Latest / Financial Planner Life Podcast / Michael Pashley discusses the brand new PIP Qualification, a game changer for all levels of financial planners

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Michael Pashley discusses the brand new PIP Qualification, a game changer for all levels of financial planners · Financial Planner Life Podcast

• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: Hi, and welcome to the Financial Planner Life podcast, where we talk to professionals at varying stages in their career about what it's like working in the wonderful world of financial planning and financial advice.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: This podcast is proudly sponsored by Recruit UK, a recruitment consultancy specifically focused on the financial services.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: They have a niche specialism, recruiting, within the financial planning industry.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: So check out their website for the latest job opportunities, hints and tips, and blog articles.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: And welcome to the Financial Planner Life Podcast.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: And first off, Happy New Year, the year 2021.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: I can't believe it's been twenty-one years since Y2K.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: If you look back on that and you remember like everyone panicking, thinking that all the computers were gonna go down and planes were gonna fall out of the sky.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: I mean the world's still pretty crazy, isn't it, 21 years later, especially with all the stuff that's going on at the moment.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: But 21 years ago, time really does fly.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: Anyway, another mic reminiscing of the past.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: Today's guest is Michael Pashley.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: Michael is the managing director of a company called Practical Financial Exams.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: And he's also the creator of a brand new financial planning qualification called the Practical Investment Planning Qualification, or PIP for sure.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: And today he tells us all we need to know about this absolute game-changing qualification, why he set it up, and why he thinks there is a place for it within financial planning.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm inclined to agree with him.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: The qualification is there to develop the practical and soft skills needed to deliver competent, compliant, real-world financial planning to retail clients in the UK.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: I see on the cake it is a level nine qualification in Scotland, a level six qualification in the UK.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: I think this is going to add huge value to the next generation of financial planners, existing financial planners, power planners and administrators, but also to the companies that incorporate this financial planning qualification into their financial planning businesses.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: I'd love to hear what your thoughts are.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: So leave your comments in the comments section on YouTube or send me a message directly on LinkedIn.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you enjoy it.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: Hey Michael, thanks very much for joining me today on the Financial Planner Live podcast.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's the first one of 2021, the year of the vaccination.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: Fingers crossed it's going to be a good year.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: How are you doing, my man?
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: You all right?
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_01: Uh yeah, great.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_01: It's a pleasure to be here.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks very much for having me.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: No worries, Michael, no worries.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: Listen, you and I have been talking anyway, and I've been sort of observing from a distance what you've been up to.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: And it's been some really interesting things that you're getting involved in, interesting things that you're doing within the profession, especially around your own new business that you set up, which is practical financial exams limited and this new qualification.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: So today, I really want to know more about your qualification that you've created and what level of service it is you're offering and why you've done it, you know, why it's come about and what value is it going to add to the next generation of financial planners.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: So really keen to find out a little bit more about that and go straight into it, really.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: Michael, just give us an overview then of what you've been up to in the last um sort of 12 months around your business, practical financial exams.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, certainly.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: So uh I have uh as as Sam said there, uh I have set up a brand new organization called Practical Financial Exams Limited.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_01: And this organization is a new qualifications provider.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: We are based in Scotland, and we uh essentially provide a new qualification called the Practical Investment Planning Qualification.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_01: This is uh an SCQF level nine SQA credit rated qualification, so broadly uh equivalent to uh CII advanced diploma examination in terms of depth and difficulty.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_01: But where it's different is in the support that we give you and in the way that it is assessed.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm gonna start very briefly, if I can, uh, by talking about the support that we give you.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: So we provide you an absolutely fantastic full colour study text, complete with it's it's a triangulated approach to the study text.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_01: So we've got the the standard text that's in there, we've also got scripted examples, and finally we've got diagrams and images to bring everything to life.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_01: And uh in addition to that, you get unlimited access to a trainer via email.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_01: So if there's anything that you want to ask about your uh your if there's anything you want to ask about your your qualification or about your uh your assessment or about the syllabus, uh you could you've got 24-7 access to a specialist.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_01: In terms of assessment, it's no written exam, it's not a 3,000-word essay or anything like that.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_01: This is all practical.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_01: This is all about practical investment planning.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_01: It's said that the clue's in the name.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_01: We want to know how good you are at your day job.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_01: We want to assess your competence at the day-to-day skills of financial planners.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_01: So for your first assessment, we want you to write a suitability report based on a fact find that we provide you.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_01: So that's like any other standard type of business.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_01: We want you to write a suitability report for us.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_01: Number two, we want you to collate a portfolio of work-based evidence that evidences the achievement of the learning outcomes.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_01: And finally, we want you to undertake an interview, a structured professional discussion with one of our assessors via Microsoft Teams or Zoom that um that that allows us to um to really dig deep and uh and make sure that you can do the day-to-day work of a financial planner.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_00: Well, make sure here, so so our listeners understand this is a financial, this is a brand new financial planning qualification, isn't it?
