Latest / Financial Planner Life Podcast / From Fitness to Finance: Tom Mangan's Journey to Becoming a Successful Young Financial Planner

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From Fitness to Finance: Tom Mangan's Journey to Becoming a Successful Young Financial Planner · Financial Planner Life Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: And today's guest on the Financial Planner Life podcast is Tom Mangan.
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: He is a financial planner for St James's Place.
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: He joined the academy at the age of 24 after a successful career within the fitness industry.
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: He's now 30 years old and he talks today about the trials and the tribulations of being a young financial planner and why he smashed the mold in the narrative that you can't be an advisor under the age of 30 years old.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: You're going to love this episode, Hugely inspiring Tom.
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: Thank you so much for joining me today on the Financial Planner Live podcast here at Knightsbridge at the St James's Place office.
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: How are you doing?
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, not too bad.
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: The sun's shining, we're getting some good weather and it's summer.
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: Well, apparently so, mate.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, apparently so.
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: I'm off to Dubai, as I told you, for endless summer.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: I think it's about 45 degrees out there at the moment, so this is actually quite refreshing out there.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: I wish it was like this over there right this second, but I think I'm going to sweat for about two weeks.
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I bet I wouldn't be in Leicestershire, I can tell you that much Right, brilliant.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: So you've come from Leicestershire down into London.
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: You're a St James's Place partner.
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: How long have you been here for?
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: So the business has been running for over five years now.
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: I've been part of SJP for about six About six years, excellent.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: What were you doing beforehand?
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: So prior to SJP I had a business in private training and training clubs like football clubs, rugby clubs.
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, prior to SJP I had coaches working for me.
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: I'd be going into professional clubs as well, and before that I was at uni doing all of that as well.
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: Fantastic so, from early days, your sort of north star, if you like, your vision of where you thought your career was going to go.
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: By the sounds of it was in the sports profession or personal training.
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, if we rewind further, I played football at a decent level.
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: I played for Aston Villa for seven years, um, right the way through to the age of 16, and then I kind of realized I'm not going to make up any excuses and say I was injured, but I kind of realized I wasn't good enough, um, and the pyramid for making it.
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: You know it's quite pointy.
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: So I went and got an education, opened a business at the same time, like I said, I had my private stuff where I was coaching members of the public but then also going into clubs and you know the more sort of professional training for training for performance more than anything.
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, I mean, right from as far back as I can remember, everything is sports based, and that's where I saw my life and my career going fantastic.
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: So being sports focused.
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: I played a lot of football when I was younger.
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: It definitely made me more goals focused, more tenacious, more ambitious, competitive.
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: Did that do the same for you?
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: Have you found that, being in that background of pre-pro uh up to then running your own business within fitness and coaching others, do you think it's transferred specific types of habits and skills into you as a person that's helped propel your career forward in financial planning?
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: yeah, I didn't realize at the time, because it's it's all I ever knew.
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: Really, it was almost the norm.
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: I definitely think being in that environment gives you resilience.
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: It gives you the want to win and need to do well in whatever it is.
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: I was also in a scenario where I'd be at school in the day and I'd be training not training, but having dinner with professional footballers in the evening that you'd see on the TV and I couldn't mess about.
• 3:48
  Speaker 2: So I had to be quite professional and I think that sort of dragged me up quite quick, gave me professionalism and, yeah, the resilience you know in game and actually playing, that's where the resilience comes from.
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: I think, anyway, like I say I was too young to know any different that that's, that's where the resilience comes from.
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: I think, anyway, like I say I, I was too young to know any different, and that's just, that's just how I am and still to this day yeah, because when you talk to professional footballers now, their days are literally controlled, aren't they, from start to finish, like you're here, you're training here, you're eating this, you're doing this, you're doing that, you're meeting this person, you're training again in the evening, you're having rest and recovery at this period, did they sort of do that with you at that young age?
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: so you'd like finish school and then you go straight in after school into that kind of environment where they are instilling that discipline in you yeah, so when I, when I was signed for villa um, from the age of 10 what 9, 10 through to the age of 16, 17, I would have school monday to friday.
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: I'd miss tuesday to go and train and play with Villa.
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: The Monday night I'd start.
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: So I'd train on the Monday night, I'd stay over, I'd play all day on the Tuesday, I'd be back on the Thursday, I'd stay on the Friday night and play on the Saturday.
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: Wow, so I'd transition from school, where you know you can mess about, do what you want kind of thing, to that professional environment and I'd have to switch into it just like that.
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: But, like I say, it wasn't really something that I knew I was building at the time.
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: It was only when I look back on it now that I think that was actually really good for me and and sort of changed me from a child to an adult pretty swiftly responsibility, discipline yeah yeah, accountability these are all the things that we want to instill in somebody at quite a young age, I think, um, and we don't see the benefit of when it's being done at that age.
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: You almost see it's like that's probably where the rebellious streak might come in with a lot of people.
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: It's like I don't really want to be that way, but it's like it's setting you up for it's setting you up in the future for positive things, really.
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah well, you'd have thought so, um, and I do believe that's the case with myself.
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: But then you look at some footballers um, you know your gazes of the world where actually you've taken away their childhood potentially, uh, and actually they're trying to make up for it later in life.
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: That's my theory on it anyway.
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: So it has like a crazy one, though he's got.
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: He's got a lot going on and he's obviously an addict um, he's got adhd I think there's so many things going on with gaza but he's a genius.
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: When it came to football he was fantastic.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: You know I grew up watching gaza and the ellinikas etc.
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: You know I remember World Cup 90, italia and it's fantastic.
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: That era of football for me, was brilliant.
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: I used to play a lot of football when I was younger, not to the standard that you were.
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: I was at Bristol City for a little bit, but as in the youth side, but I played probably four or five times a week.
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: So it was like it was that getting up, going, being around people.
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: I wasn't a massive team player, though I didn't actually massively gel with the whole kind of like culture.
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: I didn't really like it.
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: It wasn't my thing.
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: I'm a bit of a lone wolf really, and I think I turned up, did my thing and everything and then just buggered off.
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: I didn't't enjoy the culture wasn't my cup of tea.
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: To be honest with you, were you into the culture?
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: not particularly, um, I think, probably like yourself.
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: I mean that translates into even to this day, that I like to do things, go and do things on my own, um, even in business.
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: Now I don't know whether I could be employed ever again because I like to go and do things on my own.
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: Um, even in business.
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: Now I don't know whether I could be employed ever again because I like to go and do things on my own and if I'm gonna be in a team, it kind of needs to be my team, um, so no, I don't, I mean I still play football now.
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: I don't really, if I'm honest, I don't love the, the team part of it.
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: Um, I'm not sort of live or die by the team.
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: I enjoy playing the football, keeping fit and sort of what comes with it, but not necessarily I could probably give that part up quite easily.
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: Nice.
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: But I would say I'm probably more like you.
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: I prefer to just do things on my own how I like to do it.
