AFA has success in building links legal and accounting professions.

A sell-out Association of Financial Advisers (AFA) Christmas event in South Australia is proof the AFA is building strong collegial links with both the legal and accounting professions.

AFA State Director of South Australia, Dave Slovinec said the AFA issued set numbers of tickets to both the Young Lawyers: The Law Society of South Australia and the Institute of Chartered Accountants Australia and both allocations were sold out well ahead of the event which was held last Friday, 29 November in Adelaide.

“We had to move venues this year in order to accommodate a total of 350 professionals,” Mr Slovinec said. “This is a great endorsement of the initiatives the AFA is taking to encourage strong relationships between complementary professions.”

Many AFA members have already established very strong, long-standing relationships with other professionals as a result of the events.

“We believe each profession has expertise that is necessary for a seamless and successful advice process. In order to deliver great advice to more Australians, we believe it is important that as professionals, we all support each other and recognize the valuable role each of us plays,” Mr Slovinec said.

The SA Christmas event was supported by a number of corporate sponsors and all profits from the event will be donated to the South Australian charity Little Heroes Foundation.

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Reporting to Count CEO Andrew Gale, Ms Tonitto will be responsible for the development of innovative strategies to accelerate growth of Count and of Count franchisees’ businesses. She will also oversee the rollout of a new Practice Management program for Count advisers.

“Lee will develop and implement growth strategies for the Count network and individual advisory businesses at an important time in the company’s development. She will also drive marketing initiatives to enhance Count’s brand and market positioning and to attract new clients in targeted areas,” Mr Gale said.

Ms Tonitto has extensive experience in wealth management marketing, distribution, and licensee network growth. She comes to Count after 15 years with the AMP group, where she was most recently General Manager, Strategy and Direct, and three years at AMP wealth management firm Hillross Financial Services.

At Hillross, Ms Tonitto held National Manager roles covering strategy, practice management and business operations. In this capacity she developed a cohesive practice management strategy and an online practice management hub. She also assisted 115 Hillross advisers with client segmentation and a comprehensive change management program in transitioning to Fee for Service.

At AMP, Ms Tonitto focused on developing and implementing distribution and marketing programs for financial planning services. This included a leading role in growing planner numbers through the creation of the AMP Horizons Financial Planning Academy, establishing a Customer Value Offer Development function and developing new brand architecture and advertising programs.

Chair of leading industry body the Australian Marketing Institute (AMI), Ms Tonitto’s experience is backed by an Executive MBA from the University of NSW’s Australian Graduate School of Management and a Diploma of Financial Planning.

Count provides its network of 350 accounting firms Australia-wide with high quality research, technical, business development and professional training support.

“The appointment of Ms Tonitto also demonstrates our dedication to existing Count franchisees, where we aim to help them grow their accounting and financial planning businesses to their fullest potential,” Mr Gale said.

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As a strong supporter of the use of Self Managed Superannuation Funds where appropriate I’ve long been of the view that the very words ‘Self Managed’ are a misnomer.  I suspect the absolute majority of SMSFs in operation are not ‘self managed’ in every sense of the words.  These funds are more appropriately titled ‘Private Superannuation Funds’ and the government would do well to look at ‘what’s in a name’ when it next reviews superannuation.  I suspect the words ‘Self Managed’ (or Do it Yourself) and the associated accounting and compliance costs are a deterrent to many people who might otherwise be interested in having a greater level of engagement and decision making with their superannuation.

While ‘appropriate’ relates to the minimum level of assets in a private fund (to justify the annual accounting and audit costs) the basic laws of economics dictates that increased demand which is met by supply will see such costs fall, relatively speaking, and a broadening of the ‘appropriateness’ of private (SMSF) funds.  Increased participation in private (SMSF) funds suggests an eventual growth in specialist accounting service providers which can extract profit from increased scale.

The proliferation in private super funds (SMSFs) continues for a range of reasons but the point is that the proliferation exhibits an increased level of engagement in retirement planning by people who establish such funds.  This in itself is a good thing –  a workforce more engaged in their retirement planning suggests people will be more attune to issues around adequacy.

The government should recognise the blatantly obvious fact that SMSFs are not ‘self managed’ and consider a name change to ‘Private Superannuation Funds’ and openly encourage more Australians to engage with saving for their retirement.

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