Rising interest in ‘human side of advice’ resulting in some advisers leaving industry

Nathan Fradley, senior adviser at Tribeca Financial and director at Ethos Australia, said some advisers are feeling the pressure to transition to financial wellbeing and, as a result, are deciding to depart the industry. 

“I think a number of advisers left the industry because they couldn't do it or they felt they couldn't do it,” Mr Fradley said on a new episode of the ifa Show podcast.

“The emergence of the money coach, the podcast [and] the finfluencer have come about because under the current constraints, people in the industry have gone: ‘I can't do this.’"

Mr Fradley explained that financial wellbeing has yet to be adequately defined.

“Financial wellbeing has not really been well defined yet, but I think it's going to be the new thing. If you go back five to 10 years ago, it was all holistic advice and that was all about what the adviser is doing. Financial wellbeing is, ‘What does the client feel?’ It's a complete flip of the lens. It's no longer about what advice we're providing. It's about what value we're creating," Mr Fradley said. 

“And I think that's the differentiator between the great advisers at the moment and the ones that are still catching up, is financial wellbeing means something different for all clients. As an industry, we still have to figure out what that looks like, but fundamentally, and this is from the research, it's a feeling of freedom of choice and a sense of security. It's the ability to know they're okay, but they can also take risks. It's the ability to be able to spend money, but not too much money because they don't want to," he continued. 

Personally, he said, the “best” advisers are the ones trying to truly understand their client in order to create a genuine connection.

“I think the best advisers now, the ones setting the standard, are saying what does it look like in 10 years for you from a social interaction perspective? How are you gaining your social needs once you're retired? Or how are you building meaningful connection with your friends and family? What are you doing from a sense of purpose and how do we facilitate that and money being a tool to enable that?

“And that connection becomes far more than just, ‘Well, they did my super and insurance.’ That's the hygiene, that's the easy stuff. This becomes really understanding who we're working with, intrinsically caring for them and to a point where we are taking what they say is important and what they do, and we are combining those two things to be the same, in the same direction," Mr Fradley noted. 

Listen to the full ifa Show podcast with Mr Fradley here.

Mr Fradley’s comments come after a report released by Investment Trends last week which found that one in four financial advisers are expected to leave the industry within the next five years.

The research firm’s 2022 Adviser Business Model report found that 37 per cent of advisers intend to switch licensees and 70 per cent of those suggested they’ll switch to a self-licensed model.

Meanwhile, the total cost of providing financial advice to the typical client has increased from $2,850 in 2020 to $3,280 in 2022.

Last week, the Joint Associations Working Group (JAWG) — made up of 12 key associations including the FPA, AFA, FSC, SIAA, TAA and CA ANZ — launched a new survey which aims to examine the cost of advice and its impact on the process, which will then be provided to the QAR ahead of its release in December.

“The cost of advice is a key issue that the QAR has the opportunity to address, and our research is designed to get detailed information on what effect each piece of legislation, regulation and licensee obligation, and the like, has on the cost of providing advice to Australians,” FPA's head of policy, strategy and innovation, Ben Marshan, told ifa.

“We're encouraging all licensees and practices to take part in the survey which is taking place over the course of the next week.”

Neil Griffiths

Neil is the Deputy Editor of the wealth titles, including ifa and InvestorDaily.

Neil is also the host of the ifa show podcast.