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: Because I like teamwork don't get me wrong but I like being able to lean into specific people within a team that have a specific skill set to be able to complement mine.
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: I don't lean into the team to hold me up.
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: I need somebody who's a shit-hot striker or I need somebody who's a shit-hot defender, because I want to turn to that person and get what I want from them pretty damn quickly to be able to push myself forward Sounds a bit sociopathic but that's just the kind of way I am.
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: I think it leans into entrepreneurial, being entrepreneurial, I think, and I don't think that's such a bad thing Some of the most well, the most successful people that you can think of and list off the top of your head are probably that way.
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: So I don't think it's such a bad thing at all.
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, no, love it.
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: So you know.
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: You know, didn't go down the pro sports route, understandable.
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: Uh, went off to university.
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: What was the degree did?
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: uh, it was in strength and conditioning yeah.
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: Strength and conditioning, yeah, yeah okay.
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: So that was where I got the opportunities to go into, uh, leicester tigers, for example.
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: I spent a year coaching there.
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: I mean, I don't know that much about rugby, but I know about the strength and conditioning side of it so I could go in and coach their academy.
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: I think you can really make a difference in the academy.
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: So when you're training first teamers, they're almost the final product.
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: So I did a lot of work in academies, did a little bit with leicester city, england rugby, a little bit with those as well.
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: I really enjoyed it actually.
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I really enjoyed it.
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: So why did you stop?
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: Why did I stop?
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: Well, I felt like I wanted to be a business owner.
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: I knew there was something bigger on the horizon and I just felt that I'd been in that for so long that it was almost mind-numbing.
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: And although the business was expanding and there was routes to go down, I just felt it was a little bit just a little bit mind-numbing and I just wanted a completely different change of direction and I knew that there was opportunity on the horizon.
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: Strangely enough, I just had that feeling that there was.
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: I was just waiting for the right opportunity to come along and I didn't know what it was going to be, but I know it was something that I was going to enjoy.
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: Interesting.
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: So why did you end up in the world of financial planning?
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: How did that happen?
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: So it was when I was in the private training part of my business.
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: I had some, you know I had some clients myself that I would coach and one of them was a retired financial planner and we just got talking through through the sessions that we did and he gave me ideas on how to save tax, how to build my wealth, how to help my parents retire, and I really enjoyed that.
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: And and then I started to realize I've actually always been good with money and I enjoy talking about money and and opportunities and ultimately, with the business that I was running, I was enjoying the business side of it more than the actual doing and we started to talk about it more and he told me about his career and he he said I think you've got some transferable skills that you could take from what you're doing now into to what I did.
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: And the more I started to find out about it what a financial planner did and and how the business runs and the opportunities with St James' Place for example I just started to feel like this was the thing for me and the more I looked into it and as time went on, it just felt more and more like it was for me.
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: Interesting.
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: Did you know about financial planning before you spoke to that financial advisor?
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: Not particularly no.
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: Interesting, isn't it?
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: It was almost like a new client comes to me today.
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: That was my level of knowledge.
• 11:47
  Speaker 2: I knew a little bit and I was quite good with money, but I didn't know anything really.
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: Okay, so let's go back to this idea that you not idea.
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: You know you're good with money.
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: Where did that come from?
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: I don't know really I've never really thought about it too much.
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: I think it's probably discipline, um, and probably out of fear more than anything, because I never really had anything to fall back on.
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: So I mean, my, my upbringing wasn't bad at all, by by any means, but there was no funds or income for me to fall back on.
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: So it was almost as as if if I don't look after my money, then I'm going to be potentially on the streets and I'm certainly not going to be a wealthy like I see myself in the future.
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: So I think it was partly fear and partly discipline, I'd say.
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: Did you learn from your parents?
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: Was there a peer that would always kind of give examples or lead by example when it came to money management?
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: yeah I'd.
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: I mean, I don't believe they engaged with a financial planner, so everything they did was just being savvy.
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: Um, so probably as far as just budgeting and paying down the mortgage and and having savings, they never really had anything.
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: You know what we would be advising our clients um in in this day and age no life insurance, no investments really I think, sometimes the fundamental basics just come from a conversation of money, you know, in the family unit.
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: Um, I don't think many families really do pass down just a simple basics of budgeting.
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: You know how to look after your money, how a credit card works, why you shouldn't get into debt, how the mortgage works and all of that did.
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: Were your parents quite open about that, did you or not?
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: You know, did you find out for your, for yourself, because I'm always interested on people's money journeys, you know, I didn't sit down with my parents talking about money, you know, and it's taken me a lot longer on my money journey than it has with people that I know, like godfrey who was just on podcast a minute ago.
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: I mean, his dad was literally teaching him about investing at the age of like 10 or something.
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: You know, it was ridiculously young.
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: Um, did your parents sort of have that conversation with you?
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: no, never no never they.
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: I understood certain things, so I I understood um budgeting, potentially just by their ways, more than sitting down and talking about it, and the importance of paying down the mortgage.
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: I think they were pretty good with that.
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: I think it was more picking up habits as opposed to physically telling me and teaching me which leads me on to schools.
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: You just don't get taught that in schools either, which I think I mean I believe there's a little bit now, having spoken to parents, um, but I just don't think for these vital life skills you just don't get taught the basics and you have to kind of work it out for yourself.
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: And, if I'm completely honest, I didn't know much about it until I came into the industry.
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: It almost kind of feels like there's an ulterior motive for not teaching you the basics in school, to get you fundamentally in debt or something to slave to the system.
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: It feels that way.
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: Why not just teach somebody the fundamental basics?
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: It's a bit like mental health, right, if you can teach kids CBT and mindfulness in the schools, I don't know what they do these days, I don't know.
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: It doesn't sound like it when my daughter comes in um, but these are fundamental basics that kind of get you through life and get you recognizing your emotions that are attached to the decisions that you make um, or the triggers and whatnot.
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: And I think money management and spending and saving is often connected to your emotions, right.
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: So, yeah, I think there's definitely things that they should be should be teaching in school.
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: You're not the only one who ever says that on this podcast, everybody's saying the same thing.
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: And have you got any kind of um passion projects where you are educating youngsters, or yeah?
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: So so when I I mean when I very first started I needed to find ways to get clients Right.
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: So, um, I thought I quite like talking publicly, I like the thought of the teaching side of it.
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: So I held a few workshops and designed something called Draw your Financial Future and I just completely made it from scratch myself, had a bit of time on my hands back then.
• 15:55
  Speaker 2: Whether I could do that now or not is a different question, but that was there to educate people.
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: So, really speaking, I sort of listed the products that we use and thought, well, I mean, I didn't know what that does.
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: I didn't know what that does, I didn't know when to use it, but I would go through their life stages and talk to them about solutions that they might find at those times, and they could then plot out on a piece of paper or in their workbook how they thought their financial future would look and have they missed out any opportunities previously.
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: So it's very educational it was.
