Online events packed with the most relevant, engaging and actionable ideas for you and your business.
Five great
speakers
Over four
events
All delivered
online
Focusing on
what matters
Hosted by Lee Robertson from Octo Members
We were delighted to be joined by a guest host for this series, the wonderful Lee Robertson, the driving force behind Octo Members and someone who is just as passionate about supporting the advice industry as we are.
Lee made an appearance each week, getting into discussion with our speakers about their topics and putting your questions to them.
Illuminate live is accredited by the CII, doesn't have any product push from Nucleus, or anybody else, and is entirely focused on improving you and your business.
Kathryn Knowles
Cura Financial Services
Knowing when to take a different approach with clients
Kathryn discussed ways in which to spot a vulnerable client situation and how to best support them. She outlined soft skills and terminology to use, as well as detailing how to build a vulnerable client policy and monitoring system.
By the end of this online session you should be able to:
Identify key factors that will indicate that a client is in a
vulnerable situation.Summarise the appropriate soft skills and terminology to use with vulnerable clients.
Describe how to embed a vulnerable client policy into your organisation.
Understand appropriate signposting services to provide clients and yourself additional support, following a difficult conversation.
Kathryn is Managing Director at Cura Financial Services, a specialist protection insurance broker known for insuring the uninsurable. Spurred on by her own experience of facing barriers to insurance, she has built a company dedicated to improving access to insurance. She is known for her empathetic approach to client engagement. Kathryn helps advisers to understand how to support their clients and themselves, during difficult conversations.
Thursday 13 May, 1pm - 2pm
Richard Essex, Grayside and
Jeannie Boyle, EQ Investors
How to get closer to your clients through sustainable investing
ESG and sustainable investing are clearly hot topics right now. This is the case for planners and their clients, but also on the global stage.
Jeannie and Richard, both experts in the field of sustainable investing, discussed what clients want when it comes to investing for good, the opportunities for advisers in this space and how to broach the sustainability conversation with clients.
By the end of this online session you should be able to:
Explain the difference between the terms ESG, sustainable investing and impact investing.
Be confident describing the opportunities presented by each.
Identify the investing themes that are engaging for clients.
Explore how to best approach client conversations around sustainable investing.
Richard has been an Independent Financial Adviser for Grayside Financial Services for over 20 years. He specialises in providing advice and education for individuals who wish to invest, and at the same time, make a positive contribution to the wider environment
Richard has been a leading light in helping to promote sustainable investment, having previously sat on the Steering Committee of the Ethical Investment Association.
Richard is also the author of ‘Invest Feelgood Make a Difference’ a book aimed at providing a layman’s guide to sustainable investing.
Outside of the financial world he is also Chair of the Surrey Climate Commission.
Jeannie has been working in financial services for over 14 years. She joined EQ in 2008 as a Technical Consultant and since 2010 has been a Director of the firm.
When providing advice, Jeannie focuses on clear communication, so that her clients fully understand the facts, options and recommended solutions, enabling them to make well-informed decisions. As a Director, Jeannie concentrates her efforts on ensuring the advice provided across EQ is of an exceptional standard, putting in place processes and systems to ensure our clients remain at the heart of our business.
Jeannie is a Chartered Financial Planner, a Fellow of the Personal Finance Society and in 2015 won Money Management’s Ethical Financial Planner of the Year Award. She appears regularly in national and trade media outlets discussing personal finance issues.
Outside of work, Jeannie enjoys yoga, hiking, triathlons and live music.
Phil Billingham
Perceptive Planning
The future of the financial planning profession
Financial planning is often referred to as an emerging profession, as well as a global profession. As we take stock on how far the sector has come, it's also a good time to look ahead to how the profession can best evolve for the future, and importantly, what this means for business models and practices.
In this session Phil shared the insights from our latest white paper, The Future of Financial Planning, dissected some of the challenges that lie ahead for the profession, and provided a suggested way forward for financial planning practices to be fit for the future.
By the end of this online session you should be able to:
Define a working definition of what the business model of Financial Planning consists of.
Explore how the ‘Art’ of Financial Planning may develop a greater ‘Science’ foundation.
Understand what options are open to businesses seeking to become ‘Multi Generational’.
Phil is a director at Perceptive Planning, a chartered financial planner, a chartered wealth manager and a certified financial planner. He is also the author of our latest white paper The Future of Financial Planning.
He is a past director of both the Institute of Financial Planning and the Society of Financial Advisers, and a past member of the Financial Planning Standards Board regulatory advisory panel. Alongside Shannon Currie, he is also a director of World Citizens, which specialises in cross-border financial planning.
He has served as an expert witness to the courts of England, Gibraltar and Scotland, and has been a guest lecturer at the City of London university. He also been a judge for industry awards for a number of publications.
Thursday 27 May, 1pm - 2pm
Alan Smith
Capital Asset Management
The power of sharing
client stories
In the financial planning profession we often focus on promoting the process and miss out the most important part, the human experiences that our efforts make possible, from providing client security and peace of mind to creating opportunities which can benefit whole communities and leave a lasting legacy. Alan believes that every financial planner has at least one story in them of a client experience that has had a hugely positive effect for those involved. Last year he kicked off #storiesnotspreadsheets on twitter in a call to financial planners everywhere to share their client stories with the aim of bringing them together to create a collection of tales which truly illustrate the impact that good financial planning can have.
In this session Alan gave an update on the client stories project, reflecting on some of the stories received and shared how financial planners can emphasise the good they do.
By the end of this online session you should be able to:
Explain the link between planning and client outcomes.
Communicate your own client stories and case studies to good effect
Build engagement and consumer awareness about the benefits of working with a financial planner
Alan started Capital in 2004 with a clear vision to do things differently. He wanted to challenge conventional thinking in financial services that seemed to be all about selling expensive and baffling financial products to the public to generate large commissions - but which never seemed to solve the real life issues faced by clients.
So he wanted to build a boutique business with a client-focused culture that took time to get to know our clients, listened to them, understood them and built a lifetime relationship as a true ‘trusted adviser’.
Away from the office, a young family keeps Alan on his toes with mini rugby at Regents Park Royals, alpine skiing, and travel featuring prominently in more ‘normal’ times.