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's something that you have created.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: And as you said there, you've created this wonderful handbook that's about creating a financial qualification to get financial planners or people that are wanting to become a financial planner, or perhaps people that are power planners, administrators, up to the level of financial planning.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: And historically, the qualifications that are out there at the moment through the CII, um, through the CISI, uh LIBF, they're very technical, aren't they?
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: They're technical handbooks.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: They're not designed to actually train you in the practical approach to delivering financial planning.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: And that is the kind of the problem that you're trying to solve.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: Is that is that correct?
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: Uh yeah, that's absolutely right.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: So to give you a little bit of background uh on me, Sam, I was I'm a I'm a former financial advisor, I've been on that side of the fence before.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_01: And when I started my role, I literally just sat my uh my final chartered exam, which was which I then went on to pass, and I realized that basically as a chartered financial planner, um, I sat down in front of my first client.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_01: It was a pretty, pretty standard piece of business, but I realized that I hadn't learned to fact-find, I hadn't learned to uh to understand the importance of smart objectives, I hadn't learned uh about risk profiling and how to risk profile.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_01: I had no idea how to write a suitability report.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the I hadn't I didn't I didn't know how to cash flow model.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_01: I I I knew the basic theory of cash flow modeling, but I'd never actually done it, didn't really understand the maths behind it.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_01: And uh yeah, I I realized that yeah, I didn't have any of these essential skills that that I really needed in order to do the role of the financial advisor.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_01: It took me a a while to learn though learn a lot of those skills.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_01: So, what this qualification uh aims to do and what the problem it aims to solve is the idea is you you get your level four diploma with the CII or the LIVF or the CISI, whoever it whoever it might be.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_01: And then once you've got that diploma, once you've got that technical knowledge in the theory, you then move on to do your PIP qualification, your practical investment planning qualification, and the practical investment planning qualification teaches you and assesses your ability to do the day job.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_01: So it teaches you how to apply that technical content that you've learned to uh to the real world.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: We teach you how to write a suitability report, we teach you how to how cash flow modeling works, we teach you how to sit with a customer and build rapport with them and fact-find with them, and even simple things like booking meetings, simple things like going through uh key features illustrations and key features documents when you're presenting financial advice, how a fact-find meeting is structured, even disclosure documents, how to explain charges, how to explain that you're uh regulated by the FCA.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_01: There's different ways and means of doing these things, and we teach all of this.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: We teach all of this via our qualification.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_01: And again, you again your support.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_01: So let's say that you're you oh yeah, I'm unsure, I'm sure of this bit.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: This is quite a technical, a technical bit here.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_01: It's about suitability report writing.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, this is this is what I've read here.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_01: You know, what's your view on it?
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_01: We can answer that for you.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_01: 24-7 access to uh to an email helpline.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_01: There is a complete difference, as you said, with being a qualified financial advisor in terms of having your your level four, your level six diploma or advanced diploma versus actually sitting and doing the job.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_01: And I think where a lot where a lot of this has stemmed from, Sam, is the fact that the role of the financial advisor has significantly changed certainly over the last 10 years.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and it's changed from this formal role of kind of like a technical sales role to much more of a relationship management role, where the financial advisor is the face of the firm.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_01: They are the contact point, the trusted contact point between the firm which is delivering the advice and the client.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_01: Take the technical side.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_01: Really important for financial advisors to have a good GP knowledge, general practitioner knowledge of financial planning concepts.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_01: And if they're a specialist, it's important that they do have that specialist knowledge as well.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_01: But ultimately, technical power planners have in a large part picked up this kind of technical specialist mantle from the financial advisor.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_01: And the financial advisor's role is now much more of that relationship management uh role.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_01: And financial planning qualifications haven't updated themselves to take this into account.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_01: They've not updated themselves to include these you know, these huge relationship management and soft skill elements that can make the difference between uh uh in in success, between a very, very successful financial advisor and a financial advisor that that has very little or no success.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_00: And those types of soft skills, as we're gonna call them soft skills, if that's okay, but those types of soft skills historically are sort of learnt on the job, aren't they?
