Consultant responds to adviser unease with initiative

WA-based Elixir Consulting’s national initiative aims to provide provide independent practice management support to advisers in two of the biggest key areas required to get their business through the changes they’re currently facing – business planning and pricing.

Elixir Consulting founder Sue Viskovic said advisers are entering an era where almost every business will have to reshape its business model.

“The end of grandfathered commissions, greater transparency over service standards, declining business valuations, decreasing insurance commissions, greater compliance and education standards … all of these things will affect businesses in some way,” Ms Viskovic said.

“And right now, we’re hearing that many licensees are so focused on wrestling with their own resourcing and business planning that their capacity to assist their advisers is low.”

Ms Viskovic said she’s been inundated with advisers requiring assistance, and has found a consistent need for help with business planning, and pricing.

Calling her program a Business Evolution Blitz, she said the sheer volume of advisers who need help, and the urgency with which they need it has led Elixir to create a solution that provides the best of private coaching, peer support and group workshops to solve these challenges in a series of short, intensive interventions.

“Research has consistently shown us in the past that only one-third of advice businesses have had an effective business plan,” Ms Viskovic said.

“Those stats just aren’t good enough anymore – in order to serve the significant number of Australians who are seeking quality advice, financial advisers need to create and implement effective business plans to get through these next few challenging years.”

Adrian Flores

Adrian Flores is a deputy editor at Momentum Media, focusing mainly on banking, wealth management and financial services. He has also written for Public Accountant, Accountants Daily and The CEO Magazine.

You can contact him on [email protected].