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: It was interactive.
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: I think money can be boring and it switches people off pretty much instantly most of the time.
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: But I my goal was to make it as interactive and enjoyable as possible.
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: And, yeah, people enjoyed it and took a lot away from it I think it's really interesting way for you to learn as well, because when you do teach, you tend to, you tend to learn right, and you said that was like at the beginning of your journey.
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: Do you think that had a positive impact on your relationship building?
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: Understanding, then, how to position specific products in specific scenarios?
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: What's actually going through the mind of individuals?
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: What do they know, what don't they know?
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: It's kind of like a safe space to play in it, you know yeah, it is, it was.
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: It was almost like, you know, when you sit and talk about money it can be quite intrusive, whereas actually this was almost stripped back.
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: People were talking about things openly and it didn't have to be personal to them.
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: They could talk about, I don't know, mortgages, investments, things like that ask, ask questions, open-ended questions, without having to relate it back to themselves.
• 17:42
  Speaker 2: But I think I mean I would, I would advise any financial advisor to go down the sort of teaching route because, first of all, you show you know what you're talking about and, secondly, people, people want to learn and it's quite a nice, um, non-intrusive approach because they're learning and they're thinking how can they relate it to their financial picture.
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: But then, of course, if they want, um, if they want advice, then that's when they they come to a professional to pull it all into order, for I think it's again about finding your tribe, isn't it?
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: if you've got 10 people and they all want to learn about managing their finances better, then you've got 10 people in a room that all want to learn about managing their finances better, so they're all vulnerable together, um, which creates solidarity, and individual personal stories become quite inspiring.
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: And the vulnerability around talking about money because people find talking about money really really difficult, right, and becoming vulnerable about money almost shows that you have a weakness, so people hold it in, they bury it like they do anything you know, and it creates these mental health problems and these, uh, spending habits that are probably unhealthy and they keep getting into the same situations and the same problems.
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: So when you have a whole group of people in one room and you're going to be open and honest and actually own it and accept the fact that you don't know what you're talking about and you're here to learn, it's just a really, really positive environment.
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: It's the same as someone wants to go and lose weight or give up drinking alcohol.
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: They go to a group, don't they?
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: Where everyone's in the same boat, and it's a support of the group that then drives it forward, and the honesty and the openness and that's really positive.
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: And I think, learning from this conversation with you just a second, and even just exploring this whole idea, what a great training ground you know like.
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: Why not do that in the very, very beginning?
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: free workshops every week get as many people across you know what it's.
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: It's as enjoyable for me as it is for them.
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: Um, because, like I say, you're helping people with their financial planning without going, you know, stepping over the line and maybe getting a bit a bit personal with them and everybody, like you say, is open.
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, there are a proportion of people that just turn the nose up to it straight away and inevitably, you know, their financial plan and their lifestyle might not bode out the way they want it to be because they did that in the early days.
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: But those that can be more accepting and talk about it, I find I mean, finance is all about time, right?
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: So if you can make smarter decisions over a longer period of time, then it's gonna bode well for you at the end, whereas if you're towing your nose up to it until you get to retirement or until you're, you know, close to dying and realize you're over the inherited tax threshold, something like that, then, um, you know it's gonna be, you're gonna be worse off because of it.
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: Fantastic you love running a business.
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: You enjoy building a business and being in control of your own business.
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: Right why Very?
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: good question.
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: I think I like the autonomy, I like building something Maybe I'm a bit more creative than I maybe give myself credit for and don't realize that and put it into you know business and don't realize that and put it into you know business.
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: I love the thought of controlling my own destiny, I think, and not being controlled by somebody else.
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: So the usual argument is well, if you're self employed, it's quite risky.
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: Well, actually, I think if you're employed, it's riskier because you've got somebody else that's deciding what you know, what your salary looks like, what the future looks like for you, whether you get a promotion, whether you work monday to friday in the office or at home.
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: Um, I just love building something around my lifestyle, um, and it and and I think I enjoy the sort of the risk element in the back of my head if we don't do well next year, then you know this could all fall down, kind of thing which I think all entrepreneurs have, or all business owners have, yet it hardly, hardly ever, happens in reality.
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so I think I like the edge and I like controlling my own destiny.
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: That's what gets me out of bed in the morning I love it.
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: Um, we're going to jump ahead a little bit here because I think it's relevant to this conversation.
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: You're an entrepreneurial individual and I know that you are building out a team and the likelihood is you're probably going to build out more in your business.
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: Now, are those people going to be employed or are they going to be self-employed?
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: And what, as a business owner who sees employment as a risk, would you be doing to create less of a risk, to attract people into your business to work for you?
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: well, I can give you an example.
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: So we've just taken somebody on this week, um, so they're going to start off as self-employed um, and we're just going to see how it goes if they become.
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: You know, if they enjoy working with us and we enjoy working with them, we're slowly going to build them into an employed role in the in the in the new year.
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: Very nice, yeah.
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: So I mean, as as a business owner, it's think about just cost alone and being able to cut ties.
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: Self-employed is the way to go.
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: But I think if somebody's really adding value and they're looking to build their life and, you know, get a mortgage and things like that, then I think it's nice to give them the option.
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: And if they want to be employed and you know we see fit, then then why not?
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: Do you think as well when you sit down with somebody and you talk about self employment, does that show their character as well, whether or not they are considering self-employment and why self-employment could be a good option for them?
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: Do you look at that and go?
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: Well, this person's a little bit more entrepreneurial.
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: How are you gauging the fact that somebody might be up for self-employed?
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: Well, in this particular circumstance, I can see why it doesn't matter, right, because their partner's employed and the breadwinner so on and so forth, um, but I think if it was, if it was solely self-employed, that's what they wanted to do and they were going to come into the business and I think there's a slight risk of them wanting to roll out and, you know, offer what they do to other advisors or or other businesses.
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: So I probably asked that question in the interview and I think you can gauge those types of people that are open to taking the risk and being self-employed because it takes a certain type to do that anyway or are they more of a safety not going to, you know, not going to expand out?
• 23:59
  Speaker 2: So it's selfishly.
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: You know, we want them to stay on board, train them up to do this for us, but I think you could probably gauge it just by the type of person and looking at their lifestyle.
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: Fantastic.
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: Let's roll things back then.
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: What age were you when you decided to join the St James's Place Academy?
• 24:18
  Speaker 2: 24.
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: 24.
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Fantastic.
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: So a younger advisor and at that stage going through St James's Place, changing career pathway where you've actually had quite a decent amount of success, going self-employed, running your own financial planning business without any experience yeah, it's quite mad.
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: No, I was self-employed before.
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: So the last time I was employed was the age of 18.
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: Really, and I was working in a gym whilst going to uni Quickly transitioned.
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: I quickly got out of the employed route within the chain that I was working in into self-employed on the gym floor, which then just expanded and expanded.
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: So, really speaking, I've been self-employed since what?