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: They're trained out on the job.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_00: So actually, if someone's coming in as a trainee financial planner or their first role as a financial planner, or perhaps they're stepping up from power planning or administration into financial planning, that sort of coaching, that sort of training or that framework, if you like, is usually down to the person running the business who most likely is usually a financial planner.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_00: So a level of responsibility lands on their shoulders to train and develop the newbie, you know, as well as sort of doing their job at the same time.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I see what I what I really like about this qualification is, as you rightfully said, they get a book, you know, a guidebook, and it's a framework, isn't it?
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_00: It's a framework to how to do your job as a financial planner.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_00: And what I doubly like about it, it's not only a framework to how to do your job as a financial planner and the structure of it, it's also an um evidence folder, if you like, towards your competent advisor status.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I would I would completely agree.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_01: With the way that we assess you, it's not like we we you know we book out an exam venue or uh uh we get you to do an online timed exam for us, because in real life, financial advisors don't need to sit timed exams.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_01: In real life, financial advisors need to number one, they need to uh write suitability reports.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_01: Number two, they need to uh do their day-to-day job.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_01: So, for example, the work-based evidence that can be used in your work-based evidence portfolio as assessment evidence includes things like uh client feedback, things like uh learner-reflective statements, things like uh recorded and obviously suitably redacted client notes and client meetings, uh things like uh line manager statements, things like uh meeting observation forms that have been graded effective by your line manager.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_01: So there's a whole range of different pieces of evidence that can go into evidencing the meeting of the learning objectives, which are uh things like uh being able to uh to successfully establish and evaluate a client's risk profile.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, good.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_00: So it's the that's one, and that's the beautiful thing about it as well.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it is it is that evidence.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's clear, that's what I'm sort of seeing the understanding of this.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_00: It's not not only are you doing a level six qualification, so you've done your level four qualification, okay.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um, fair play, you've got your level four, but you've got absolutely no idea about delivering financial planning.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: So not only is it teaching you the structure and the framework of how to deliver financial planning, but at the same time, you are um taking yourself from level four qualification to level six qualification.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_00: So as you're as you're learning the structure of how to deliver financial planning, you are also getting yourself up to level six qualifications.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like a double bubble, isn't it?
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh yes, yeah, that that's that that that's absolutely right.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_01: The way that this qualification is structured in terms of depth and difficulty is uh much more on the on the advanced side.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_01: It's been said credit rated by the Scottish Qualifications Authority at SCQF level nine, which uh is broadly equivalent to your RQF level six in England.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um I think we're very, very used to talking about level four, level six purely because that's the um the framework that tends to be used as the English framework.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um bearing in mind we're based in Scotland, we use the Scottish framework, which is uh your SCQF rather than your RQF.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but it's but the two are broadly, broadly comparable.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_01: SQF level nine is broadly comparable to RQF level six.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um so yeah, once you've done your your level four deployment, this is going to give you an appropriate level of challenge when you're going out to deliver real life uh competent investment planning, uh, rather than kind of giving you uh an easy ride.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_01: This is uh it's a lot more uh in-depth, a lot more difficult than your your standard kind of level four level four qualifications.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's much more in-depth.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_01: But one of the things it will give you is it will give you the um the experience of studying at that higher level to allow you to then subsequently go on and complete your your CII or L IBF or whoever it is, their their charted theoretical exams.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so you see is it almost as a kind of bolt on to the level four, get yourself up to SQF level nine.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um that's the equivalent, that is the equivalent though of level six within the UK.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_01: So actually, well it's it's it's it's it's not about it's not about UK.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh there are there are several um credit frameworks within within the UK.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's just that we've got one for England, which is the RQF, we've got one for Scotland, which is the S SCQF.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, cool.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_01: So there's one for Wales and Northern Ireland and Europe as well.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_00: Uh right, I didn't I didn't know that actually.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: So we've got so for example, um USCQF level nine is also EQF level six, which is RQF level six.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, it gets gets a bit uh gets a bit confusing.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_00: So someone's sort of sitting here listening to this right now, and they're used to seeing the your you know your big your classic hits on the uh the training front and and qualification front, so the CII, L I B F C I S I.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: Why, you know, and they and they see SQF S E Q, sorry, what would you do to sort of calm their nerves that actually look the S the S E Q level nine qualification, so my practical investment planning qualification, what would you do to calm their nerves to say, look, take this qualification um first before taking your advanced qualifications, say through the L IBF or through the CII?
