

That is the state of the art financial data provider of the known free world. And it was very intimidating to learn when I just started and now I’ve been doing it for over five years, and I know exactly what to do really quickly and get the data I want. It really helps our investment committee and our asset management team in general make some really good decisions.

 

[15:04] – What’s the Best Market News Source?

 Maddy Miller:

Yeah, that’s awesome to hear. Like you just talked about a little bit as a research analyst, you have to stay up on the news and what’s happening with different companies. I’m just curious, from just an average person standpoint, what news sources do you find most helpful and least biased? Because that’s hard literacy in the media is hard. So I’m curious what your thoughts are on that.

Austin Wilson:

I try and look at the most neutral news possible because I feel like that gives us the best true facts of what’s going on. I try and also not look at hyped up stuff because I feel like a lot of financial news is dramatized pretty heavily. So one thing that I don’t put a ton of weight in all the time is like CNBC is pretty good for what it is, but I think that’s pretty dramatized as far as business news goes. I prefer Bloomberg, and that’s because we pay a lot of money for access to this data but it also is extremely in depth and I think as factual as can be, so I really enjoy that. There are other data providers we use. One of them is Morningstar’s a big one too. I feel like they do a pretty good job as well. But I would say Bloomberg’s probably my favorite.

Maddy Miller:

Yeah, your all-time top tier?

Austin Wilson:

Always.

Maddy Miller:

Love it. Is that something that, I mean, I don’t know if I’d ever actually pursue this, but if I wanted to go on Bloomberg, could I read stuff or do you have to have a subscription?

Austin Wilson:

Yes and no.

Maddy Miller:

Okay.

Austin Wilson:

You can go on Bloomberg’s website and get a ton of news, some of it for free, at least to a point. And then there’s an access for just a reader to go read the news that’s not that expensive. But then to get the full terminal experience is certainly an investment.

 

[16:43] – What Are Some of Austin’s Goals Moving Forward?

Maddy Miller:

Yeah, for sure. Okay, cool. Thanks for answering that. Another question I had was just about goal setting. So I feel like goal setting’s really important just in your personal life, in your career. I’m curious, as you think about your career in the future, what are some goals or a goal that you have that you still want to achieve?

Austin Wilson:

Absolutely. So I mean, a lot of it is, I think that over time as our asset management team grows, because right now it’s really myself and the portfolio managers. And as our team grows beyond that, I think it’d be great to be able to offer more strategies that we manage in-house for our clients. So maybe that could be a small cap strategy or an international strategy or something like that in the future. And I’m excited about something like that. I also think that it could be cool to be a portfolio manager one day and to be able to be the guy making those decisions of exactly what goes in the portfolio. So those are some things that are on my radar over time. It’s a constantly evolving team and a lot of it is market dependent on what we’re able to do over time. But it is certainly, I think, on the agenda to be doing some of this stuff in the future.

 

[17:46] – The Biggest Challenge of Austin’s Career

Maddy Miller:

Cool. All right. I have two more questions for you. The second to last one is, when you look back at your career, so we were just looking forward, what is one of the biggest challenges you faced and what got you through it?

Austin Wilson:

Yeah, we’re in it right now. Let’s say that. This current market environment for the last year and a half has been exceptionally challenging as a company who manages portfolios in-house. One of the reasons is we’ve really not, as an economy, been in this situation before. Coming out of COVID. The whole inflation thing and the Federal Reserve hiking interest rates really, really quickly. And just understanding the story behind what’s going on and then turning that into how we can make actions for our portfolios that are actually going to help us to outperform has been extremely challenging. Because just when you think you have an idea of where things are headed or you have a comfort level of what’s going on, things change quickly. And that’s something that has been certainly the case over the last couple years. And I actually think that from a asset management portfolio management, investment management standpoint, the current bear market we’re in right now is more difficult to manage than the COVID selloff that we experienced in 2020. Which was just, it bounced back so much faster and seemed a little bit easier to gain traction on which direction things were going. But right now, I think we’re currently in the most challenging part of my career.

Maddy Miller:

And what do you do to, I don’t know, stay positive, I guess?

Austin Wilson:

Yeah, I mean, it’s easy to get down in the doldrums when you look and see, I’m looking up at Bloomberg right now and the NASDAQs down 1.7%. So that’s certainly not a fun day. But I think you just have to keep a long-term perspective. And if you keep a long-term perspective, you know that this economy and this market situation is going to heal. It’s going to take time, but the best is ahead. For sure.

 

[19:42] – Austin’s Advice for Aspiring Research Analysts

Maddy Miller:

For sure. Love to hear it. So my last question is a question I ask everyone on my podcast. What advice do you have for someone wanting to pursue a career that’s similar to yours, in the financial world, or specifically as a research analyst?

