Jacobsen’s appointment follows the recent decision by David Carney, VBP Co-founder and longstanding CEO, to step back from day-to-day management to focus on business development, marketing and innovation.

Paul Barrett, Chairman of VBP and CEO of AZ NGA, said Jacobsen’s track record of successfully transforming wealth management businesses and his experience in strategy, technology and M&A strongly positioned him to lead VBP into its next phase of growth.

“Nathan is a highly respected financial services executive and we are extremely fortunate to have him on board to lead this dynamic business. VBP’s vision and purpose is to support professional advisory firms to grow and deliver generational change for their clients and, over the last decade, it has become an invaluable business partner to some of Australia’s best advice businesses,” Barrett said.

“David Carney has done an incredible job of turning VBP into Australia’s leading adviser services utility and we are pleased that he will remain with the business to facilitate a smooth leadership transition and play a key role in the group’s ongoing success.”

In his new role as Head of Growth, Carney will report to Jacobsen.

VBP was established in 2013 by David Carney and David Deegan to deliver a range of outsourced business solutions including financial planning administration, accounting and bookkeeping, paraplanning and mortgage broking support.

In 2023, the group acquired Elixir Consulting, significantly expanding its capability and capacity to provide business coaching, strategy and consulting.

The Australian-owned, Sydney and Philippines-based group, which has over 1250 team members and 260 clients, is a Certified B Corporation (B Corp) and has consistently been recognised by Great Place to Work.

According to Jacobsen, the skills shortage in Australia was holding businesses back from helping more people, which increased the need and relevance of VBP’s proposition.

“One of the biggest challenges facing businesses is finding and maintaining talent, and VBP is ideally positioned to help advisers solve that problem. There is also an exciting opportunity to help advisers achieve scale and efficiency benefits through process optimization and the effective use of technology,” he said.

“I am excited to lead this fantastic business, as we continue investing in people, products and solutions.”

Jacobsen departed Diverger in March, following the group’s merger with Count. Prior to his role at Diverger, he held a number of senior positions including Managing Director of Paragem and General Manager of Perpetual Private.

He was also formerly an officer in the Australian Navy.

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Sue Viskovic

VBP has created three new roles in its leadership team to assist the firm’s continued expansion in the financial advice industry.

The appointments follow VBP’s recent acquisition of specialist financial planning consulting and coaching firm Elixir Consulting.

Amanda Yun joins VBP as chief growth officer and Shaun Nesbitt has been appointed chief information and digital officer. In addition, Elixir founder Sue Viskovic will become VBP’s general manager consulting.

David Carney, VBP’s chief executive officer, says the appointments as well as the acquisition will help take VBP’s evolution to the next level.

“We are significantly expanding our service offering to continue supporting our clients with their growth at a time of continuing change in the financial planning landscape.

“VBP has a 10-year track record of providing this support and with the addition of Amanda and Shaun to the business, as well as the expertise of the Elixir team, we have significantly deepened the level of assistance we can provide,” he says.

He added that the combined business of VBP and Elixir will position the business as the ‘go to’ growth partner for advice firms looking to innovate and scale.

“Harnessing the experience of Elixir and boosting it with the scale and expertise of VBP means we are better positioned to provide the specialist support and assistance that advice practices need.

“VBP now has the resources to deploy a bespoke team on a project basis to assist clients in executing the priority projects from their strategic planning, and to take full advantage of opportunities in the current environment.

“Over the next year, VBP will focus on helping firms innovate by investing in intelligent automation solutions, cyber and governance security as well as new coaching programs.”

VBP has also recently rebranded from Virtual Business Partners to Vital Business Partners, reflecting its role within the financial advice community and its 10 year track record.

Mr Carney says that while the business will still be widely known as VBP, it was important to make the subtle name change to Vital Business Partners.

“The new name is more reflective of our future direction and desire to be a vital partner in our clients’ future success. Dropping the word Virtual allows us to move away from a traditional outsourcing business and recognises the human connections that are very much the core of each and every client relationship.”

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Founded in 2013, VBP provides off-shore specialist assistance and support to Australian-based financial planning firms, and has recently expanded its services into bookkeeping and accounting.

As part of this expansion, Daniel Harrison has joined VBP as its technical lead – accounting. Reporting to the head of client experience Sarah Matthews, he will be responsible for the development and enhancement of VBP’s accounting offering.

Mr Harrison has worked in the accounting industry in Australia for over 20 years, predominantly in public practice. He has previously run his own accounting practice as well as held management roles in mid-tier accounting firms in NSW.

He has also worked for the Australian Tax Office, is a member of the Institute of Public Accountants and sits on the tax working group for Blockchain Australia.

VBP chief executive officer David Carney said the firm has already begun offering bookkeeping services to clients, and is the first stage of a broader accounting offering that will be ready in the coming months.