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: Age of 1920.
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: So I think it was something I always wanted to do.
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: Um, I mean, nobody taught me how to do a tax return.
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: I just walked into an accountant's one day and and said don't want to get done by hmrc, can you help me out?
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: Kind of thing.
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: So I've been doing it since then.
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: So the self employee part of it you know that that wasn't really an issue for me.
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: The issue, the issue, looking back, that I've really put myself at risk and to this day I'm glad I did it.
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: But looking back, you know, at the time I wish I'd have, you know, maybe thought it through a bit more.
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: But yeah, I just completely left the business one day and opened up the financial advice.
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: I mean, I did my training whilst I, you know, had the old business and everything and until I was ready to open the business, and the day I opened the business I said I need to chuck myself at this 100%.
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: So I'm stopping everything else.
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: I don't want there to be any kind of crossover.
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: I don't want to be any kind of crossover.
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: I don't want you to see me as the guy that runs this business anymore.
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: This is the business.
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: This is what I do now.
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: So you put down the track suit and picked up the suit.
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: Then, by the sounds of it, pretty much I I do remember wearing my logoed nike t-shirt and and there is there is a photo somewhere and and adidas joggers, which is a crime in itself on the friday, um, and then the monday it was, yeah, a shirt, and okay, where are these clients going to come from now?
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: yeah, yeah and it literally was like that, and that's when I, you know, I made the video and so when you look back on that and you just said it was a risk, and I look back on it and I'm kind of glad I did it, but what happened?
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: You know why?
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: Why would you, what would you say to your younger self now, in that situation, what would you have done, maybe differently?
• 26:49
  Speaker 2: I think it's really important that the people that, because you know this, this kind of business starts with your network as you know quite you know quite a lot of business probably will but it starts with you, the people that are close to you, and it's really important for them to know that you no longer do this, that this is what you do, you're serious about it and you're professional and you're good at it.
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: You've done all your training so that that bit was fine.
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: But the finance world is a lot slower than the fitness industry.
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: You could meet somebody on the monday.
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: They could book in with you on the monday afternoon, um, and you're already starting to get an income and starting to build your client base.
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: And they might bring two friends or see you on the gym floor or something like that, um, and you could.
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: You could theoretically have a full client base between monday and friday, and that's how long it'd take you to build it if you were.
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: You know really good at what you did in the finance world.
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: It's a lot slower.
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: So you're sending off letters of authority, you are booking people in for two, three meetings that are, you know they can only do a month at a time, kind of thing.
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: So you three months until a client starts speaking to you and comes on board you.
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: You have to build a lot more trust, so you have to take time to um get to know clients and for them to get to know you.
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: And that doesn't happen overnight, it's contact points.
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: We're talking six, seven contact points before somebody um feels comfortable with you offering them financial advice, a lot more serious really, uh, financial advice.
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: So I would have potentially continued and just overseen the business for a little bit longer, um.
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: So there was a transition period, made sure everybody knew what I was doing now, um just to ease into, ease into the next business um, because yeah, in the early days it's quite brutal yeah, yeah, good advice.
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: So that's the advice you would give somebody if they're thinking about becoming a financial planner.
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: Let's say they're going down the self-employed route with st james's place as a partner yes, and they had a business, um on one side and they were leaving it behind.
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: Perhaps, um think about that transition.
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: I think about the time it takes you to do a deal in your current environment, up against the time it might take you to do a deal, uh, within financial planning.
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: If we were to put a time scale on, like your first deal that came in, how long did it actually take?
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: um, I think my goal was to take on board nine clients in the.
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: I want to say, in the first two months I didn't have that.
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: No, I didn't have that at all.
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: I probably had.
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: I probably had two or three investment clients and the rest were made up of whatever you know protection, little bits of protection, or maybe a mortgage or something like that.
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, it took time.
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: It took.
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, we tried to fill our diaries with 15 of our friends' family from day one and I think I got 10 people booked in for an initial fact find the first, you know, the first 10 people I ever went to see um, and some of them just didn't need financial advice.
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: They just didn't need what I did, um, and the theory was that these guys were going to refer you on to their friends and family and it would just snowball like that.
• 30:05
  Speaker 2: But it doesn't happen that easily.
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: It takes, it takes time to build trust and gain, uh, gain referrals.
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: Did you lean into your professional network prior to being a financial planner?
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: So you talked about some of the rugby clubs.
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: You worked with some of these high profile sports stars, which is notoriously not brilliant with with money right due to their careers in early retirement, etc.
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: Did you lean into that environment?
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: Did that become part of your strategy?
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: no, not really, because by the time I'd left where I was known and I knew people villa, I was what?
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: 17 years old, and this didn't come about until I was 24, 23, 24.
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: So by that point the whole club had changed.
• 30:48
  Speaker 2: I didn't really know anybody there.
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: I didn't really have any connections into what I said.
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: Enough connections.
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: I did have connections, but none that saw me as somebody that could help with finances, because I wasn't at a club for long enough.
• 31:02
  Speaker 2: I was kind of coaching here and there, um, you know, throughout a few years.
• 31:07
  Speaker 2: So the answer is no.
• 31:10
  Speaker 2: I didn't have strong enough collections into clubs, especially in the, in the finance, you know, to then go and deliver finance.
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: It was more to do with the private side of things, in the gym that I used to work at people that I'd see day in, day out and built some really good relationships.
• 31:23
  Speaker 2: To this day I'm still having people get in touch with me now who knew me from back then to talk about finances fantastic.
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: So you did lean into that part of the network, but not so much on the professional club side.
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it was more the people I suppose again that you built more intimate relationships with around the pting side and the yeah, yeah when I say I let you know, did I lean into them?
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: I did try in the early days.
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: I put you know, put a few webinars, seminars on things like that.
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: Nothing really came of it.
• 31:52
  Speaker 2: It's only later, down the line, when they come reach out to me.
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: And having them on social media helps with that.
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: Um, I did still attend that gym until a couple of years ago that that kind of helped as well, yeah, um, but even then it was hard to win them over and for them to understand that I'm good at what I do and it took them took some of them a couple of years for them to feel comfortable enough to say, right, tom must know what he's doing.
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: Now he's been going for a few years, um, and yeah, even even this year, still I'm having people reach out to.
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: It takes you a long time to build your brand.
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: It does take you a long time to build your brand.
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: Like my financial plan, life form was going for three and a half years well, three years, I reckon before I started making money out of it.
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: It took a while for people to get the concept of the fact that I have a podcast and that I'm building a podcast that builds brand awareness, that gains followers.
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: That if you go and spend 25 grand at a pfs event where they've got 100 people attending you're spending 25 grand for 100 people attending.
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: Or you could come on my podcast and you know you'll have 10 000 people uh listen in one month and about 25 000 views on social media of all the audience that you're listening.
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: So how many people are going to be listening to this?
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: So, like you know, it takes a while for someone to actually gain the, get the concept of it and, like you can imagine me like walking into st james's play.
