What is the process in use in recruiting financial planning staff?

The best way to find new planners is to look for young people who are well qualified and part the way through a CFP designation.

We might also appoint a paraplanner to work under the guidance of a senior adviser and progress until they became a consultant in their own right. This process could be two to three years.

Planners could also start off in a support role and these would be undergraduates who work for a year throughout their tertiary course. Ideally it would be a DFP type course or otherwise a finance or business course.

I think it can be difficult to find financial planners. It's more difficult for an older person, who for example might have a banking and finance background, to break in. Although they might be very qualified they don't have the experience in the financial planning industry.

We would choose to go for a younger person who is energetic and we can develop them in our environment and with our compliance standards.

Neil McKissock

Co-principal

Godfrey Pembroke, Doncaster, Vic

Because of the size of our company we look for quality rather than quantity. If we were looking for a financial planning we would usually go on referrals from our existing financial planners. I noticed the other day in the paper that one of the fund managers had an advertisement for 20 advisers, that is not what we would do.

We have about 40 planners on board and we speak to those people who work for us and see if they know anyone and we go on word of mouth.

There is a separate paraplanner group and we try and recruit those people internally. We look for people in the compnay who show an interest in a planning career and have the aptitude for the job. From paraplanning they can move in to financial planning.

We have in the past placed advertisements but we always advertise internally and prefer to appoint someone that way.

If we were to place an advertisement for a financial planner we would be looking for a person with two to three years experience and someone who is well advanced in their DFP studies, particularly in superannuation.

In the past we haven't had much problem with responses, I think people see NRMA as a good company to work for in general.

Mark Danckert

Special Channel Operating Manager

NRMA Financial Planning

I have taken a policy of recruiting people who are untrained, but have a degree in an appropriate discipline and are interested in the industry and willing to take on DFP training.

I currently have two planners going through this process, one who works full time and is doing the DFP part time and another who is doing the DFP full time and works part time.

I consider an appropriate discipline to be something like business, finance, economics, commerce, or teaching.

This system works better for me because the way I train may be different to others. For one thing I don't use commercial software, I have developed my own so that puts the business on a different platform immediately.

My processes are specific and have been developed over a long time. The planners have a broader role and a lot of the business is focused on existing clients.

It is easier to bring in people and train them, rather than having to undo set ways of doing things that people may already have.

Leonie Henry

Principal

Henry & Co

The industry has changed a lot in regards to recruiting. One way to find new financial planners is by doing service work in the industry. I am in the position of lecturing for the FPA so there is a lot of opportunity to come into contact with people who are interested. Being active in the market place and meeting people is the way and I wouldn't really think about advertising.

One issue these days is the qualifications needed. What we are seeing for the first time is graduates coming out of university with a bachelor degree in financial planning. Of course they still have to do two or three years for the DFP designation.

Given this I think the business is still very much a people business, even though it is being turned into an academic business.

I have found that a lot of people are actually writing in looking for work. As the industry grows there are people moving over into financial planning from other careers, plus the merging of some sectors for example insurance and financial planning.

For me recruiting is about succession planning and training. I am quite lucky because my son is about to join the group.

David Holloway

Principal

David Holloway & Associates