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_01: Well, the advanced uh I mean first of all, what I would say uh Sam is that uh there's plenty of English students want to do their their university at Glasgow or St Andrews or any of these other big big Scottish universities.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um they're not getting an RQF qualification, they're getting an SCQF qualification if they're going to one of these big big universities.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_01: But so there's no there's no real difference.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_01: Anyone that's uh you know that this this qualification is offered across across the UK, it's just that we selected this particular credit framework and it's no different from uh you know a student coming up to Glasgow or coming up to uh St Andrews or Edinburgh or anywhere anywhere else to do uh to do a qualification.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um it's just the particular credit framework that we've got, but but uh qualifications can cross borders, so to speak.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_01: Uh in terms of uh why they should do this before they go on to their advanced diploma exams, is because this teaches the day job.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_01: If you are an advisor that's recently achieved their uh their RQF level four diploma, and you are now starting the job, learn the job first, get good at it first.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: Then once you're good at it, and once you can you can do the day job and you can do the day-to-day, and you can uh do the fact-finding and do the uh do the cash flow modeling and do the suitability report writing, do the presenting, and you've got all the basics done.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_01: So this is the important point.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_01: This is it's it's not about a set of complex scenarios that we want you to solve.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_01: This is about doing the basics, but doing them at an incredibly high standard.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_01: So there's no 55% pass mark for it.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_01: This is a binary.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_01: You either you either get 100% or you get or you fail.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_01: Right, okay.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_01: So this is about doing the basics to a very, very high standard.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's not about high complexity.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_01: Then once you can do those basics to that very high standard, then move on to the CII or LABF advanced, more theoretical qualifications and apply the advanced theory that you'll be learning with those qualifications to the uh and build upon that that existing practical knowledge that you've got.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_00: So if I was to put my my my recruitment head on, if you like, you know, I run a recruitment company, have done for some time, and I'm investing time and energy now into attracting the next generation of financial planners to the financial planning profession.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: It's you know, it's no um secret that there's a lack of advisors coming in and plenty of financial advisors aging out of the profession.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: Now, what a lot of these um inexperienced um uh candidates come to me and say is, look, you know, what's the best route for me to go down first to get my qualification?
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_00: So I talk to them about all the routes now, yeah, every single route, what they are, what they do, and all of that, and the differences and the nuances to them.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_00: They ask me the question well, if I get my level four diploma qualification, will I be able then be able to become a financial planner?
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: So I have to talk to them a little bit about the realities of becoming a financial planner, what the qualification actually does.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't teach you to be a financial planner, it teaches you the theory.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_00: And then I've got to sort of say to them, look, once you then make a decision, do you want to want to get into financial planning?
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_00: There's different routes for you to go down.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_00: So perhaps you start as administrator, power planner, and financial planner.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_00: Now, with this qualification, what it sort of tells me is look, you know, if you really, really want to be a financial planner and you've gone out and off your own back got your level four qualification, had two guys like that I'm speaking to at the moment, both of them gone out off their own back, level four qualification, did it within 12 months.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_00: Now, they don't have those practical skills or understanding of actually how to structure a meeting or all the things that your uh PIP qualification will teach them.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_00: Now, my advice to them would be go and do this qualification.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_00: Take on this qualification because what it's almost doing is kind of pre-competent advisor status.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_00: So it's making you more marketable as a candidate, more experienced as a candidate, because you can go into your interview and say, look, not only have I done my level four qualification, so I'm prepared to give financial planning.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm gonna save you time, money, and energy on getting me up to level four, but I've also done my PIP qualification, which gets me up to level six, and it's given me the structure of how to do my job.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_00: So as an employer, they're gonna be like, wow, great.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: You know, this is another thing that I don't have to do.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_00: From my perspective, looking at it, this is like a this is solving a massive problem.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_00: This is solving a massive issue of Employers not wanting to take anybody on because they lack the experience, the understanding of what a financial planner does.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_00: So if I flip that over to the client side, to the person who's looking to hire and grow a team of people, they themselves might have some administrators, some power planners within their business.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_00: Let's call them the next generation of financial planners.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: They're chomping at the bit to become financial planners.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_00: Again, the company hasn't got the time or energy to be able to train them, develop them effectively, because they need them doing what they're doing.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_00: Hand them over to someone like yourself, get them up to level six and get them understanding the fundamental framework of what it is to be a practical financial planner.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_00: And that there again creates a portfolio that can be used towards competent advisor status to help speed up the process to getting financial advisors competent and out there delivering financial planning.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_00: So in my head, this is a massive solution to the problem that we face of getting people into financial planning positions.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_00: It speeds it up in my eyes.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I would I would completely I would completely agree with you.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_01: Ultimately, it's one thing for a candidate to go into an interview with an experienced hiring manager who's a financial planning professional and say, uh, yeah, here's my level four diploma.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I've never worked as a financial advisor before, but here's my level four diploma, and uh, you know, and you know, I want to see, I want to see uh if this is going to be for me and and how I do.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_01: But it's different if you go to that hiring manager and say, I've got my level four diploma, so I know all the all the technical stuff, but I also have my PIP qualification.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, right, okay.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_01: So if they've even if they've never heard of that, so what's what's what's your PIP qualification?