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: Oh, by the way, you need to do a talent partnership with me and do a subscription model and I'll promote the academy which will drive people to you and it's all about brand the winner.
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: It takes a while for people to even get it and understand the concept of it.
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: They have to see you, have to hear you, they have to uh see the reaction from others and get maybe refer, referrals speaking about it and talking about that person, and it takes time for that to happen.
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: It's not transactional and you've experienced that financial planning is 100, not a transactional environment, right, it's definitely not.
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: So I think people definitely.
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: I think the advice you gave there about making sure that that transition period is good.
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: You were obviously good with money, so you had savings in place as well yeah, savings, I think I'd say savings are important.
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: Um, you, well, yeah, savings are important if you can get another income stream and and just leave that running to fall back on.
• 33:54
  Speaker 2: Part of me says take that income stream away so you go out and get it, which is kind of what it was like for me.
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: But if you want to be a little bit safer, then maybe have, uh, have, an income stream, yeah, and if you're I mean if you're coming into the business, you know quite new, depending on whether you're a partner or um going into a practice you might want a small book of clients to go and see straight away that that'd probably help as well.
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: Very, nice, not always a luxury that everyone can get when they're trying to get into the financial planning profession.
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: Um, and training, development, mentorship, a clear career framework they're starting to get built.
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: But we have a profession that has lots of smaller firms with an aging advisor population.
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: A lot of those advisor owners are exiting out the profession great opportunity for a young chap like you to come in and buy their businesses in an ecosystem such as sjp, which is built to be that way, right, um?
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: But everyone needs some help, everyone needs some support, everyone needs some education and guidance.
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: And you're in a position where you wanted to be a financial planner but you hadn't.
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: You don't understand the blueprint, right.
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: So you joined st james's place, the academy, six years ago.
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah, tell us a little bit about that journey, that experience.
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: How beneficial was that to accelerate your knowledge and experience and practical skills to get you out there actually building a business?
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: well, it was a godsend really.
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: I and I'm not just saying this because I'm part of the team, but I don't know why more people don't do it because it's it's a great pathway.
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: So, um, they taught me just about everything I could know without going out and doing it myself.
• 35:30
  Speaker 2: Um, and even still, I had the opportunity to, um, you know, go out with mentors, and even before I joined the academy, I'd been out with an advisor to just see what they do.
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: I didn't have a clue what he was doing, but now it all makes sense because I've learned it in the meantime.
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: So the academy is great.
• 35:48
  Speaker 2: It preps you for what it's going to be like, as much as it possibly can, without going out and seeing what it's like.
• 35:58
  Speaker 2: But you learn so much, in short, in such a sort of short amount of time.
• 36:02
  Speaker 2: And even with the exams, the exams, I I couldn't probably never have passed those exams if it was just me in the book I'm not that way inclined at all being taught it, I mean, I don't know what they do these days, but I was.
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: I was taught those, you know the material, those exams, um, over what a three-month period.
• 36:25
  Speaker 2: And it helps so much and it's it's helped my knowledge no end and I carry through.
• 36:30
  Speaker 2: Most of what I know now was is what I learned in in those three months and then the, the sort of um, the other stuff that they teach you, you know about, you know how to do a fact, find how to, you know, speak to clients and deepen relationships with clients.
• 36:47
  Speaker 2: It's yeah, it was great, it was, it was great.
• 36:49
  Speaker 2: I think it's changed a bit now.
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: I think it might be online, I'm not sure but um, yeah, I couldn't ask for much more before going out in into the world.
• 36:58
  Speaker 2: I still had to go and get it myself, but I was, yeah, I was fully fully equipped.
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: You have to go out there and get it yourself.
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: Right, you need a horse to water, but you can't make it drink.
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: Not calling you a horse, but that's the fact of life.
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: Right, you have to put one foot in front of the other to go out there and get it.
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: But understanding that there is a tried and trodden path that works gives you confidence, right?
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: What about when we talk about terms one, two, three and four at st james's place, which is very kind of on the, it's not even on the job well, parts of it are on the job, but then you've got those terms five and six.
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: So you're out there, you're doing your job, but then you've got the support of um, the uh, the local kind of business managers that help you, yeah, bdms that run your business.
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: They help you run your business.
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: They answer some questions, they might talk about recruitment with you, they might review your meetings with clients.
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: How beneficial was not just being kicked out the door, let's say, off, you go.
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: You're a financial planner, now you've had your qualifications, when in fact you have never.
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: Really how important was the hands on experience and the coaching, let's say that came in terms five and six, when you were out in the field yeah, it was, it was great.
• 38:04
  Speaker 2: I mean the terms that, the term terms.
• 38:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I wasn't, don't think, unless I was being ignorant, it wasn't really, I don't think it probably was yeah but I don't think it was about back then, but it's the same principles really.
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: So we had, um, growth and development.
• 38:19
  Speaker 2: It's called growth and development, right, um?
• 38:21
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, whilst I was in growth and development, um, you've got a small knit group of people in my note in, uh, in my location we've all got our business development managers and it was great.
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: I was meeting with her once or twice a month so she could hold me accountable, um, she could update me on what's going on in this big corporate giant of a business, st St James Place and it's almost the bridge between the partner and St James Place, because a lot of us work in offices one of us, two of us, three of us or work at home.
• 38:56
  Speaker 2: However it might be, especially in the early days, you're on your own pretty much from the start.
• 39:01
  Speaker 2: So that was great because I could keep up to date with the things that were happening at St James Place instead of just having to read it and read about it through emails and on the intranet.
• 39:11
  Speaker 2: Um, but then they they look after other people as well, so they can take the best bits of what other people are doing and tell you which nobody's bothered about.
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: It's a great thing to do.
• 39:24
  Speaker 2: So it was.
• 39:26
  Speaker 2: It was really helpful, to be honest, and I almost didn't want to leave that part of uh, of st james's place when I sort of then moved on and transitioned into the next stage and the next stage which I'm at now, which is kind of you can go, go and do what you want, not do what you want, but you're free, kind of thing.
• 39:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I almost wanted to to keep that just because, uh, it was so useful at the time, but realistically, I don't need it anymore.
• 39:54
  Speaker 2: But, um, it was nice to have such a close relationship and so many, um, so many meetings with, with, with that bdm, just just to keep on track, because I think, if, think, if you go 1% off every month, before you know it, you're 10% off of where you wanted to be.
• 40:12
  Speaker 2: So it was great for accountability.
• 40:15
  Speaker 1: It's support is the word that comes to mind.
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: You know it's support, it's the ongoing support and there's coaching like business coaching, these types of things.
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: If you go out there and set your own business up, you might know you need a business coach, but you're not going to put your hands in your pockets and go and get one because it comes at an expense to you and your business and all that.
• 40:32
  Speaker 2: Oh, it would be expensive, yeah.
