Central to a wealth management plan is the accumulation of assets to fund future goals like a comfortable retirement, a good education for your kids or some other goal.  However, accumulation is not only about adding to your investments regularly.  Rather, it includes earning, spending and saving money.

Determining the sustainability of your current cash flow is the first step of accumulation planning.  If you don't tell your money where to go, you'll ask where it went later.  Good planning will help you direct your money toward your goals, i.e. a comfortable retirement, a college education for your children or grandchildren, a nice vacation, home improvements, etc.

Once the cashflows for your household are accounted for, an investment plan tailored to your goals, values and tolerance for risk is created.  Depending on how much you have in investment assets now and how much you are contributing on a regular basis will determine what investments are used.  A typical plan should involve a broadly diversified portfolio using mutual funds, exchange traded funds or a professional manager utilizing individual securities.

Within the investment selection process your values should be taken into consideration.  There are a broad spectrum of investments that avoid investing in companies engaging in activities you don't want to profit from. (i.e. firearms, poor environmental records, gambling)  There are other investments that try to encourage and allow you to profit from certain activities you deem as good.  (i.e. alternative energy, sustainable practives, good treatment of employees)  There are also investment programs that allow you to exclude any specific company for your portfolio because you would rather not own a certain company or you already own a large amount of that company.