Bryan M. Kuderna is a Certified Financial Planner™ and the founder of Kuderna Financial Team. Named of New Jersey’s Top 10 Financial Professionals of 2021 by NJBiz, he also hosts a popular finance and business podcast—The Kuderna Podcast. He is a regular contributor to CNBC, Newsmax, Yahoo Finance, AARP, and other media. His first book, Millennial Millionaire (2016), launched Kuderna as a national speaker at colleges, hospitals, corporations, and financial instructions and paved the way for his new book, WHAT SHOULD I DO WITH MY MONEY? Economic Insights to Build Wealth Amid Chaos (McGraw Hill, 02/07/2023). Bryan has a Master of Science in Financial Services from The American College and a Bachelor of Science in Finance and Economics from The College of New Jersey. He enjoys staying active, having completed an International Ironman and marathon, practicing Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, and spending time with his wife and three children.
Early Days
With a dad working for the Army and a mom who was a paralegal, Bryan Kuderna was born into a middle class working family in Ocean Township, New Jersey.
He grew up much alike many other children, playing sports and attending public school. Kuderna attributes much of his success to his family instilling in him the mindset of,
"Nothing is earned. You have to be able to go out and get it. Work hard at whatever it is you want to do."
As a young child, his ambitious personality was able to be fine-tuned through his dedication to sports. Kuderna recalls never being the most athletic person on the team, but always being willing to work the hardest.
Despite the more or less obvious route into the military that Kuderna could've chosen, he always knew he wanted to pursue his entrepreneurial curiosities. So, even with an older brother working for the Department of Defense, Kuderna ventured out into the business world.
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His intellectual curiosity enabled him to travel south to Florida and attend business school at the University of Tampa before heading back to New Jersey and receiving two separate degrees to further his financial education.
What He's Up to Now
Currently, Kuderna lives in New Jersey with his wife and three children. He spends the majority of his work week managing clients on their way to financial success.
Most days for Kuderna begin around 6am when he awakes to partake in some leisurely reading before breakfast with his family. Kuderna joked during our conversation by saying,
"With a wife and three kids, I'm doing 45 minutes of dishes every morning [after breakfast]."
After his morning routine, Kuderna heads to the office where he'll typically make an appearance as a contributor to a news organization's story and then proceed with the rest of his day meeting clients for his financial advisory business.
On the weekends, Kuderna calls it "Bryan's time" and relaxes with his family or partakes in some of his favorite hobbies such as running, reading, or practicing Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.
View on Economics
Kuderna breaks down economics from the lens of it being "the psychology of business." By studying economics it allows people to understand consumers and why they make the decisions they make.
In his book, WHAT SHOULD I DO WITH MY MONEY? Economic Insights to Build Wealth Amid Chaos (McGraw Hill, 02/07/2023), Kuderna tries to break down wealth in term that many people may not typically think of.
"When people think of wealth they typically think of your money or your net worth."
Kuderna, instead, looks at the true etymology of the word "wealth" which comes from an Old English word "weal" which means well-being. So wealth, in Kuderna's mind is attributed more to finding a state of well-being as opposed to exorbitant amounts of money.
In describing the outlook people should have on money, he describes a quote he heard from Mark Cuban which says,
"I'm not concerned about return on money. I'm concerned about return on time."
I appreciate the sentiment here, as I strongly agree with the fact that many people often get overwhelmed and too consumed with the drive to earn lots of money. When, in reality, it's the time that money can buy you that really matters.
Kuderna goes on to say,
"We're only here on earth for a finite amount of time. So what do we get to do within that time? You know, what gives us joy, what makes us feel fulfilled? And those start to become kind of the things that define who we are."
MICE
In his book, Kuderna teaches the readers about a term called MICE, which stands for money, ideology, compromise and ego.
He coined this term from a book he read when learning about the CIA that describes how every spy needs to learn how to use MICE. The reason for this is that money, ideology, compromise and ego are the four motives that guide how people make decisions.
So when we approach our everyday lives we commonly see the M in MICE (money) as the most prominent factor. However, if we learn to effectively decipher our own decision making, we can soon determine the ways in which the remaining pillars of MICE play a role.
Kuderna speaks to this point in great detail, but summarizes by saying that if you look at every decision through the 4 lenses of MICE, you can begin to assign values to what one party of a decision wants vs the other. This becomes relevant when people realize that all of life is some sort of negotiation or compromise.
Advice for Young Adults
When asked about finding your passion, Kuderna recounts his own experiences of trying to determine which path to go down and how being an avid reader helped steer him in the right direction. From this experience stems his biggest piece of advice for young adults...read!!
Additionally, Kuderna doesn't believe that college is necessarily for everyone.
For career paths such as those related to STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math), Kuderna believes that you probably need the additional schooling that college provides to accelerate you knowledge and succeed in those fields.
However, for other skill sets whether it be business, sales, communication, law enforcement or trades, it might be exponentially quicker for your career to go directly into the workforce and not subject yourself to six-figures worth of debt on a piece of paper that might not mean much at the end of the day.
Lastly, Bryan invokes a call to action for all young adults to think early and often about what they want their life to look like when they're older, as this can help them make the right decision about if to go to college and what to study if they do.
Closing Thoughts
Bryan Kuderna is a very thoughtful individual, whose deep industry expertise and years of experience shine through in his publications.
If you want to find out more about Bryan, you can check him out on his website bryankuderna.com!
Vin
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