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_01: Well, first and foremost, it's an advanced level qualification.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: That's uh number one, it's an advanced level, it's uh it's an equivalent of your RQF level six.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_01: And uh what I've actually been done in doing that qualification is that I have actually produced.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_01: It's not just about assessing capability.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_01: So my capability has been assessed with my R04, but I can actually demonstrate a degree of competence in day-to-day financial planning.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_01: I have written a suitability report that has been graded as a pass by a uh a fellow of the Personal Finance Society.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: I've I've written a suitability report which has been graded as a pass by a fellow of the Personal Finance Society.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_01: In addition, I have produced a portfolio of work-based evidence, such as uh my own personal reflective statements, uh such as recordings of me uh with my with my webcam, uh, doing you know, uh presenting concepts such as inflation and risk and investment strategies to clients.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_01: I've uh collated uh notes.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_01: Here's my study notes, here I've collated things like uh agendas that I can use in real-life financial planning meetings.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um I have uh also undergone a an interview, a structured professional discussion with a uh with an assessor.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_01: And uh that all came out as a pass, and all of that was to test my my ability to deliver financial planning to clients in terms of the ability to uh deliver great pitch and fact-fire meetings, to synthesize a piece of professional financial advice, and also to deliver that advice.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, fantastic.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_00: So if I was no, let's take it, I'm a I'm a uh trainee financial advisor, okay.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_00: I'm thinking about becoming a financial planner.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not even in the industry, I'm not in the profession.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_00: So I've forked out a load of money to do my CII qualifications.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_00: I've I've put my head down, I've knocked them out in in record time, okay.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_00: But all of a sudden I've seen this PIP qualification, okay.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm thinking to myself, that sounds really good, and that's gonna really help get me a new job opportunity.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_00: So let's just talk about what is someone how long is it gonna take to pass this PIP qualification?
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_00: How long is it gonna take?
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_00: And what's involved?
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_00: Just break down the framework for me.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_00: So to let me know what the journey looks like.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: So it takes about 100 hours to complete.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and that can be spread out, for example, you could probably do um say uh I don't know, uh eight hours a week for about three months.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: That would that that would probably be about right for you.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_01: But it's up to you.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_01: You can complete it in record time.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: You could probably take two weeks to do it if you really, really wanted to nail it full time, or you could you could spread that out over a longer period of time.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_01: When you first enroll, what happens is that we'll arrange for you to have something called an induction meeting.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_01: And that induction meeting is with our uh is is with one of our assessors, and our assessor will uh engage with you, our assessor will explain the standard of uh our standard the standard required for you to pass your assessments and what the assessments involve.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_01: So you're supported right from the off.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_01: It's not like we send you a textbook and then say get on with it, right?
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_01: You're supported right from the off.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_01: Then once you have uh undergone your your induction, on that same day, you'll be issued with your first assignment.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_01: Now, that first assignment is your written suitability report that you need to produce.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_01: So we give you a fact find and you will need to take that fact find and read it and analyze it and produce a written suitability report off the back of that fact find for a piece of investment advice.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_01: We want to see everything that you would put into a normal suitability report, including a cash flow model.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_01: It must have a cash flow model in order to pass.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: We don't care which cash flow modeling software you use, you can use um uh voyant or cash calc or any other cash flow modeling software that you like.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_01: Furthermore, uh once you've once you've done that, once you've completed that assessment and sent that over to us by via email, we'll we'll grade that for you.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_01: It's not gonna take uh an exhaustive amount of time or anything like that.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_01: We'll grade it and uh let's say that let's say that it didn't quite meet our standards.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_01: We're not just gonna send you a any you know an email basically say you know with four letters on it saying yeah, fail.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna support you in it, and we would say, right, this is where you fell down.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_01: Can you please get that get correct this uh correct this mistake and get it back to us?
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_01: We'll tell you where the mistake is.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, we actually publish, we publish our marking criteria on our website.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_01: So you've got all the support that you need.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_01: You've got the textbook, you've got 24-7 access to a trainer, and also you've got our own marking criteria that we use to mark it.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_01: So it's not going to take weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks for us to get back to you with a with a decision.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it's it's it's a relatively short process once you've submitted it.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_01: Usually it takes between two and three weeks for us to get back to you with a with an initial decision.