“Increasingly our clients are multi-disciplined firms. To date, VBP has been able to provide services to the wealth management and mortgage broking divisions of our clients, but not to their accounting and bookkeeping divisions at the same level of operational excellence,” Mr Carney said.

“With the support of Daniel, we are now realising the opportunity to support their accounting and bookkeeping divisions. It will also support pure financial planning firms to benefit from in-house bookkeeping support around internal payroll functions.”

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David Carney

As more Australian advice firms seek business process outsourcing (BPOs) partners amid a local staffing shortage, they should be vigilant in finding the right partner that aligns with their values, according to Virtual Business Partners (VBP) founder and chief executive, David Carney.

Carney says that while finding the right outsourcing partner can be a time-consuming process, following four simple steps can help:

1. Identify the business

“Look at the business and do a little tyre-kicking from the comfort of your laptop. There is a lot of information about outsourcing firms that can be found by researching on Google,” Carney says.

“Some helpful indicators to consider include whether the partner has a good website with appropriate domain authority.

“You should also find out whether they have a suitable digital footprint of their company when you search them online. For this check, look at LinkedIn, Glassdoor, Facebook, and any other reputable third-party sources that pop up in a Google Search.”

2. Inquire about their service offering

Carney says that once some BPOs that match your needs have been identified, contact a few of them, and monitor of the speed and quality of their responses.

“When you talk to a BPO, they must demonstrate good, responsive turnaround time and processes when responding to your initial inquiry, and have a deeper understanding of your business need,” he says.

“Also determine whether they answer more complex questions competently and whether they openly share information about the company, such as size, years in business and specialties.”

3. Discuss your needs with suitable candidates

Once an advice firm has a good feel from their initial responses from the potential BPOs, Carney says it’s then time to have a more detailed discussion with a short list of firms.

“The sales process for any BPO should feel competent, consultative and not “salesy”, or too aggressive and superficial. You should have conversations with people who can understand your requirements and advise you accordingly. Their advice should be valuable and insightful. The pricing model should be clear and concise.

“A call is also much more powerful than a templated email response, an RFP or PDF proposal. So feel free to get on the phone or Zoom call.”

4. Choose the BPO that best fits your firm’s needs

Finally, Carney notes that there are several different approaches within the outsourcing industry, and that advice firms should take note of these approaches.

“It can be highly educational to speak to a few outsourcing firms about what they do and how they do it,” he says.

“However, be mindful that these BPOs are ultimately all trying to sell you so a certain amount of their insight and advice might be angled to their benefit.”

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Chris Miller has joined VBP as paraplanning technical lead. He is tasked with developing and broadening VBP’s capabilities by providing technical support, learning, development and mentoring to a team of paraplanners, quality assurance analysts and managers.

Mr Miller joins from Focus Partners Financial Services, where he was a paraplanner since January 2020. Before that, he spent four years as both a paraplanner and a financial planner at Generations Personal & Professional Advice in Wodonga, Victoria.

Mr Miller reports to the head of client experience, Sarah Matthews, who was promoted to the newly-created role in January this year. Mrs Matthews was previously VBP’s head of advice delivery, and has been at the firm since December 2019.

VBP provides off-shore specialist assistance and support to Australian-based financial planning firms and was founded in 2013 by financial advice industry veterans David Carney and David Deegan.

Mr Carney said Mr Miller’s skill in working under pressure and adapting to new situations and challenges makes him a perfect paraplanning technical lead.

“Chris is a dedicated financial planning professional with a history of maintaining high levels of technical and compliance support to financial planners and their businesses,” Mr Carney said.

“With a proven history of managing teams of support staff, we believe Chris has what it takes to make a significant impact and effectively meet client expectations and company goals within an expanding VBP team.”

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Paul Barrett

Professional services utility, AZ Next Generation Advisory (AZ NGA), and national financial advisory business, Invest Blue, have joined forces to co-invest in Australian-owned, Philippines-based paraplanning and back-office solutions provider, Virtual Business Partners (VBP).

Under the deal, AZ NGA and Invest Blue will acquire a 40% interest in VBP with the group’s management team increasing their holding to 20%, and VBP’s founding shareholders, David Carney and David Deegan, retaining a 40% stake.

The transaction enables all parties to fulfil key strategic priorities. It represents AZ NGA’s foray into the advice supply chain, giving the group exposure to a high-quality standalone investment, and securing capability and capacity in the midst of a skills and talent shortage.

Similarly, it reinforces Invest Blue’s strategy to acquire capability and empower people on its mission to become Australia’s largest integrated financial advice brand.

The deal also concludes VBP’s extensive search for an experienced long-term capital partner to help manage key-person risk and succession, and fuel the group’s growth and expansion plans.

According to David Carney, VBP Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer, the transaction will ensure VBP retains its convincing lead as Australia’s number one outsourcing partner for financial planning businesses.

“This is an exciting partnership that means we can continue growing, innovating and adding value for our clients,” he said.

