Grant Howe

Tasmanian financial advisory firm, Zenith Wealth, has joined Fortnum Private Wealth, after an extensive review of Australian Financial Services Licensing options including self-licensing.

According to Grant Howe, Zenith Wealth Managing Director, the group was attracted to Fortnum’s in-depth understanding of advisory businesses, pragmatic approach to advice delivery, and commitment to helping advisers achieve their personal and professional goals.

“We are looking to scale our operations and grow so we need a licensee that can come alongside and partner with us on that journey,” he said.

“We need a licensee that understands and encourages our client-first ethos, and has the knowledge, experience, systems and solutions to help us drive practice efficiencies and deliver a stronger value and service proposition to our clients.”

Zenith Wealth has offices in Burnie and Devonport in Tasmania’s North West, and a satellite office in Maroochydore, Queensland. It is also looking to expand into Victoria.

The firm provides holistic financial advice across a range of areas including superannuation and investments, retirement planning, and personal risk insurance. It employs 16 staff including six financial advisers.

Mr Howe said the group’s transition to Fortnum from AMP’s Hillross, concluded a year-long search that included discussions with around half a dozen licensees and a serious look at self-licensing.

“Our focus is on growth not running an AFSL. Fortnum offers everything we need from technology solutions to research and technical expertise. We determined that we couldn’t do it any cheaper or better,” he said.

“We have a lot of confidence in the great team at Fortnum.”

Fortnum Group Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director Neil Younger said Zenith Wealth encapsulated the type of business that the group wanted to partner with.

“Zenith is an established business that is dynamic and has fantastic growth potential. It recognises the value that a strong, capable licensee and business partner can add to help it take advantage of opportunities in the market,” Mr Younger said.

“We are focused on recruiting high quality businesses but it’s not about quantity. In order to achieve our objectives and help our member firms achieve their objectives, there must be a strong cultural fit and alignment of interests. That is the baseline from which we can achieve results together.”

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Former AMP Partnership Manager, Simon Wright, and former Practice Manager at Steel City Financial Planning, Jaimie Ramsey, have been appointed as Practice Engagement and Growth Managers, with responsibility for driving the efficiency, profitability and value of FPW member firms. Wright and Ramsey, who are based in Brisbane and Sydney respectively, will report to Robert Skinner, Head of Practice Engagement and Growth at Fortnum.

“Over the past three years, Fortnum has invested significantly in people and capability across every facet of the business. This has coincided with a period of steady, consistent growth for the licensee and our underlying member firms, and that momentum is building,” Skinner said.

“As a licensee, our goal is to continue recruiting high quality practices while enhancing and expanding the services we provide. Simon and Jaimie are well respected industry professionals who are passionate about working with advisers to grow their businesses.”

Prior to joining Fortnum, Wright spent 15 years at AMP including eight years as a process and technology specialist with responsibility for helping practices implement technology solutions to drive process improvements.

He has a Bachelor of Business, Management and Marketing from the University of Queensland.

Prior to her role at Steel City Financial Planning, Ramsey held practice development roles at Securitor Financial Group, AMP Financial Planning and Lonsdale Financial Group.

Ramsey has deep practice development experience in coaching and business transformation. She has worked with practice principals to improve profitability, efficiencies and governance. She is also highly skilled at business planning, succession planning and mergers and acquisitions.

Ramsey has a Diploma of Financial Services (Financial Planning). Fortnum Group Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director Neil Younger said the group’s key strategic priorities continued to be recruiting high quality practices, achieving requisite scale, and assisting member firms to grow and operate more efficiently to reduce their cost to serve.

“While growth and scale are important, it is also critical that we nurture and protect Fortnum’s brand and unique culture by only bringing on like-minded, high calibre advisers who share our values and are committed to serving their clients for the long-term,” Younger said.

“We believe the bulk of regulatory change is behind us so it’s now time to focus on incorporating those changes into our businesses as efficiently as possible.”

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Ray Miles

Australian Financial Services Licensee, Fortnum Private Wealth has announced that the group’s Founder and Executive Chairman, Ray Miles, will step down from executive duties at the end of the year, capping off a stellar 51 year career in financial services.

Miles, who will continue serving as Non-Executive Chairman, established Fortnum Private Wealth in 2010 to support professional financial advisers seeking an alternative to the large institutionally-owned dealer groups that dominated the landscape at the time.

Prior to that, he co-founded Associated Planners in 1989, after starting his career in life insurance with MLC and later Aetna Life & Casualty.