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: So the link that you have then with St James' Place and what St James' Place can actually do for you because they've tried and tested, they've gone down the different pathways they've able to provide that to you and say, look, you're on the right path, you're slightly off, you've got to go this way.
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: Have you tried this?
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: Because it works for such and such over there.
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: That's hugely valuable and to have that internally as a part of your journey is huge.
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: Right, it's, it's, it's so important.
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: How many people go out there set the business upon their own fail.
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: Loads of people do that and it's probably likely to do with the fact that they're just not getting the right mentorship and support and development opportunities that run alongside that business.
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: They've developed them, they've created them, they've tried and tested them.
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: They know the things that work and don't work and they can put it against you.
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: And what I like about it is like a process of improvement.
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: So six years ago you joined.
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: The six years it is today will be completely different.
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: It will be better because it will just continually improve, and that's what I like about the ecosystem at St James' Place.
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: I think the academy is fantastic.
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: It's best out there, best out there, right.
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah you can't dispute that.
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you can't dispute it, right?
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: And you know it's like I had an interesting call with a fund actually phoned me up.
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: They just bought a lot of shares in st james's place and they wanted to know my opinion on the financial planning companies that are out there, what younger advisors views are of them and who they would join.
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: And they are asking me loads of questions, obviously, about st james's place.
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: Buy a load of, buy a load of shares.
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: I've never come across anybody who is younger who has a negative thing to say about st james's place, and that's the truth, and I'm not just sitting there saying that because I've got st james's place as a talent partner on my podcast.
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: Genuinely, I never hear anything negative about st james's place from younger advisors that go through.
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: Now you've also got this narrative out there that younger advisors need to gain experience and all of that before they can become advisors and oh, there isn't enough training, there isn't enough development or mentorship out there for them.
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: But st james's place are doing that.
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: I got you here today at 24 years old.
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: Um started your journey to now just under 30, aren't you're 30 years old?
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: 30, right?
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: You've spent your late, your second part of your 20s, building a financial planning business, self-employed, and yeah, the first couple of years were hard, right, but you're in a good position now, right, yeah, and you've got that ongoing support.
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: To me.
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: It's amazing.
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: To me, it's like they're doing exactly what they said they're setting out to do.
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: That is a hugely positive thing to talk about.
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: I've got another lad who's coming on.
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: Lad, I'm bloody, nearly 43 this year I'm starting to call bloody people lad now.
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: He's 26 years old.
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah, right, 19 years old.
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: He was on £14,000 as an administrator.
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: He's £130,000 a year earner, now On an employee basis, went from power planning to financial advice At St James's place and he's earning good money.
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: He's writing over 300 000 pounds a year, 16 million under management, and he's got fantastic training, development and mentorship, not only from the partner he's working for but from the support of the business.
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: It's brilliant.
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: So when this fund asked me about it, obviously I spoke highly of it and positively about it because I couldn't pick anything negative about it because no one's really touching them and that's genuinely it.
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: There's no one really out there that has an academy that's touching st james's place and the amount of energy and, uh, even money that they put into I think it's like 28 million a year or something ridiculous they put into it yeah I mean, at the risk of um sounding like I'm an for SJP Academy, which I'm absolutely not- yeah, yeah yeah, this is what I mean.
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: I don't know why more people aren't doing it.
• 44:13
  Speaker 2: They can see the pathway, I mean just off the back of a video I put out a couple of weeks ago.
• 44:19
  Speaker 2: I'm having people message me that are sceptical about joining and they just pick up the phone.
• 44:24
  Speaker 2: Two or three people have done that, yeah.
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: I think sometimes, when you're a large organization and you're going to always be looked at negatively by a certain amount of people and there are opportunities to pick flaws in something, and it's always going to cause a little bit of anxiety if someone is thinking about going down that pathway and I think it's the stories like today, um, the honest stories about the challenges, um, but the support that comes along with it.
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: I think the kind of underlying thing theme here that I come across from people that go through academies, right, whether they're going down the self-employed route is can you actually cover yourself during those early stages?
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: Can you back yourself?
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: Do you have the transferable skills, the needed to go out there and make a success in this profession?
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: Because if you're looking for all of that from the employer or the pathway or the academy that you're joining, you're not gonna.
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: You're not gonna get it all from there.
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: You have to bring something to the table and I look at someone like you, self-employed from a very young age, transferable skills already out there, communicating with people in relationships something to the table.
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: And I look at someone like you, self-employed from a very young age, transferable skills already out there, communicating with people in relationships, working on performance management with individuals within sports clubs, in sports yourself good with money.
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: It was like, yeah, well, they're clearly you're a great fit, they could pick you up, you could put you in the academy, an ecosystem that's only going to bring those brilliant qualities you have out and make you a success.
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: I think that was a smart move for someone like you, so somebody who's maybe like sat in a back bedroom, just finished university, done their level four qualifications, got none of that kind of transferable skills or life experience, right, I don't think it's a good idea, don't do it probably not, no, yeah you know, don't, don't do it.
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: Um, it's not for everybody.
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: You can't make a financial planner out of everybody, right, there is a journey you've got to go on and there's a time and a place for when you join something like the st james's place academy.
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: It's not for everybody, no, it's not it's not for everybody.
• 46:22
  Speaker 2: No, I mean, the first thing you think of is are you good at maths, um, and do you know much about money?
• 46:27
  Speaker 2: And actually they're probably.
• 46:29
  Speaker 2: I mean, you need to be okay at maths, but them two things are probably low down on the list of qualities that you need.
• 46:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, those things that you just mentioned are, and I think, generally a positive.
• 46:40
  Speaker 2: A kando attitude will get you such a long way, and being able to talk to human beings yeah if you've got those two things, then there's no reason why you can't.
• 46:51
  Speaker 2: And, like you say that, I, I took probably about as hard a route as I possibly could.
• 46:56
  Speaker 2: I didn't start with a book of clients.
• 46:57
  Speaker 2: I started out on my own as a partner, not an advisor.
• 47:00
  Speaker 2: There are other options that are, I'd say, slightly safer, but that that's not what I wanted.
• 47:06
  Speaker 2: I wanted to do it myself and for it to be mine.
• 47:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah, um, be quite right, it's not.
• 47:11
  Speaker 2: It's not for everybody.
• 47:12
  Speaker 2: So that probably answers my question as to why more people don't do it, but I think it is for more people than are probably doing it now yeah, fantastic.
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: Talk to me about the difference between the first couple of years to where you are now then.
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: So a bit of a struggle in the first couple of years and where are you now?
• 47:29
  Speaker 2: yeah.
• 47:30
  Speaker 2: So the first couple of years year you don't know whether your practice, realistically it's not what you tell people, but you don't know whether your practice is still going to be functioning in a year or two years time, because it only takes a few bad months potentially.
• 47:44
  Speaker 2: The first year was the hardest, believe it or not.
• 47:47
  Speaker 2: The second year was really hard still.
