Concept Overview: A third portal type (or a distinct configuration mode) that mirrors the affiliate portal's grouping functionality but is purpose-built for the financial advisor relationship.

Key Features: Fund Grouping
The financial advisor should be able to organize their clients' funds into logical groupings — by household, family name, client tier, or advisory team. This mirrors the affiliate portal's grouping capability without co-opting the affiliate record type.

Separate Record Type: Rather than using the Affiliate record, CommunitySuite would introduce a Financial Advisor record (or profile type) in the CRM/contact layer. This keeps the data model clean:

1. Affiliates = supporting organizations with a formal organizational relationship to the foundation
2. Financial Advisors = professional intermediaries managing funds on behalf of donor clients

Portal Access Scope: The financial advisor portal would display:

1. All funds linked to that advisor (across households/clients)
2. Grouping by household or client name
3. Fund balances, grant history, and giving history per group
4. Grant recommendation capability (same as the fund advisor portal today)
5. Optionally: contribution/gift entry on behalf of clients

What It Would NOT Do:

1. It would not create or modify the Affiliate/Supporting Org record
2. It would not surface affiliate-specific workflows (e.g., supporting org grantmaking, affiliate fund pools)
3. The two portals remain independent — a fund can have both an affiliate relationship and a financial advisor without conflict

How It Could Be Configured: A possible setup flow in CommunitySuite would look something like:

1. Create a Financial Advisor profile on a contact record (similar to how an affiliate is created on an org record today)
2. Link funds to the financial advisor — either directly on the fund record or via a "Financial Advisor" relationship field
3. Define groupings — advisor can be given the ability to label/group their funds in the portal, or staff can pre-assign groupings (e.g., by household)
4. Send portal invitation — a dedicated portal URL or login type that renders the financial advisor view, not the fund advisor or affiliate view

Why This Matters: The affiliate portal's grouping feature is essentially being "borrowed" today by foundations that want to give financial advisors a multi-fund view. The problem is that it:

1. Pollutes the affiliate/supporting org record with non-org contacts
2. Creates reporting noise (financial advisors showing up in affiliate reports)
3. Conflates two very different relationship types

A dedicated financial advisor portal solves the relationship integrity problem while delivering the grouped, multi-fund experience that financial advisors actually need.

Posted on behalf of Community Foundation of the Ozarks