At Associated Planners, he led the group’s incredible growth from 13 advisers to 450 advisers nationally and over $18 billion in funds under management and advice. In 2004, he orchestrated the sale of Associated Planners to Challenger Financial Services Group for $99.9 million and its merger with Challenger’s Garrisons Financial Planning to form Genesys Wealth Advisers, serving as the group’s inaugural Chief Executive.

Commenting on Ray’s contribution to Fortnum and the broader financial services industry, Neil Younger, Group Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of Fortnum Private Wealth said: “Ray is a pioneer of the advice industry. He built two exceptional businesses, effectively from scratch, and has championed the value of professional advice for five decades”.

“Ray has never shied away from expressing his opinions on key issues including the separation of product and advice, vertical integration and volume rebates. He has been a vocal supporter of higher education and training standards, and regulation that strengthens consumer protections.”

“As Non-executive chair, he will continue providing counsel to the Fortnum Board and leadership team, monitoring the group’s management and performance, and serving the interests of shareholders, all of whom are Fortnum advisers and staff.”

Miles said: “The industry has changed a lot in the past 50 years. After decades of regulation, which has been tough, the model has been reconfigured to put the client at the centre. The people at Fortnum live out that client-first philosophy day in and day out, and I am proud of what we have achieved so far and will continue to build”.

“I would like to thank and acknowledge Neil for his vision, commitment and support these past five years. When looking for a successor, you look for someone younger, smarter and capable of taking the business to the next level. Most importantly, you look for someone who will care for staff, advisers and clients as much as you do. You can’t tell that from day one and we’ve all seen someone come into a business and take a lot of money out but add zero value or destroy value.

“I didn’t want what happened at Genesys after I exited to repeat itself, which is why I stayed on as executive chair for the past five years. I am now more than confident to step down.”

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Titled, The inevitable advice journey: Where professional advisory firms are set to land, the paper claims the majority of advice businesses are not yet achieving their full potential and are vulnerable to attack, despite having a compelling value proposition and robust systems and processes, because they are not scalable and lack a clear strategy to get to scale.

The paper outlines the path advisers need to take to bulk up, reduce their vulnerability to external shocks and significantly enhance their capital value.

According to Neil Younger, Group Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of Fortnum Private Wealth, advisers have done a lot of great work to refine their value proposition and improve processes, governance and culture but now attention must be given to driving organic and inorganic growth if advisers want to create a material asset.

“Many advisers want to run their own business and many have done an incredible job to date but the industry is going through a transformational phase and advice businesses, which have traditionally struggled to grow beyond a certain point, let’s say, $2 million to $3 million in revenue, will need to get much bigger. They need to bulk up to reach their full potential and build something great,” he said.

“While some advisers are happy to run a smaller businesses and simply take home a decent salary, as the industry advances towards a bona fide profession, we’re starting to see more ambitious, visionary entrepreneurs. They are not content to run a good business. They understand the macro themes driving long-term demand for professional advice, they want to be leaders in the emerging advice profession and, when they ultimately retire, they want to have a material asset to sell.”

Presenting to over 200 advisers and support staff at the group’s national conference on October 19-20, Younger outlined the key financial and non-financial benefits of scale including purchasing power, a stronger employee value proposition to secure and retain talent, and the ability to offer a broader value proposition and “grow share of wallet”.

Citing the paper, he attributed the industry’s failure to successfully implement the integrated one-stop-shop model, despite a lot of hype in the early 2000s, to a lack of scale.

“The one-stop-shop experiment generally failed because most businesses were simply too small. They didn’t have the resources to invest in the systems, processes and skills required to expand their value proposition and efficiently execute,” he said.

“To develop and execute a strategy that will drive efficiencies, scale and capital value, advisers don’t need to do everything themselves. More than likely, they will need to leverage the expertise of experienced business partners.”

Download a copy of The inevitable advice journey: Where professional advisory firms are set to land.

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Chris Fallico

Running an advice business will become increasingly challenging in the future, unless they can gain the necessary advantages of scale, while avoiding the issues identified by the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry, according to a new whitepaper from Fortnum Private Wealth.

According to the Fortnum whitepaper, The Advice Business of the Future, scale has traditionally been the domain of the institutional model. However, new collective approaches are emerging to ensure profitability and sustainability. These will evolve to create the new operating solutions for the future.

The Advice Business of the Future aims to challenge the way licensees and advisers can work together to achieve better outcomes for the end consumer, and the overall business.