Austin Wilson:

Yeah, I think be curious is definitely one, look for things that other people aren’t looking at. When you’re looking at investments, don’t always look for what’s the most popular, look for little hidden gems. I think that’s kind of fun and exciting. But I also think don’t limit yourself to, this is exactly what I’m going to be doing for the rest of my life, when you just start out. Because you don’t know that. I could’ve ended up being an accountant for the rest of my life, and I never would’ve known that if I hadn’t have tried it. But I tried it and I did great at it, and I learned that that’s not what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. Before that, I was in internal controls. I did not really care for that either. Before that, I tried another internship at a smaller Japanese firm where I was working on special projects for them in the manufacturing setting. And there were just certain things that I had tried over the years that I really, I enjoyed a lot of the people I worked with, the experiences I got, the opportunities that there were there. But I learned a lot of what I didn’t want to do forever.

And then when I did find what I want to do, which I currently think I’m doing, I’ve really just embraced it and been really content with that. So try things. Be curious. When you’re looking at investments, poke holes in things. Don’t just go with what everyone else says and don’t go what they say on TV. Try and do your own thing.

Maddy Miller:

All right. Well, I’ll remember that advice when I do your guys’ bracket, investment bracket challenge.

Austin Wilson:

Oh, that’s right.

Maddy Miller:

… challenge or whatever. I’ll remember that. Yeah, I’ll be different. I want to just shout out the fact that I won that. Did I win? Yes. I was winning for a while. And I remember that was-

Austin Wilson:

You were winning for a while.

Maddy Miller:

… but then I think I dropped off.

Austin Wilson:

I don’t think you ended up winning at the end, but yeah.

Maddy Miller:

Yes. That was such a small victory in my mind of I just chose things so randomly and then I was winning for a little bit.

Austin Wilson:

Well, you wait till this year, you might still pull it off.

Maddy Miller:

Yeah. If I take your advice, maybe. That’s right. That’s right. Perfect. Well, thank you Austin, so much for, like I said, this collaboration is so fun, but just allowing people to hear more of your story and your advice and the challenges you’ve gone through so people can learn from it.

Austin Wilson:

Yeah. Well, thanks for having me. I’m excited that we were able to do this, and hopefully we’ll be able to collab it again in the future.

Maddy Miller:

I hope so.

Josh Robb:

All right. Well guys, thanks for listening to both of these episodes. We really appreciate you joining us on this collaboration. So there’s a couple ways you connect with both of us.

Austin, why don’t you tell everybody how they can connect with Maddy?

Austin Wilson:

Yeah, absolutely. We would love it if they went to maddymiller.co. Check out her website, also follow her on Instagram @TheMaddyMillerShow and like and subscribe, leave a positive view because I’m sure that you loved these episodes. She just is a gem and we love working with her.

Maddy Miller:

Wow, that was so nice. Thank you so much for that shout out. And I of course, want to shout out my very own favorite podcast because it is truly the roots of all of my podcast skills. The Invested Dads Podcast. So you can visit theinvesteddads.com where you’ll find all of their episodes plus a really helpful transcript and show notes to accommodate each episode.

Plus, you should follow and subscribe wherever you listen to your podcast. And if you enjoy their episodes, which most people do, you should leave them a review. Plus, if you like timely updates on all their episodes, follow them on social media and subscribe to their weekly newsletter, which all of this that we just mentioned will be linked in the description below, so you’ll be able to find it there.

But thank you guys so much for joining The Maddy Miller show and having me join The Invested Dads.

Austin Wilson:

Yeah, thank you.

Josh Robb:

Yes, thank you so much. And until next Thursday from the Invested Dads, we’ll see you soon.

 

Thank you for listening to The Invested Dads podcast. This episode has ended, but your journey towards a better financial future doesn’t have to. Head over to theinvesteddads.com to access all the links and resources mentioned in today’s show. If you enjoyed this episode and we had a positive impact on your life, leave us a review. Click subscribe and don’t miss the next episode.

Josh Robb and Austin Wilson Work for Hixon Zuercher Capital Management. All opinions expressed by Josh, Austin or any podcast guest are solely their own opinions and do not reflect the opinions of Hixon Zuercher Capital Management. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon for investment decisions. Clients of Hixon Zuercher Capital Management may maintain positions in the securities discussed in this podcast.

There is no guarantee that the statements, opinions, or forecast provided herein will prove to be correct. Past performance may not be indicative of future results. Indices are not available for direct investment. Any investor who attempts to mimic the performance of an index would incur fees and expenses which would reduce returns. Securities investing involves risk, including the potential for loss of principle. There is no assurance that any investment plan or strategy will be successful.