Meaning, the financial planner is in business to make money too. So understand how they are compensated and make sure there's no conflict of interest.
-Do they make commission on any products/mutual funds/annuities/life insurance, etc that you sign up for? Are there alternatives that don't have those commissions?
-Do they charge a percentage of assets under management? if so, what's their incentive for growing your nest egg (as opposed to growing their income by getting new clients with big nest eggs, instead of concentrating on growing yours).
-Does your financial planner actually make the investment decisions, or is your portfolio actually managed by folks in the corporate office.
-How easy is it to move to someone new if needed (i.e. will you have to sell some mutual funds (and realize cap gains)).
Some people feel the best, simplest approach is using an hourly fee based financial planner. You pay them for a few hours of their time on a regular basis (annually? every other year?) to go over your stuff.