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_01: Once you've completed that first that first task, that first assignment, you can then move on to your second assignment.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_01: And your second assignment is in building the portfolio of work-based evidence.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_01: Now that portfolio of work-based evidence can be it's going to be unique to you.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_01: Now we provide you again very detailed guidance about what constitutes and what needs to make up that body of work-based evidence.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_01: We don't uh, you know, we don't kind of let you let you just get on with it.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_01: We give you that guidance.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_01: We tell you what the evidence needs to look like and the standard of evidence that we're looking for.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_01: But it can include things like uh video role plays, actual recordings of client meetings with the client details obviously suitably redacted, uh, fact-find notes, uh, written agendas, uh, even uh things like scripts or you you presenting something to your webcam to a recording of your webcam.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_01: We want to see that you can do those soft skills, such as explain things like disclosure documents, and explain things like um risk profiling and explain things like inflation to customers.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_01: Once you've collated that that body of evidence, that you know, again, we give you a tick list in order to make sure that you've you've covered everything that you need to cover in that body of evidence, you send that to us, we'll grade it, and then assuming that that's a pass, you'll then uh we'll you'll then move on to your final assessment.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_01: Your final assessment is simply a uh Teams or a Zoom call with one of our assessors, and we'll put you through your paces, we'll ask you various questions about your uh about your achievement of the learning outcomes.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh they'll usually be in the form of competency-based questions or short role plays, such as uh Sam, can you tell me about your charging structure?
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_01: Now we want to see that you that if a client asks you, that you can like that uh immediately launch into well, this is exactly how our charging structure works.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_01: And it's clear, concise, it uses relevant examples where necessary, etc.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_01: And once you have completed that, our your assessor will say thank you very much.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_01: Well, the call will end, and the assessor will then uh contact uh contact me with their decision, and it will be up to me to go back to you with yay or nay, did you pass?
• 31:48
  SPEAKER_01: Fantastic.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that's really simple, and it's that mentorship approach that you're providing.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_00: It's not just so much a trainer, but it's a mentorship approach.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_00: Now, what I really like about this as well is because I am that kind of experiential learner, so I am somebody that has to kind of have a hands-on approach to something.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_00: So this ticks boxes for me.
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I you know, the theoretical side of financial planning, I know that you have to do it, I know you have to pass your qualifications and get yourself to level four.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_00: And as you say, you know, take the advanced papers as well and work on that side of it.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_00: But the hands-on approach, the actual practical side to it, this suits me massively.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I think it suits a huge amount of people out as well.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_00: But also, what it does, it builds upon confidence in the individual.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_00: Confidence that they're not shooting from the, you know, shooting in the dark, are they?
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_00: So when they actually go into the role of financial planner, they're not shooting in the dark.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_00: They're ready and and and trained to do it, what they should do as a job.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: That's a confidence then that is then passed over to the employer, but a great confidence for the person that's actually going into the financial planning role and knowing that they know exactly what they need to do.
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the part of it that I, again, I just I just think is I really like because there is nothing out there, is there, like this?
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_01: Uh no, I don't, I'm not aware of anything that's like this uh out in the market.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_00: You know, there might be some people out there training people to uh deliver, you know, coaching people out how to deliver the best meeting with a client or something like that, but nothing that then runs alive runs alongside a qualification that gets you up to.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_01: I would probably agree with you.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_01: I don't I don't know of anything off the top of my head which um uh assesses the soft skills uh at all.
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_01: You might get um it's a bit like uh advisor academies.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_01: There's plenty of advisor academies out there with large firms uh that that that you know seem to be seem to be running absolutely great, but what if you're not on a large firm?
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_01: What if you're you know what what if you're you're on your own or if you're in a small firm and you've not got access to those academies?
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_01: Well, this provides essentially access to that academy for every firm in the profession for as little as 799 pounds per person, yeah.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_00: Have you started talking to the academies and working with the academies at all?
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um I'm I'm starting to approach them, yes.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_01: But uh this is still very early days at this point.
• 34:12
  SPEAKER_00: But the great thing is as well, though, is tried and tested, isn't it?
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_00: You've got people going through this process at the moment.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, on the telephone call that we had, you explained to me also that you had someone say, Teach this old dog some new tricks.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_00: If someone came to you who's been in the profession for quite some time, I believe you've mentioned they might have been chartered, and it said, like, you know, teach me what let's you know, let's see if you can teach me a thing or two.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_00: How's that going?