• 47:49
  Speaker 2: Um third year started to swing and you start to think I could make something of this.
• 47:54
  Speaker 2: Um year three and year, you know, sorry, year four and year five, it really starts to come through.
• 48:01
  Speaker 2: But I think it it boils down to not only are you developing as an advisor, but it's mostly around the relationships you, you lay the seeds with people.
• 48:12
  Speaker 2: You start to gain trust in year one and only in year three, four, they might start to um, their lives might start to change and they'll come back to you for, for more you know, more advice, and that's when they'll start to introduce you to their friends and family.
• 48:25
  Speaker 2: So it's a compounding effect really.
• 48:28
  Speaker 2: Um, but you've very much the first couple of years.
• 48:31
  Speaker 2: You're finding your way.
• 48:32
  Speaker 2: You're finding your niche.
• 48:33
  Speaker 2: Um, not that I think I'm particularly good with any kind of niche, even still at the minute, but you're finding how, how you work.
• 48:42
  Speaker 2: Um and sjp is a huge place, it's a huge business, and sometimes it can feel like um, yeah, on your own, kind of thing.
• 48:52
  Speaker 2: If you don't reach out and get it, and sometimes if you don't know where to find the help that you need, it can take time and if you don't know how to use certain things, so things get slicker.
• 49:01
  Speaker 2: Things compound, introductions start to happen, and the more and the longer you're in it for the the easier it gets, because then next year I already know I'm going to likely get x amount of referrals.
• 49:13
  Speaker 2: I've already got the funds under management sat behind me.
• 49:15
  Speaker 2: You know the chances of you know not being here in two years time reduce every every single year, and now I'm only just feeling like this is you know, I think I've done all right here.
• 49:27
  Speaker 2: This is quite comfortable, whereas if you'd have asked me six years ago that and told me this is where I'm going to be in five years, I'd have thought, wow, you've done really well, but now it's.
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: It's not like that when you're actually in in the position brilliant, such a realistic expectation, um, based on experience, and I think that's so important that people hear it that it isn't quick, it isn't easy, it's going to be tough, it's going to be hard, and every at times where you might be thinking have I made the right decision to do this?
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: Um, you know, it's not given to you on a plate when you go through a pathway like this.
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: It's.
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: It's not absolutely.
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: You have to make it work for yourself, to give some people some context.
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: Then, if you don't mind answering this question, aum, what have you generated under aum within that period of time?
• 50:11
  Speaker 2: so I've we've currently got just over 25 million nice yeah great, that's fantastic.
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, 30 years old with 25 million under the management and, as you said, those first couple of years were putting the groundwork in laying the seeds, but the fruits want to come to fruition now.
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: Right, and it's nice.
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: When you've got some assets under management, you know you've got your clients in place, you can start to kind of deliver a higher level of service, and then those referrals start coming in as well.
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: Gives you a bit of confidence knowing you've got that regular income coming in as well.
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: Right, is that kind of then freed you up to start thinking about growing the business yeah.
• 50:43
  Speaker 2: So for me at the minute, it's all about creating a solid back office.
• 50:48
  Speaker 2: So for me, to go and see the client and that's about all I do.
• 50:54
  Speaker 2: That's that.
• 50:55
  Speaker 2: You know that's.
• 50:55
  Speaker 2: That's the aim.
• 50:56
  Speaker 2: We're not quite there yet, but I want to be able to just go and see the client or pick up the phone to a client and just talk to clients and go and give great advice.
• 51:05
  Speaker 2: The bits in between should be done by somebody else, some somebody that you can trust.
• 51:12
  Speaker 2: Within the practice, it should.
• 51:13
  Speaker 2: It should be quite slick.
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: Um, that's the challenge for me at the minute operational executioner I'm.
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: I'm in the same situation with the financial plan of life, where I sold my recruitment business.
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: I had a couple of people in there that were supporting me, but I was never really good at the operational side.
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: Even like trying to instruct somebody operationally, I find it quite, quite difficult because I get so sidetracked with this.
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: The fun part.
• 51:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they're talking to people.
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: This is the bit that I love, right?
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so I want to spend all my time doing this thing.
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: I want to spend all my time talking to people in any situation, because that, to me, always creates opportunity.
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: So where I've kind of like, moved on now with the financial power, life took that as a sole business, made it a decision that that I need an operational person in their execution person.
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: So when I have these ideas and I'm out doing it, they are and they're with me.
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: They're the type of person that don't need to be told.
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: They can see where they can add value to my life.
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: My job would be like right, I don't want to do what I'm asking you to do, right, so can you work out how you can take that and make that your job so I can do this?
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: And that's where I want to be.
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: It's a beautiful operational execution person that just does things, gets it done, moves things around, likes databases, likes CRMs, likes booking things into diaries and being organized.
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: I love to be organized.
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: I wish I was organized, but I'm not.
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: I'm likes like, um, booking things into diaries and being organized.
• 52:27
  Speaker 1: I love to be organized.
• 52:27
  Speaker 1: I wish I was organized, but I'm not.
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you know I'm a scatterbrain because I get sidetracked by really fun things like this yeah, me too yeah but that's the fun part of running a business I think most entrepreneurs are like that yeah yeah you know, it's where you get all these entrepreneurs, and alan smith's got a podcast called the bulletproof entrepreneur now all stories of ups and downs and craziness and not every entrepreneur is good at money, right, you know even things like that.
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: I'm not great.
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: I've never been that great with my own personal finances.
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: So I've now got someone coming into my financial plan of life business who is ex-accountant and financial advisor.
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: That's what you need, mate.
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: Like I'm just like yes, please, please, come in and be part of my business and was like, don't give up a share of your business.
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: Like no, I'm a hundred percent gonna push out of my business because this person will solve my problems, because I don't want to be that person.
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think leaning into what those skills are to allow, that's where growth comes from.
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: Right, I guess it was st james's place.
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: They have a lot of the stuff in place the infrastructure and all of that and it's like a stepping stone, isn't it to get to the goal that you need to get to a lot quicker.
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: If you did it on your own, could you have done on your own?
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: What is the next couple of?
• 53:24
  Speaker 1: Are you thinking about practice buyouts?
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: Are you doing anything like that.
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: What does the future look like for you?
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: The immediate future?
• 53:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so I think last year, not so much this year.
• 53:32
  Speaker 2: This year has been pretty good with you know.
• 53:35
  Speaker 2: It's been more about growth and increasing funds and management.
• 53:38
  Speaker 2: Last year it was more of a consolidation year, so it was.
• 53:42
  Speaker 2: You know, consumer duty came in in the summer.
• 53:45
  Speaker 2: There was a lot of admin and sorting things out generally, um.
• 53:50
  Speaker 2: So the reason I'm trying to build this slick, bulletproof back office is because then we can, once we've got that, it's really attractive for somebody like me six years ago to come into, whereas if if that wasn't the case, I don't feel like I'm adding enough value to to this advisor coming in.
