Ten BentOak Capital alumni share how Texas Tech shaped their careers and why they keep investing in the next class of Red Raiders
Every fall, alumni and employers come back to the Texas Tech campus for Opportunity Days, the School of Financial Planning's three-day recruiting event. Employers interview students, meet them at speed networking sessions, and celebrate them at the Awards Banquet. Students get workshops, panels, and face time with the professionals who might hire them.
This year's event, held Sept. 23-25, carried extra weight. It marked the school's 40th anniversary, a chance to honor the history and traditions that built the program while looking ahead to the next generation of financial planners.
Before students walked into those interviews, BentOak Capital made sure they were ready. The firm hosted a professionalism training for financial planning students ahead of the event, and the feedback was strong. Students who attended stood out to employers.
It's a natural fit for BentOak. The firm has about 25 people, with team members in Weatherford, Fort Worth, Lubbock, and Houston, and its Chief Executive Officer, Brandon Garrett, says they are "overwhelmingly Red Raiders." We asked 10 of them how Texas Tech shaped their careers. Their answers keep circling back to the same professors, the same network, and the same piece of advice: relationships matter.
Brandon Garrett
Brandon Garrett , CFP®, earned his bachelor's degree in Personal Financial Planning
in 2010 and went home to Weatherford to join his father's firm, then called Snow Garrett
Wealth Management. He started at the bottom.
"Phones, faxes, paperwork, and plenty of jobs no one else wanted," he said. "It was not glamorous, but it taught me how the business actually works."
He moved into client work early, became president and chief investment officer, helped lead the 2020 rebrand to BentOak Capital and became CEO a few years ago.
His defining Texas Tech moment came from the late Robert Barnhill, known as the toughest professor in the program. At the end of the semester, Barnhill handed Garrett a note with his grade and "great performance!" written underneath, then shook his hand. That note is framed in Garrett's office today.
"For him, it was probably just another day," Garrett said. "For me, it was the day I realized I could not only handle difficult challenges, I could excel in them."
Ask what he's most proud of, and he doesn't hesitate: "The team. Without question."
Hayden Hill
Hayden Hill, CFP®'s career started at Opportunity Days. In spring 2016, he interviewed
at the event with Garrett and his wife, Audra.
"It was then I knew I wanted to come work for their family business in Weatherford," Hill said.
He grew up in a small town and knew Weatherford was a better fit for him than Dallas or Houston. He earned his bachelor's degree in 2016, finished his internship, and got a full-time offer that fall. Ten years later, he's a wealth advisor in the Weatherford office.
He credits Vickie Hampton, who taught his Introduction to Personal Financial Planning course, with showing him what a career in the profession could look like. Chris Browning and Mitzi Lauderdale followed by pushing him out of his comfort zone.
"Growth doesn't happen in your comfort zone, only outside of it," he said.
Today, he's most proud of giving back, whether that means mentoring younger advisors, students or kids in the community. He's already paid it forward at least once. He's the reason Madison Wallace interned at BentOak.
Madison Wallace
Madison Wallace, CFP®, grew up around the profession, with six financial advisors
in her family. At Texas Tech, she took Introduction to Financial Planning a year early
and found Hill, a family friend from her hometown's rival school, sitting right in
front of her. A year ahead in the program, he encouraged her to apply for a BentOak
internship.
Near graduation, she had a choice to make: join her father's practice or forge her own path at BentOak. She walked into Chris Browning's office hours, and he spent more than an hour helping her think it through.
"I remain incredibly thankful for his service as an educator and mentor, especially during such a pivotal moment in my life," she said. "I am also very fortunate to now be able to call him a colleague."
Wallace earned her bachelor's degree in 2017 and has gone from intern to client service associate, paraplanner, and wealth advisor in Fort Worth. She now manages BentOak's internship and externship programs.
Her advice to students is simple. "You do not start building your professional network after graduation," she said. "You are building it now."
Chris Browning
Chris Browning, CFP®, has spent his career connecting what students learn in the classroom with what financial planners do every day. He earned his doctorate in Personal Financial Planning at Texas Tech in 2013 and now teaches in the School of Financial Planning. He also serves as a wealth consultant in BentOak Capital’s Lubbock office.
For Browning, those two roles naturally fit together. Teaching allows him to share his experience with students, while his professional work at BentOak keeps him connected to the day-to-day realities of serving families and individuals.
“Being part of the firm has given me opportunities to apply my education in practice and bring real-world perspective back into the classroom,” he said.
Some of those ties started in his office hours, where conversations with students such as Wallace and Hill sometimes continued beyond graduation into shared work in the financial planning profession.
Students know Browning for encouraging curiosity, preparation, and a willingness to keep learning. Those same values guide his work in financial planning, where listening well and asking thoughtful questions are just as important as technical knowledge.
“I love applying what I teach at the firm and bringing practical experience into the classroom,” he said.
His advice to students is simple: “Your education has just begun. Stay curious and always be willing to learn and lend a helping hand.”
Tanner Castle
Tanner Castle, CFP®, graduated alongside Wallace in 2017 and started his career at
Lee Financial in Dallas. In 2021, he moved back to Lubbock to be close to family and
kept working remotely.
Two years later, Wallace called. BentOak wanted him in its Lubbock office to work with AJ Bunn and serve as his mentor. Castle already knew Bunn, Hill and Garrett.
"I knew instantly that I would be a great fit and would enjoy working here," he said. "It was the best decision I've made in my career."