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it's it's it's been going great.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_01: And the silence that we've had have been a range of individuals.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_01: It's not just been kind of one type of person or one type of individual, it's been a full range of different people of different ages, of different backgrounds, um, who are interested in taking this.
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_01: We've had uh people who are you know young, uh relatively new, uh trainee financial advisors who are recently uh dipped for qualified.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_01: And we've also got um more experienced, chartered financial planners who have been doing it for the last 20 years and who are wanting to uh essentially get a uh an independent picture of what does good look like in 2021?
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_00: Because again, as well, I suppose historically the qualifications, some of them are really old, you know, they date back pre-RDR, don't they?
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_00: Some of the modules.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um and moving into the new world, and as you rightfully said at the beginning of the call, the role of a financial planner isn't just product sales, is it?
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's very much relationship-based.
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_00: And um again, the qualification that you, you know, your qualification sets somebody up not only for becoming not only for having the sort of the part theory arranged as but it gives you the practical skills.
• 35:50
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the part that's lacking at the moment.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the part that kind of creates a barrier to entry, a barrier from the client's perspective of hiring somebody because they don't have the practical experience, but also barrier to entry for somebody who's got absolutely no experience about financial planning and can't then articulate what it is a financial planner does, even though they hold charters.
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's it's it's crazy.
• 36:11
  SPEAKER_00: So the way I look at it is your qualification is exciting, your qualification is a game changer, you know, without a shadow of a doubt.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I think I'll I'll be mentioning it to absolutely everybody I speak to, because to me, it's a no-brainer.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_00: Get this qualification, get yourself up to this level, make sure you know what quality looks like in 2021 as a financial planner, what it is you're meant to be doing.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_00: Not only that, you're going to get the equivalent of level six in the in England, um, uh you know, SQ, S S D Q F level nine in Scotland, but it's like it's it's a no-brainer to me.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_00: So, and you've created this whole thing yourself, haven't you?
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_00: The framework, you've got the documents, you've got the guide, you're running the training alongside it.
• 36:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so it's your baby.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_00: So the last thing you're gonna want to do is have anybody go through that process and fail.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_00: And what I love as well, it's not an exam at the end of it.
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_01: No, there's no, there's no there's no written exam.
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_01: But but then you have to think, but but financial advisors don't, you know, it's not like it's a case of, oh, right, yeah, Mr.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_01: Klein, um, yeah, I'm just gonna sit with you and I'm just gonna go through this exam with you.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and that this this whole thing about knowledge recall in a written exam, it's it's just crazy because that's not how financial planners work.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_01: If a financial planner think, think what's more useful, Sam.
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_01: Advice is going through uh a financial planning concept with a client, particularly technical one.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_01: What's more useful?
• 37:39
  SPEAKER_01: Being able to just say, right, I know I know what that is.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_01: I know what that is.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_01: Bearing in mind you're taking the risk because you might not know what it is, or having the confidence and being taught the structure of how to say, Mr.
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_01: Client, I don't know the answer to that question.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_01: It's a particularly uh niche one that that comes up very, very occasionally.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_01: What I'd like to do is get you a complete and full researched answer once I'm back at the office.
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_01: And I'll email you today with the full answer, and we can go through it on the phone if um uh if if need be, if you need more guidance on it.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_01: To me, being able to say, you know, no, I'm I'm unsure of that, and do that with confidence rather than stutter through a uh a technical an answer to a technical question that you may not be sure of, to me, that's far more valuable for a financial planner.
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, without a shadow of a doubt.
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I think you can't really fake it so you make it as a financial planner either, can you?
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I mean, your credibility will sort of look terrible if you start telling somebody something and it's wrong.
• 38:43
  SPEAKER_00: It's obvious also in your face.
• 38:45
  SPEAKER_00: I think honesty and transparency in this situation is all about, is what it's all about, because it builds trust with the client.
• 38:50
  SPEAKER_00: You know, anything that can help you improve upon that and also take away that pressure that you should know everything, because you know, not everybody knows everything.
• 38:58
  SPEAKER_00: Some people are absolute machines at remembering things, but they get things wrong as well.
• 39:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 39:03
  SPEAKER_00: So everyone, everyone does.
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, there's we're all of us human, right?
• 39:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and I think that there's this, particularly with uh with more inexperienced uh advisors, it's this thing about you must know everything.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_01: But if you're taught how to use what I call the car park, uh and that's the car park is used on the course.
