Rob Francais Named 2026 Wealthies CEO of the Year Finalist

The recognition reflects a long-term vision for Aspiriant: building an independent, 100% employee-owned wealth management firm designed to endure for generations.

We’re incredibly proud to share that Aspiriant CEO, Co-Founder and Partner Rob Francais has been named a finalist for the 2026 Wealthies CEO of the Year among Individual RIA Firm Leaders with $25 billion or less in assets under management (AUM).

For more than 25 years, Rob has helped build Aspiriant around a long-term vision for independence and employee ownership to best serve clients, while creating opportunities for future generations of employees to own and lead the firm.

Those ideas are also at the heart of the work highlighted in this year’s nomination, from expanding employee ownership and developing future leaders within Aspiriant to bringing together employee-owned firms across the wealth management industry.

“I’m honored by this recognition, but what I’m most proud of is what we’ve built together,” Rob said. “Seeing people grow their careers here, become owners and step into leadership roles is incredibly meaningful to me. That’s how I know Aspiriant will keep growing and evolving long beyond any one of us, with the ultimate goal of serving clients for generations.”

Building a 100% employee-owned wealth management firm

Aspiriant was built around the belief that a wealth management firm can serve both the people who entrust it with their financial lives and the people responsible for serving them.

100% Employee ownership is central to that idea.

Today, Aspiriant is 100% employee-owned, with more than one-third of our employees also serving as owners of the firm. Ownership is about more than who holds shares. It gives the people building Aspiriant a meaningful stake in its future and creates a culture where responsibility, opportunity and long-term success are shared.

It has also institutionalized firm ownership for each generation of advisors and leaders, whereby each generation is thought of as a “temporary steward” of the ideals Aspiriant represents in service of our client families. At Aspiriant, we are well beyond the founder generation, and our owners are almost all second, third and fourth generations owners.

That continuity matters in wealth management. Relationships can span decades and generations. Building a firm that can develop future leaders and transition ownership over time is one way Aspiriant seeks to bring a similarly long horizon to the organization itself.

Employee ownership also supports the firm’s independence. As consolidation and outside investment like private equity continue to reshape wealth management, Aspiriant’s structure allows decisions about our future to remain with the people who work within the business and serve our clients. This creates strong alignment between clients, employees and owners and supports our ability to put our fiduciary responsibility to clients at the center of the decisions we make.

Putting employee ownership into practice

An employee-owned firm needs more than an ownership structure. It needs people who see a future for themselves within it and leaders prepared to carry the organization forward.

Aspiriant continues to broaden participation in ownership by welcoming new partners each year, thus expanding our group of owners that now includes more than one-third of the firm’s employees.

Among the results highlighted in Rob’s 2026 Wealthies nomination, employee engagement increased from 73% to 83%, while female representation on our national leadership team grew from 14% to 66%.

Those numbers measure different things, but together they offer a view into the people side of employee ownership, such as creating opportunities to participate in the firm’s future, building an engaged team and developing a broader group of leaders prepared to take on greater responsibility.

These measures don’t tell the entire story of a firm. But they help illustrate the larger goal: creating an organization that can evolve beyond its founders while continuing to serve the people who depend on it.

Advancing employee ownership across wealth management

Across wealth management, independent firms are confronting many of the same challenges around ownership, succession and consolidation. What happens when founders are ready to step back? How can ownership transition to a new generation? And can firms grow without giving up their independence?

Those shared questions helped inspire the Employee Ownership Summits, where Rob brings together leaders from 100% wealth management firms to candidly discuss growth, succession and what it takes to scale while remaining independent. Those conversations are also continuing through the Employee Ownership Alliance, a group of independent firms exploring how employee ownership can become a more enduring and scalable model within wealth management.

As Family Wealth Report explored in its coverage of the second Summit, participating firms are navigating many of the same pressures around growth, succession and independence as they consider what comes next.

The conversation has also reached beyond the U.S., including an international delegation that Aspiriant hosted for industry leaders interested in learning more about the employee-ownership model and its potential to support long-term independence.

Employee ownership isn’t the right model for every firm. But as the industry considers different approaches to succession, these conversations are helping keep it among the options for firms seeking to remain independent.

Rethinking succession as a people strategy

For Rob, these industry conversations connect to a larger question about succession. As he has written, succession doesn’t have to begin with a transaction. It can begin with questions about who will serve clients next, who will lead the organization and how the next generation can have a meaningful stake in what they’re being asked to build.

Building for the next generation

More than 25 years into Aspiriant’s story, much has changed. The firm has grown from its beginnings as a startup into a national wealth management organization serving more than 2,300 individuals, families and institutions, supported by a team of more than 250 employees.

But the longer-term goal remains remarkably consistent: Build a firm capable of continuing beyond the people who started it. For a business model designed to serve families across generations, that means preparing for generations of leadership within Aspiriant, too. Developing future owners and leaders is an important part of carrying the firm forward while continuing to evolve alongside the needs of the people we serve.

Rob Francais CPA Chief Executive Officer, Co-Founder Member of Board of Directors Partner

“The families and individuals we serve think in generations. The firms serving them should, too.”

Explore more on employee ownership and succession

Rob’s recognition as a 2026 Wealthies CEO of the Year finalist gives us an opportunity to celebrate his leadership and the ideas at the heart of Aspiriant’s approach, such as our employee ownership, independence and thoughtful succession. Those ideas continue to shape how we think about the firm we’re building and the industry we hope to help strengthen.

Explore Aspiriant’s 100% employee-owned model

Read Rob’s perspective on building firms designed to outlast their founders