Complex subject, obviously. This stuff is kind of a hobby of mine. One of the things I do is to differentiate "Investment Advisor" from "Financial Advisor." The former concentrate strictly on investments; often they are employed by a brokerage house. Usually they call themselves Financial Advisors or Financial Planners but they are not -- by my definition. A true financial advisor is involved with the breadth of clients' financial lives, saving for college (often via 529 plans), saving for retirement, planning for retirement, health care strategies prior to Medicare age, Social Security strategies, etc. You get the idea.
What you pay and what you get via a 401(k) can vary quite a bit. Here I'll talk about the kind of issues that arise when you consider hiring someone privately to help you with your finances. In general I would advise looking for a true Financial Advisor. Investment advice in general is not worth the money, even if it is free.
The industry separates advisors into two piles in a different way. "Fee-Only" advisors are not paid commissions on products that they sell. Most commonly they charge a fee based on portfolio assets (Assets Under Management aka AUM). Licensing usually shows Series 65 or Series 66 "Registered Investment Advisor," but some advisors inherit the RIA status of their RIA employers. Commission-based advisors are commonly licensed to only sell insurance or are Series 7 licensed broker sales representatives. RIAs are legally fiduciaries (
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/f/fiduciary.asp) and must act in their clients' best interests. Commission based advisors are only limited to "suitable" investments, which may be high-cost funds or other financial products.
Stay completely away from commission-based people; ask for a letter documenting that the person you're working with has a fiduciary responsibility to you. ALWAYS (always) check a potential advisor at
https://brokercheck.finra.org/
RIA fees vary with the size of the portfolio. At $1M you should pay no more than 1%, maybe a little less. I am on the investment committee of a small nonprofit and our RIA is charging about 0.6% on $5M. That is a tad high IMO but we are kind of high maintenance because of complex fund structure and flow. At the low end, Vanguard charges as little as 0.3% but that is only for investment advice, not comprehensive financial advice. (Fees are sometimes referred to in terms of "basis points," 1/100th of one percent. So Vanguard's fee would be 30bps.)
Finally, there are advisors who charge hourly or per-job rates. These somewhat-rare birds are also referred to as "fee only," hence there can be confusion.
https://www.garrettplanningnetwork.com/ seems to have a good reputation as a way to find fee-for-services advisors but I have no personal experience.
"Certified Financial Planners" (aka CFP) is kind of a mixed bag. CFP certificates are issued by a private nonprofit corporation where the president makes over $1M/year. The more CFPs he generates, the more dues money he collects. So, for example, a college degree is required but Mortuary Science is just fine. Economists call this an "agency problem." Despite what some will tell you, possession of a CFP does
not make a person a fiduciary. All that said, a CFP is a useful credential but it is not magic. Caveat emptor.
There is a half-century of data showing that professional investment managers do not add value to a portfolio versus a passive portfolio benchmark. Here are some reading recommendations to introduce you to that subject: "
If You Can" by William Bernstein
https://www.etf.com/docs/IfYouCan.pdf (free 16 page download), "
The Coffee House Investor" by Bill Schultheis
https://www.coffeehouseinvestor.com/ (This is Bill's first book; read it before reading his second one.), and "
The Bogleheads Guide to Investing" by Taylor Larimore et al
https://www.amazon.com/Bogleheads-Guide-Investing-Taylor-Larimore/dp/0470067365 These three are pretty easy going. A step up is "
Winning the Loser's Game" by Charles Ellis; make sure to get the May 2021 edition.