With subsidised advice models coming under increased pressure, Neil Younger, Managing Director and Group CEO of Fortnum, says there needs to be a better way forward.

“Advice collectives will begin to emerge from licensee structures, as they exist today, as the rules of engagement are realigned for participants within those businesses. Advice businesses will have to start adjusting their business model to suit the new world of advice, and it will be a timeline of up to five years for the industry to readjust to the emerging reality”, says Mr Younger.

Chris Fallico, Principal and Financial Adviser of Acadia Wealth Advice, agrees that the success of the collective is dependent on aligning with the right people, philosophy and operating model.

“It can be an attractive proposition for advisers who, in partnership with the right collective, could access significant scale benefits for clients, and increase and unlock business value”, says Mr Fallico. “The new world of advice will need to feature the client front and centre, and businesses will need to learn how to deliver those client-focussed services while finding ways to grow.” As practices seek to extend their business value proposition and product subsidisation is removed from licensee models, businesses need to consider the best way to grow.

The white paper provides some thoughts for discussion. Read the white paper.

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Ms Psathas – who has over 15 years’ industry experience including project and change manager roles – will join Fortnum’s leadership team, reporting directly to Neil Younger, Managing Director of Fortnum.

Ms Psathas joins Fortnum from ClearView Wealth Limited where she was responsible for the day-to-day operations of the group’s aligned dealer groups Matrix Planning Solutions and ClearView Financial Advice.

She also previously held operational roles at BW Financial Advice and Commonwealth Bank.

Mr Younger said the appointment of Ms Psathas further strengthened Fortnum’s team.

“Jenny brings with her extensive financial services and operations experience and we are excited to have her on board,” he said.

“As a licensee we are continuously looking for ways to be more efficient and improve the services we deliver to advisers, and Jenny is ideally placed to help drive the growth and success of Fortnum.”

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Ms Thomas, who has over 15 years of financial services experience, will report to Joel Taylor, Managing Director of Fortnum Private Wealth.

She will enhance the delivery of Fortnum’s professional advice program to the group’s national network of advisers. “Kerry has the right blend of skills, expertise and values, and is the right cultural fit for Fortnum,” Mr Taylor said.

“It’s important that our staff – and advisers – have a high degree of personal integrity, and embrace our high performance, collaborative culture. Kerry is an experienced professional who has a genuine rapport with advisers and she is a great addition to the team.

The appointment of Ms Thomas coincides with the appointment of Cassandra Mackay to the role of Practice Technology Manager. Ms Mackay joined Fortnum earlier this year from Bendigo and Adelaide Bank where she was previously Digital Advice Manager.

Chief Executive and Managing Director of Fortnum Financial Group, Neil Younger said the appointment of Ms Thomas and Ms Mackay formed part of restructure designed to strengthen the licensee’s proposition to advisers.

“Our focus continues to be on delivering relevant advice solutions that drive practice efficiency, productivity and profitability. We are committed to streamlining advice processes in order to free up advisers to do what they do best which is service clients, give advice and deliver improved client outcomes”, Mr Younger said.

“Consumer needs and preferences are rapidly evolving and the advice industry has to evolve to keep up. Clients are looking for innovative advice solutions that meet their needs and as a licensee we want to be on the forefront of change. Kerry will be spearheading the delivery of our new advice initiatives to help advisers and practices capture opportunities.”

Mr Younger is thrilled to have Ms Thomas on board the Fortnum team. “Kerry’s commitment and experience to enhancing advice solutions aligns perfectly to Fortnum and we are excited to have someone with Kerry’s knowledge and reputation join the team.”

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Mr Younger will work closely with Fortnum Financial Advisers managing director Joel Taylor, Innova Asset Management managing director Dan Miles and group chairman Ray Miles.

“Neil is a well-regarded, experienced wealth management executive with proven skills across a range of areas and we’re fortunate to be able to attract someone of his calibre to take Fortnum to the next stage,” Ray Miles said.

“Neil’s appointment enables me to step back from the day-to-day operation of the Fortnum group to focus on my core skill set of recruiting advisers and working with our practices.”

He added that while Fortnum had established a comprehensive, award-winning licensing and dealer services’ solution, considerable growth opportunities lay ahead and the business had plans to lead the evolution of the professional services advice firms.

“We believe in a complete end-to-end solution for clients and business life stage solutions for our advisers. Neil’s brief is to lead the ongoing development and implementation of those solutions,” he said.

