By Kevin Taylor, Certified Investment Management Analyst (CIMA®) and Accidental Pollinator Advocate

Most investment analysts spend their weekends deep in spreadsheets or debating macro trends over coffee. And sure, I love a good yield curve as much as the next person. But this spring, I found myself in a much different setting: ankle-deep in native grass, planting wildflowers under a blue Colorado sky, with bees buzzing nearby.

No, this isn’t some kind of mid-career identity crisis. It’s part of Nature with Neighbors, a pollinator habitat restoration project I helped launch through the Erie Rotary Club. You can check it out here. 

What started as a few shovels and a collection of juvenile but important plants has grown into a community-wide initiative focused on ecological renewal, and unexpectedly, it’s taught me more about investing than any market cycle ever has.

Let me explain.

Pollinators Are the Original Asset Managers

Pollinators—bees, butterflies, hummingbirds, moths, beetles, and bats—aren’t just charming signs of spring. They’re the invisible infrastructure that sustains global agriculture and natural ecosystems. In fact, more than 75% of flowering plants and over 30% of the world’s food crops depend on animal pollinators.

They don’t extract value—they amplify it. A single honeybee colony can pollinate millions of flowers in a day. Native bees like the mason and leafcutter, often unsung heroes, are even more efficient at certain crops. These creatures quietly fuel reproduction, resilience, and diversity in ways that are easy to overlook—until they’re gone. Then you see just how essential they were to everything else.

Sound familiar?

Because in the world of finance, when you lose diversity, long-term thinking, and systems of support, everything starts to unravel there, too.

The Business of Biodiversity

The parallels are uncanny. Pollinators move through the system, enabling productivity in quiet, consistent ways. Financial firms should work the same way.

When we invest in communities through education, time, and environmental stewardship, we’re not just building goodwill. We’re fertilizing a more sustainable economy. And the return on that investment? Trust. Stability. Legacy. 

You won’t see those on a Bloomberg terminal, but they show up every day in client loyalty, team cohesion, and public trust.

From Seedlings to Stewardship

This year, I had the joy of passing the Nature with Neighbors project to two fellow Rotarians, who, like the pollinators we aim to support, took root and made it perennial. They’ve created a culture of care that will bloom well beyond me. The habitat is thriving—and so are the people around it.

The wildflowers we planted aren’t just beautiful; they’re functional. Native plants provide protein-rich pollen and nectar suited to our local climate, and their staggered blooming seasons ensure pollinators have food sources from spring through fall. The more diverse the flowers, the more resilient the pollinator populations. The more resilient the pollinators, the stronger the entire ecosystem.

The same is true for any thriving business. Diversity, care, and long-term stewardship create the conditions for lasting impact.

Doing Well by Doing Good (…and Getting a Little Sweaty and Dirty)

I’ve always believed that building a great financial firm is about more than outperforming a benchmark. Yes—performance matters. Competence matters. Strategy matters.

But none of it means much if it isn’t grounded in something bigger:

Values. Integrity. Service. Stewardship.

To me, truly successful firms don’t just manage capital—they align it with purpose. They don’t just optimize for returns—they optimize for impact. And they don’t just show up at bi-annual reviews—they show up at local events, in school gymnasiums, on town committees, and, yes, in wildflower meadows with shovels in hand.

Because finance isn’t just about numbers—it’s about people. It’s about neighborhoods. It’s about the future we’re all planting together.

So yes, at our firm, we will absolutely continue doing what we do best:

• Helping families plan for retirement
• Minimizing taxes
• Building generational wealth
• Managing portfolios with care and insight

But I’ll also keep getting my hands dirty—literally and figuratively. Because some of the most enduring lessons about growth, stewardship, and resilience don’t come from Wall Street.

They come from wildflower meadows.
From honeybee hives.
From watching ecosystems thrive when we choose to care for them.

That’s not just a personal philosophy. It’s a business strategy.
And it’s one I believe more firms should embrace.

A Portfolio of Pollination

So what does this really have to do with finance?

Everything.

At its heart, a financial firm isn’t just a collection of accounts and allocations. It’s a living system. At our firm, we now manage over $80 million in stocks, bonds, and real estate. We’ve become an integral part of several business retirement plans. And we’re proud to serve 110 households and more than 200 individual clients, each with their own needs, goals, and dreams.

But our success didn’t come from chasing the latest trend. It came from building an ecosystem.

Our team members are like diverse species in a meadow—each bringing unique skills and perspectives. Our clients are the flowering plants, nurtured through personalized planning and thoughtful guidance. Our leadership provides the sunlight and soil, creating a foundation where the whole system can thrive.

And our culture? That’s the pollination—the invisible but essential work that connects us all. The cross-pollination of ideas, encouragement, collaboration, and service. It’s the community events, the mentoring, the unexpected notes of gratitude. These are the nutrients of a healthy business.

When you see a meadow in full bloom, you don’t single out one flower. You admire the system that allowed it all to grow. That’s the kind of firm I want to keep building. That’s the kind of wealth I want to help people grow—not just financial, but relational, environmental, and human.

Because in the end, the best investments are the ones that keep blooming long after we’re gone.