• 39:22
  SPEAKER_01: If if if you don't know the answer to a question and you stammer your way through it using abysmal soft skills, whether that's right or that's wrong, we're gonna we're gonna highlight that to you in your assessment.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna say, hang on a minute.
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's that's not that's not good.
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_01: But if you actually say, I don't know the answer to that question, what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna park it for now, and I'll get back to you by the end of the day with it, and we can go through it on the phone.
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_01: Brilliant answer to a question.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_01: As long as you're not doing it for every single question that they're asking.
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_00: No, that no client is gonna mind that.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_00: But also, that's the purpose of this qualification.
• 39:59
  SPEAKER_00: This qualify this is the purpose of the qualification is to establish what you know and what you don't know in those situations.
• 40:04
  SPEAKER_00: So you're better prepared than when you do sit down with a client of exactly what it is you need to say.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_00: Now, you may still not know 100% of it, but sure as shit, if you did this qualification, you'd know a hell of a lot more than not doing the qualification.
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_00: And you'd be a far better financial planner and far more prepared, therefore, more confidence in your ability to be an advisor, but more confidence from the client side when hiring somebody with this qualification.
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I I would say so.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_01: I would say so.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_01: In terms of uh, yeah, we still expect you to have a very, very strong standard of knowledge.
• 40:35
  SPEAKER_01: We expect you to be able to explain to us, for example, everything in your written assessment, everything in the suitability report that you have produced.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_01: We are expecting you to know that like the absolute back of your hand.
• 40:47
  SPEAKER_01: We expect you, for example, what we may do in our in the professional discussion is challenge you to explain the cash flow model that you've produced.
• 40:58
  SPEAKER_01: And if you have produced a cash flow model that you don't understand, trust me, we're gonna know.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_00: And what I like about this as well, and when you're talking about cash flow modeling, because a lot of the guys that go through and girls that go through the level four qualification um and want to become financial planners, obviously they've got no experience of cash flow modeling, you know, they've got no understanding of it.
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_00: Lots of people in administrative roles, power planners saying no experience of cash flow modeling.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_00: So actually, this qualification gets you prepared for that as well, um, which I think is really useful because um no one knows about it, really, you know.
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_00: So no one knows about it.
• 41:33
  SPEAKER_00: Listen, Michael, really, really enjoyed talking to you today.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_00: Is there anything else at all you'd like to add before we close this conversation off?
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um the only I will add one thing, if I may, um quite shamelessly.
• 41:46
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Pip is currently on uh kind of like a like like an early an early sign-up special, just until the 25th of January.
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_01: So it's 799, it's standard retail price.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_01: But if you buy before the 25th of January, you get it for 80 quid off at 719, and that's like our early bird special, so to speak.
• 42:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh well worth taking advantage of the savings.
• 42:09
  SPEAKER_01: And even if you can't do it now, you can postpone your enrollment indefinitely because your 12-month time limit to complete the three assignments doesn't kick off until you have had your induction meeting.
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_01: Now we do these we can we can schedule these inductions pretty much whenever you want.
• 42:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so it's a case of you tell us when you're ready for that 12 months to kick off.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_01: It's not a case of the moment you buy the exam, you've got 12 months.
• 42:35
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so you're just from your induction.
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_00: Perfect.
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_00: But what I'm sort of a quick question I'll ask is then if somebody wants to sign up for the qualification and and get that discount, A, they don't have to then start it straight away so they can defer it.
• 42:49
  SPEAKER_00: But do you expect payment before the 25th?
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_01: Uh yeah, yeah.
• 42:55
  SPEAKER_01: When I talk, when I if you purchase it from our website before the 25th, you will get that discount.
• 43:02
  SPEAKER_00: Well, great.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_00: Look, look, we'll we'll talk about a little um financial planner life discount uh code as well, because um obviously got a big big following here and we want to get this out to as many people.
• 43:10
  SPEAKER_00: And it's certainly something that I want to partner with because I think it's it's it's it's brilliant.
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_00: I think anything that's gonna get people quickly understanding the role of what it is they need to do in a practical sense and get their level six, I think is an absolute winner and a game changer for everybody involved in growing the profession and attracting more financial planners.
• 43:28
  SPEAKER_00: So fair play, Michael.
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_00: It's brilliant talking to you.
• 43:30
  SPEAKER_00: Great to learn about the PIP qualification, and I wish you all the best, mate.
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks so much, Sam.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_00: I've really enjoyed being on here.
• 43:36
  SPEAKER_00: Top man.
• 43:37
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks.
• 43:37
  SPEAKER_00: Good time.
• 43:38
  SPEAKER_00: Cheers, thanks, bye for now.