• Setting investment goals: This involves understanding a client's risk tolerance, time horizon, and financial objectives (e.g., retirement planning, saving for a down payment).

• Developing an investment strategy: Based on the client's goals, an appropriate strategy is formulated, which might involve active trading (seeking to beat market benchmarks) or passive indexing (aiming to match market performance), according to EBSCO.

• Asset allocation: Investment managers diversify assets across different classes like stocks, bonds, real estate, commodities, and other securities to manage risk and seek to optimize returns.

• Security selection: This involves choosing specific stocks, bonds, or other investments based on research and analysis.

• Portfolio monitoring and rebalancing: Regularly tracking investment performance, market conditions, and making adjustments to the portfolio as needed to stay aligned with the client's objectives.

• Risk management: Identifying, assessing, and mitigating risks associated with investments through strategies like diversification, hedging, and stress testing.

• Tax planning: Minimizing the tax burden on investment earnings and capital gains.

• Performance reporting: Providing clients with regular updates and statements detailing their portfolio's performance. 

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Investing involves risk, including the potential loss of principal. No investment strategy can guarantee a profit or protect against loss in periods of declining values. There is no guarantee that a diversified portfolio will enhance overall returns or outperform a non-diversified portfolio. Diversification does not protect against market risk.

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Asset allocation does not ensure a profit or protect against a loss.

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Rebalancing a portfolio may cause investors to incur tax liabilities and/or transaction costs and does not assure a profit or protect against a loss.