Mr Younger, who has held senior wealth management roles at ANZ, BT Financial Group and Commonwealth Bank, comes to Fortnum with deep expertise in the areas of licensee management and advice. He also has considerable Board and Responsible Management experience.

“Fortnum is a quality business with considerable growth opportunities and I’m excited about working with Ray, Joel, Dan and the team to take the group forward,” Mr Younger said.

“As the industry continues to respond to evolving client expectations and businesses to a very different operating environment, advice specialist businesses such as Fortnum are well placed to evolve solutions and to lead. As a licensee with a client-centric mindset, and a proven record of helping professional services firms grow, Fortnum has a compelling offer and is in a strong position to continue to attract quality advisers.”

The post Former ANZ Managing Director to lead expansion for Fortnum Financial Group appeared first on AdviserVoice.

Joel Taylor

Boutique advisory firm Cardena Private Wealth, formerly trading as Arrive Wealth Management Sydney, has joined non-institutionally owned licensee Fortnum Financial Advisers, signalling an exciting new era in the practice’s growth and direction.

Prior to joining Fortnum, the team at Cardena Private Wealth had been authorised by AMP’s Hillross dealer group for 14 years.

Director of Cardena Private Wealth Jonathan Kilborn said the move to Fortnum positioned the business strongly to continue delivering quality professional advice and best-of-breed services to high net worth individuals and families.

“We considered all our options, including applying for our own AFSL, and conducted an extensive review of the market before deciding to partner with Fortnum,” he said.

“Fortnum’s core values, operating model and ownership structure align with our core values and requirements. We wanted a licensee that was not part of a financial institution and had a long proven track record of successfully running a dealer group and overseeing the provision of client centric financial advice.”

“Fortnum will support us to focus on growing the business while doing what we do best, which is look after our clients.”

Managing director of Fortnum Financial Advisers Joel Taylor said: “We are extremely pleased to have a high quality professional services firm like Cardena join Fortnum. We are very selective of the practices we take on and our advisers set a high bar in terms of professionalism. Cardena is a great fit.

“It is an exceptional business with a great team of people.”

Mr Taylor said Fortnum continued to experience strong momentum and was well positioned for future growth.

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Ray Miles

Stratus Financial Group is the winner of the prestigious ‘2016 Principal Practice of the Year’, presented at the Fortnum Financial Advisers Awards held recently.

The Fortnum Financial Advisers ‘Principal Practice of the Year’ Award recognises the Fortnum practice that demonstrates the highest level of financial performance, offers the best client value proposition, makes an outstanding contribution to its own community and engages deeply with the Fortnum dealer group in terms of participating in training, coaching and other business development, charitable and social events.

Fortnum Private Wealth Chairman Ray Miles said, “The ‘Principal Practice of the Year’ Award is a highly sought after prize as it recognises the Fortnum practice that is most committed to excellence not only in terms of technical knowledge and business development, but for its outstanding and genuine commitment to our client-first values”.

The Stratus Financial Group leadership team comprises Brett Cribb, Ross Munro and Steven Nicholas.

In accepting the award on behalf of Stratus Financial Group, Brett Cribb acknowledged that a whole-of-team commitment to fulfilling a pledge expressed simply as: ‘Making it happen’ is central to their success.

“As a team we are committed to ongoing education and remaining abreast of the continually changing landscape of financial advice. Collectively we are knowledgeable, experienced, well-coordinated and genuine in our endeavours and this enables us to offer the integrated and multi-layered services, that is reflected in our name, and that our clients value,” Mr Cribb said.

Stratus Financial Group delivers bespoke financial advice that is specific to their clients who include singles, couples and families; business owners, executives and professionals; and people heading towards retirement and aged care.
Mr Cribb says that while every individual’s circumstances are different, the common factor is complexity.

“Central to our theme of ‘Making it happen’ for our clients is to create clarity from complexity which enables confident, informed decision making,” Mr Cribb said.

Brett Cribb holds a Bachelor of Engineering (Hons) and a Diploma of Financial Planning. He is a Senior Associate with the Financial Services Institute of Australia and a Member of the Financial Planning Association.
Ross Munro is a Certified Financial Planner and holds a Bachelor of Commerce. He is a Chartered Accountant and a Member of the Financial Planning Association.

Steven Nicholas holds a Bachelor of Applied Science, Graduate Diplomas in Applied Finance and Investment, Financial Planning, and Agricultural Economics. Steve is an ASX Accredited Listed Product Adviser and holds SMSF Accreditation.

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