Like Garrett, he remembers Barnhill. His Advanced Tax Planning class sparked Castle's interest in tax planning, which remains a major part of his work as a wealth advisor.
"It was the toughest class I will ever take, but getting an A in that class was one of the most rewarding experiences of my time at Texas Tech," he said.
His advice to students is to find a culture fit first. "Your day-to-day will be so rewarding if you actually like the people you are spending your days with," he said.
AJ Bunn
AJ Bunn, CFP®, grew up in San Diego, so few would have predicted he'd put down roots
in Lubbock. His drive took shape at his first Opportunity Days banquet, listening
to Vickie Hampton recognize Texas Tech students who had competed nationally.
In 2020, he got his own shot. Bunn, Kenzie (Arrott) Hall and Rob Tuckfield prepared over Zoom through the COVID-19 shutdown and won the FPA Financial Planning Challenge virtually, taking first in the plan, the presentation and overall.
That summer, as a BentOak intern, he sat in on a meeting where leadership laid out a plan to grow into a $1 billion firm. There wasn't a full-time job waiting. In his last week in Weatherford, he told Garrett that if BentOak wanted someone to build something in Lubbock, he wanted to be that person. A couple of weeks later, he got the call.
Bunn earned his bachelor's degree in 2020 and is now a wealth advisor who helps lead the firm's retirement plan division.
"The Texas Tech Personal Financial Planning network is special," he said. "It is filled with people who will ride for you, but there is a responsibility that comes with that. You have to ride for the brand, too."
Laura Werner
Laura Werner, CFP®'s BentOak career started more than a year before graduation. She
joined as an intern in the Lubbock office in January 2022, split that summer between
Weatherford and Fort Worth, then finished in Lubbock.
After earning her bachelor's degree in 2023, she moved to Fort Worth as a paraplanner. She studied for the CFP® exam while sitting alongside experienced advisors as they prepared for meetings and built financial plans. She became a wealth advisor in May 2024.
As a girl from West Texas moving to Fort Worth without family nearby, she expected the transition to be tough. It wasn't.
"Returning to BentOak Capital felt like coming back to a place I already knew, with people who had already invested in me and made me feel supported," she said.
Werner describes herself as naturally reserved, and she's proudest of how much she's grown in connecting with clients. Her advice borrows a line her colleagues gave her: "Be a sponge."
"Some of the most valuable learning moments come from asking small questions, observing how others communicate, and staying open to feedback," she said.
Michael Cochran
Michael Cochran, CFP®, took the long road to BentOak. After earning his bachelor's
degree in 2006, he worked at a trust company, a regional bank, and one of the largest
financial institutions in the country.
"Having seen many different sides of the business and gained invaluable experience along the way, the opportunity with BentOak Capital arose, and it was exactly where I saw myself building a long-term career," he said.
What sold him was the culture, the caliber of his colleagues, and the chance to work with clients in niches he cares about. Today, he's BentOak's chief investment officer, based in Fort Worth.
His interest in investments started at Texas Tech in David Cordell's Asset Management II and III courses, which gave him a base he's built on ever since. Now he delivers comprehensive advice to a specific niche of clients.
"It doesn't feel like work," he said.
His advice to students is practical. Find a podcast, book or YouTube channel that helps you professionally, he said, and keep at it. "Use your time efficiently (you have more than you think)."
Nathan Harness
Nathan Harness, CFP®, has spent his career helping shape the next generation of financial planners.
After earning his doctorate in 2007, Harness built a career in higher education, developing university financial planning programs and mentoring students entering the profession. He credits Texas Tech with giving him both the foundation and the confidence to build.
“Texas Tech didn’t just give me an education,” he said. “They taught me to be an entrepreneur, someone who could build something with it.”
For Harness, financial planning has always been more than technical expertise. While he was a student in Lubbock, his brother died, and the response from his professors and colleagues left a lasting impression.
“It showed me the human side of financial planning and took me deeper into this discipline, because financial planning isn’t just technical,” he said. “It’s relational.”
That perspective followed him throughout his academic career and ultimately drew him toward working more directly with families. A longtime friendship with Garrett later connected him with BentOak, where he now serves as a Wealth Consultant in Houston.
Today, Harness brings together his experience as an educator, program builder, and financial planning professional, carrying forward the same relational approach that first shaped him at Texas Tech.
Jason McGarraugh
Jason McGarraugh, CFP®, earned his master's degree in December 2002. Two and a half
weeks later, he was on a plane to Singapore for a job with a financial education company,
thanks to a lead from one of his professors. It didn't last, but it made for a pretty
good semester abroad.
He later spent nearly a decade working alongside Houston advisor Wynette Stuntz, a connection Texas Tech professor Deena Katz pushed him to make, and bought her practice when she retired in 2015. In 2023, while thinking about the next 20 years of that practice, he called Garrett.
"McGarraugh, two weeks ago I almost called you," Garrett told him. McGarraugh joined BentOak as a wealth advisor in Houston in January 2024.
At Opportunity Days, he passes along advice he first heard from former professor Bill Gustafson. He walks up to tables full of students who already know each other and asks how many of them could hire the person sitting next to them.
"No hands," he said. "Then I tell them, 'Get up.'"
It's the same lesson behind this year's training. "The next time you walk into a room full of people you don't know, don't sit with your friends," McGarraugh said. "Go find the table that makes you a little uncomfortable."