“It has allowed David Deegan and myself to realise some capital value, created a pathway for key staff to buy into the business and, in doing so, strengthened our employee value proposition, which will help us attract and retain the best talent.”

Paul Barrett, AZ NGA Chief Executive Officer, said the group was attracted to VBP’s clear purpose, differentiated proposition and vision for the future.

“VBP is not an outsourcing company but a human resources partner for advisory businesses looking to increase efficiencies, reduce their cost to serve and improve their net profit margin,” Mr Barrett said.

“Culturally, there is a lot of alignment between VBP, AZ NGA and Invest Blue, and together our focus is on helping more advisory businesses and extending VBP’s market position.”

David Stephen, Invest Blue Chief Executive Officer said the group was continuously on the lookout for profitable, growing businesses.

“As one of VBP’s largest, longest-standing clients, we know the people who lead this organisation and the talented people they attract. We have every confidence in their ability to grow and continue providing excellent service,” he said.

“We’re also keen to attract and acquire other like-minded advice businesses, and we have the right structures and processes in place to enable advisers to deliver their client service proposition. VBP is a key part of that framework.”

Mr Barrett added: “AZ NGA is not only interested in high quality accounting and advisory SMEs but we see opportunities to invest in key parts of the supply line.”

“A horizontally integrated strategy makes sense because there are clear bottlenecks in the advice process, such as the production of advice documents, and there’s also a huge war for talent. These trends support our strategy and underpinned our interest in VBP,” he said.

“VBP is effectively a human resources solution. It is partnering with advice businesses to solve resourcing problems and build a strong people strategy.”

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David Carney

Financial advice practices seeking growth through acquisition are searching for greater scalability and capability as the average cost to deliver financial advice continues to rise, according to Virtual Business Partners (VBP).

In the past, M&A activities focussed on buying a client book, and the associated funds under advice (FUA), with a focus on acquisition and embedding the clients into the new practice and the related investment platform.

But commenting on current M&A trends within the financial advice space, VBP chief executive David Carney said what advice practices are looking for has significantly changed in the last two or three years.

“In the current environment, firms are looking to acquire other firms that can expand their own capabilities – for example, those that have a certain advice specialisation or a particular client demographic,” Carney said.

“They are also focusing on scalability.  In the past couple of years, the average cost of providing advice has increased by around 30 per cent. So firms wanting to remain viable in the current market are looking to acquisitions to ensure they can provide scalable advice that is affordable for clients.”

For advisers seeking to sell their practice, Mr Carney says the number one thing that turns off a potential buyer is a bad relationship between directors – something that is also a leading indicator for value destruction.

“In M&A, if there are relationship issues between the owners, it’s best not to go ahead with the acquisition, as the business will only deteriorate in value until the directors deal with whatever issues they may have with each other,” he said.

“Another area to consider is that vendors should be clear on the sale strategy, and clear on the reasons for selling or getting a capital partner.

“You want them (the firm selling) to have good access to information, because it means they have well-organised and manageable business.”

In addition, Carney says that the human relationships are the most overlooked element in assessing a merger or acquisition.

“The culture of a firm is a huge aspect that many buyers tend to forget about. However, it’s still important, even if it’s likely that the people within the acquired firm are unlikely to stay on,” Carney said.

“We always say that the clients match the planner, or the planner attracts the client, so you know you’ve got to get along with each other.

“If you don’t, it means their clients are probably going to be mismatch between the two merging firms. So you want to know where there is a match between the two firms in terms of business goals, culture and what is defined as good client service.”

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Cassandra Thong has been appointed to the newly created role. She will work closely with Andrew Rocks, who has been the Head of Partnership and Business Development since January 2020.

Based in Sydney, Ms Thong has more than 25 years of experience in the financial planning industry, with her first 12 years spent running her own financial planning and mortgage broking business. Ms Thong joins VBP from Capify Australia where she was a Senior BDM. Prior to that, she was the National Partnership Manager for Sydney-based advice firm Milyar.

Ms Thong will work with new and existing clients to assist with building out each financial services practice’s capacity and capability and assist them with achieving their strategic goals.

David Carney, chief executive officer of VBP, said Ms Thong’s extensive knowledge of financial planning and mortgage broking will be a useful asset to the business as it expands its strategic capabilities.

“Cassandra has established strong relationships and networks within the industry. She comes from a strong business development and relationship management background and has a solid understanding of Australian clients and business,” Mr Carney said.

“Cassandra’s knowledge and experience will be invaluable to VBP as we integrate the financial advice administration, paraplanning, mortgage broking administration and bookkeeping team members and critical infrastructure we have developed over eight years across 950 team members.”

The appointment of Ms Thong follows the hires of Lia Gunawan as Strategic Relationship Manager and Hannah Pike as Client Services Specialist earlier this year. Ms Gunawan is tasked with refining and enhancing VBP’s strategic relationship management framework while Ms Pike is developing VBP’s financial planning assistants across complex administrative tasks.

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