• 54:12
  Speaker 2: It's almost an ecosystem of its own yeah so they're coming into st james place, which is an ecosystem, but my practice, mangan.
• 54:18
  Speaker 2: Financial planning needs to be an attractive proposition and I need to be able to get the best financial advisors to come in and work with me.
• 54:26
  Speaker 2: To get the best financial advisors to come in and work with me to scale, of course, um, but they won't do that unless they see real value.
• 54:34
  Speaker 2: And I think for me as an advisor, if you can take away all the admin, I mean it's no secret that if?
• 54:38
  Speaker 2: you see more clients and spend time with your clients, um, you'll do better at the end of the day, better outcome for both parties.
• 54:44
  Speaker 2: So if that's what they want to do, they can come into my practice and have that, and everything else is done for them.
• 54:51
  Speaker 2: So it's about you know it relates back to the the previous answer.
• 54:56
  Speaker 2: It's make sure that's bulletproof and slick and all working as well as possibly can do, and then we can start to scale um, bring bring advisors on board, um and maybe you know, acquire clients for them.
• 55:09
  Speaker 1: So scale up.
• 55:09
  Speaker 1: I think you said earlier you know one of the attractive things is being able to give somebody a small client book, you know.
• 55:15
  Speaker 1: So if you are attracted to those people, one of the most attractive things would be small client book, perhaps a small basic salary, possibly leading to self-employment like a hybrid.
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: So, like, we've got an opportunity, there's employment and if you can, if you're given a small client book, then you know that there's a level of recurring income off that client but that would cover a certain amount of the costs.
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: Then you're putting in um clear objectives what they need to do to grow that book, running alongside that as a training and development, and the slicker support in place for those individuals to make sure that they can deliver a level of service in a way that's quick and efficient and stopping them from going do it on a direct basis themselves.
• 55:54
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so that makes total sense to me.
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: And also by having that process in place the slick systems, the operational side that we were talking about you're going to be more freed up to bd, which means that you might go out and do some more corporate stuff.
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: You might generate some really good referral networks and generate more client opportunity you might think to put your marketing hat on a bit bit more and do more marketing.
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: You might go out and podcast.
• 56:15
  Speaker 1: You might set your own podcast.
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: You might do a youtube channel.
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: All of a sudden you're freeing up that time to think how can I gain more um clients inquiries into our business to be able to then feed the newer advisors that are coming into the business?
• 56:30
  Speaker 2: so it makes total sense yeah, I think it's about working.
• 56:32
  Speaker 2: I think I see too many business owners working in the business and not on the business it's a cliche saying, but it's.
• 56:38
  Speaker 2: It's true.
• 56:39
  Speaker 2: If you're doing the things that create value in the business or on the business, then you're gonna accelerate a lot quicker than if you're stuck and bogged down in the business doing the things that aren't going to.
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: Kind of the managed owners, aren't they?
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: You know the financial planners that are owners of their businesses, and that's why you've got so many of these smaller type firms.
• 56:58
  Speaker 2: And we all get sucked into it.
• 56:59
  Speaker 2: But you've just got to say to yourself this was the goal, bringing people in to do this for you, and make sure that if you don't, if you shouldn't be doing it, it's delegated and it can be, it can be hard because you're gonna have to pay for it, but that's, you know.
• 57:13
  Speaker 1: That's where the funds and the management come in and help building a business that, if you sort of walked away from it, it's still running.
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, that's everybody's dream that's the dream, yeah but it's not unachievable right in this game.
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: It's not.
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: It's not unachouchable at all.
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: Um, when the time's right to obviously do it.
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: And the great thing about being a younger advisor coming in like yourself is that time is on your side.
• 57:30
  Speaker 1: I mean, you're well up, well ahead of so many people.
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: You know so many advisors.
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: I know they're in their 40s, 50s.
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: You've achieved way more than they have like.
• 57:40
  Speaker 1: So you should pat yourself on the back massively and back yourself that you're on the right pathway, because I've seen the market, I've seen people, I've talked to people over 16 years.
• 57:49
  Speaker 1: You're doing exceptionally well.
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: Keep pushing forward and no doubt you're going to be a huge success.
• 57:53
  Speaker 2: You are now, thank you, but just keep pushing because you're that way it's hard to know because you you can't really compare yourself with with other people.
• 58:03
  Speaker 2: It's so.
• 58:03
  Speaker 2: That was another reason why the business development manager is useful, because you'd go away from it feeling warm and fuzzy because they've just said oh, you're actually doing really well compared to you know so you're right there and I think it's.
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: I think it's tough.
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: We want that validation and confirmation that we are doing well.
• 58:19
  Speaker 1: Um, take it from me you're doing well, and I talk to the whole market.
• 58:25
  Speaker 1: Do you know?
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: I mean, you are 100 doing well and like, be proud of where you are and be enthused by where you are, because you don't need that validation.
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: You've got it, you're doing it, you're doing an amazing job.
• 58:40
  Speaker 1: And I'm so impressed because I'm 43 years old.
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: If I had the business acumen that you did at your age and the confidence and the drive that you had, I would be over the moon.
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: You know I kind of just I've just kind of waddled my way through my life really, but you know, that's another strategy yeah, I think everybody has.
• 58:59
  Speaker 2: What's the word now um something?
• 59:01
  Speaker 2: Syndrome, what's it?
• 59:02
  Speaker 1: called imposter syndrome.
• 59:04
  Speaker 2: We all have that.
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: I think, yeah, and I still have it now.
• 59:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I've I've managed to let go of imposter syndrome, because we're all different, right, and we've all got different little pathways, um, but we all from time to time want some reassurance that we're doing a good job right, and I think it's important because otherwise we then put way too much pressure on ourselves because we don't think we're doing enough right.
• 59:28
  Speaker 1: There's there's having the validation that you are definitely enough and you are, but what's next?
• 59:35
  Speaker 2: yeah, yeah, I think that's the bit that's exciting yeah, I think it's easy for me to be a critic of my, not a critic of myself.
• 59:41
  Speaker 2: But stay ambitious, yeah, and I, you know, I don't I.
• 59:47
  Speaker 2: I appreciate it when you know people tell me I'm doing well.
• 59:49
  Speaker 2: It's nice to hear, it's nice, but also I will then tell myself you know, this is where you got to get to next.
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: Don't stop, don't stop yeah, or else you end up going backwards.
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: 100, don't get lazy man, don't get complacent.
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, 100 well, listen, it's been an absolute pleasure talking to you.
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: Um, always a pleasure to hear about a young person's journey within financial planning and making it a huge success.
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: There are people going to listen to this episode and are going to go.
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 1: I'm going to do this now because Tom's done it.
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 1: So, tom, thank you for sharing your career story and your career journey.
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: It's been an absolute pleasure and we at the Financial Planner Life wish you all the best.
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: Thank you so much.
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: It's been an absolute pleasure.
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: Nice one, tom.