Webinar Key Takeaways
Money is one of a handful of stressors that shape daily life, and easing it can carry over to your family, your work, and your health. (04:46)
Credentials and competence are table stakes. Exceptional advisors stand out through compassion, connection, and a clear picture of what your life is meant to serve. (10:52)
One of the costliest investing mistakes is not investing at all. Uncertainty isn't the enemy; it's the reason markets offer an expected return. (24:45)
Evidence-based investing puts data ahead of stories, and ideas that don't survive testing never become funds. (28:22)
The goal is never simply lower taxes. It's higher after-tax returns, and newer fund structures give investors more ways to pursue them. (37:09)
Every dollar Bryce Skaff has in the markets sits in Dimensional funds. Investing is his life's work. And yet, when he and his wife began mapping out their future, they hired a financial advisor.
That detail, shared at our 2026 Annual Conference, says a great deal about how the people closest to the research think about money. Bryce, CFA, is Co-Head of the Global Client Group at Dimensional Fund Advisors and has spent more than 28 years at the firm. In a conversation with Leonard Golub, CFA, our President and Founder, he discussed evidence-based investing, uncertainty, and what good advice looks like from the inside. His central point may surprise anyone who expects an investment firm to lead with returns: a sound portfolio matters, but it was never the whole job.
Financial Well-Being Rarely Stays in One Place
It's tempting to treat money as its own category, separate from family, work, and health. Research on well-being suggests otherwise. When we asked Bryce to help our clients understand Dimensional, he started with purpose before scale: "What we really are is an organization that's trying to help all of you, and people all over the world, lead more fulfilling lives."
The stressors most people carry fit on a short list: family, work, physical health, and money. They tend to travel together. Someone who isn't worried about what the market will do tomorrow may show up differently at the dinner table, focus better at work, and carry less stress overall.
That's part of why you won't see Dimensional advertising during the Super Bowl or putting its name on buildings. The firm builds investment strategies and leaves financial planning, estate planning, and tax advice to independent advisory firms. "We know where our lane is," Bryce says. The goal is shared. The work is divided.
Credentials Are Only the Starting Point
Ask most people what makes a good financial advisor, and they'll point to credentials. Bryce sees those as table stakes. Honesty, integrity, competence, and designations like the CFA and CFP are necessary, but they aren't what sets an advisor apart. "I think ultimately it's the soft stuff that really helps people stand out," he says.
The Questions That Matter Most
The soft stuff starts with compassion and a real commitment to act as a fiduciary, which Bryce defines as "putting your interests ahead of ours when there's a decision to make." It also shows up in the questions an advisor asks. What experiences shaped you? What are you averse to? What does your family look like? What is all of this supposed to serve?
Those questions can seem disconnected from a financial plan. In Bryce's view, they're "undivorceable" from it. The alternative is familiar to anyone who has sat across from the wrong advisor: "How old are you? How much money do you have? Here's your portfolio." As Bryce puts it, "That's not sufficient."
Why an Insider Hired an Advisor
Which brings us back to Bryce's own story. "I didn't need help investing, but life gets complicated," he says. What he and his wife wanted was someone unbiased to guide the bigger conversations about their future, "a financial therapist, if you will."
They met with three firms, and all three were competent. The deciding factor wasn't skill. It was connection, trust, and a sense of advocacy, because choosing an advisor is a lifelong decision that can shape a plan for your children and the causes you care about.
Emotional Questions Deserve More Than Data
By Bryce's own description, Dimensional is "a very left-brained academic organization." After the 2008 financial crisis, that became a problem. Worried investors asked questions, and the firm answered with data. It didn't land. "Emotional question, logical response," Bryce says. "Those two don't talk to each other."
Dave Goetsch, a writer and executive producer of The Big Bang Theory, is a case in point. He had a hit show and every dollar in bank accounts, and he still woke up stressed about a stock market he wasn't even invested in. What helped wasn't more information. It was a different way of seeing markets: not as something to fear, but as a tool to build wealth and reach his goals.
Good advice works the same way. The numbers matter, but they tend to land only after someone has listened.
Uncertainty Is Where Returns Come From
We often say the greatest financial risk isn't what markets do to investors, but what investors do to themselves. Leonard put that idea to Bryce directly, and his answer may surprise anyone who thinks of risk as losing money in a downturn. One of the costliest mistakes, he argues, is not investing at all.
Cash left in the bank can lose purchasing power over time. Still, many people stay on the sidelines because markets feel like a casino, with someone behind the curtain and the odds stacked against them. Bryce sees it differently. Markets offer investors an expected return for supplying capital to businesses that innovate and grow, and that expected return exists precisely because the outcome is uncertain.
"There is no reward for certainty. There is only reward for uncertainty," he says. It's a central theme of Stay Calm: Learn to Embrace Uncertainty in Investing and Life, the new book from Dimensional founder David Booth.
The catch is that uncertainty doesn't make every approach a good one. Investing the wrong way can be worse than staying on the sidelines. What tends to help is a plan, broad diversification, and the discipline to stay with both.
Evidence-Based Investing Starts With Saying No
Due Diligence Runs Both Ways
Our relationship with Dimensional began in 2008 with a test. Before New Capital could use the firm's funds, two Dimensional representatives came to Leonard's office and walked him through a questionnaire. Bryce explained why the firm works that way: "We had this nasty hang-up with integrity." An advisor who wanted to use the funds because of a strong return the year before heard a simple answer: "That's no reason to use our fund."
From Crystal Balls to Data
The same discipline runs through the research. Before the 1960s, investors had little choice but to trust whoever claimed to pick winners. Researchers at the University of Chicago, Stanford, and MIT changed that by studying stock returns at scale, and David Booth later worked on the team behind the first index fund. Today, research points to factors that help explain why some groups of securities have higher expected returns than others, and Dimensional builds globally diversified funds around them.
"Stories are meaningless for us unless they're well supported by a robust foundation of evidence," Bryce says. For Leonard, the ideas that never reach the market matter just as much: "I think that's really important for us as advisors to know: that you're not going to unveil something that hasn't been thoroughly tested."
Keeping More of What You Earn
"It's never about reducing taxes. It's always about maximizing after-tax returns." Bryce said it twice for emphasis, and it's worth hearing twice. A zero tax bill that comes with a zero return isn't a good outcome.
That thinking shaped Dimensional's push for ETF share classes. The firm now offers ETF and mutual fund share classes of the same portfolio, at the same cost and with similar tax efficiency, and it led the SEC effort to make the structure possible. For a growing number of its portfolios, investors can move between the two without selling and facing a capital gains bill.
An Asset Manager, Not a Custodian
One question from the audience got to the heart of how the relationship works: why doesn't Dimensional appear on our custodian list alongside Fidelity and Schwab? Because Dimensional isn't a custodian. It doesn't hold client accounts, process trades, or print statements. It manages funds. Your accounts sit with your custodian, and we manage those custodian relationships on your behalf.
"One of the things that I love about working with Dimensional is they're an asset manager, and that's all they are, and we don't compete with them," Leonard says.
Questions About What This Means for You?
A portfolio built on evidence is a strong foundation. What you build on it depends on understanding what your money is meant to serve. If this conversation raised questions about your portfolio, your plan, or how we work with Dimensional, reach out. Clients can contact the team anytime at info@newcapitalmgmt.com or (713) 874-1444, and anyone new to the firm is welcome to schedule a consultation.
For informational purposes only. Not investment advice. Past performance is not indicative of future results. All investments involve risk, including the potential loss of principal. Advisory services offered through New Capital Management LP, a registered investment adviser.