A hallmark of the dealer world

Additionally, some 220 advisors — 47% of those surveyed — claimed to be holders of the certified financial planner designation. Forty-four per cent of advisors made the same claim last year.

Firm executives were almost unanimous in the belief that supporting advisors’ efforts to prepare financial plans for their clients was a top priority; many pointed to their firms’ software platforms and training regimens as evidence.

Some executives equated planning with the image of their firms, but none did so as passionately as Kevin Regan, executive vice president of financial services with Winnipeg-based Investors Group Inc.: “[Financial planning] really speaks to the heart of this organization’s long history. Financial planning has always been a part of our heritage. The message that we try to impart is ‘The Plan’ — the financial planning ethic, the long-term view, reinforcing the one-to-one relationships between advisors and their clients. We take the financial planning ethic very seriously.”

It’s a message that has made it to the front lines. When asked to name the most positive aspects of Investors Group, an advisor on the East Coast who holds a CFP and says he does financial plans for 75% of his clients, says: “We’re a leader in financial planning, and have been for 80 years.”

The Report Card results support Regan and the East Coast advisor’s belief in Investors Group’s emphasis on planning; for the second consecutive year, the firm was rated second-highest in both performance and importance, behind only Mississauga, Ont.-based PFSL Investments Canada Ltd. All but one of the 46 Investors Group advisors surveyed report that they prepare financial plans — and that 65.4% of their clients have a plan in place.

PFSL is a unique firm whose results merit closer attention. At first glance, the firm’s near-perfect performance and importance scores — to say nothing of the 93% of its clients who have a plan in place — would lead you to deem PFSL a planning powerhouse.

But there’s a major caveat: many PFSL advisors were quick to point out that the document they prepare for clients is not a financial plan, per se, but a very thorough financial needs analysis. Advisors spoke highly of this FSA. “I had a friend come in from a competitor to look at [it],” says a PFSL advi-sor in Ontario, “and he couldn’t pick his jaw up off the floor.”

However, the advisors admit that the FSA lacks certain key features of traditional financial plans. “At PFSL, [advisors] complete a financial needs analysis, not a financial plan, and we say that right on the front,” says president and chief marketing officer Jeff Dumanski. “Are we doing a full tax analysis? No. As far as rules go, we cannot call it a financial plan. Generally, if you are doing those things, you have to have the credentials to call yourself a financial planner.”

Indeed, credentials — specifically, the CFP designation — constitute a lens through which much sense of financial planning can be made. That only 5% of PFSL advi-sors surveyed hold a CFP is a clear indication that the firm has its own distinct protocol.

As well, firms with a greater than average rating for support for developing a financial plan for clients — Investors Group, Montreal-based Peak Financial Group and Mississauga, Ont.-basedInvestment Planning Counsel — also tended to be firms in which the percentage of advisors with a CFP matched the survey average, at the very least. So, it seems fair to suggest that the firms that place a greater emphasis on financial planning attract advisors who do the same.

An advisor in Ontario with IPC who holds the CFP designation says he would recommend the firm to other advisors because it is “financial planning-focused.”

Elsewhere, the reviews weren’t quite as positive. Burlington, Ont.-based Manulife Securities Inc.‘s performance rating was next to lowest for the second straight year, and its ranking was outstripped by advisors’ importance rating by a whopping 1.8 points — the largest such disparity among the 13 firms surveyed.

@page_break@”[Financial planning] is not really their focus,” says a Manulife advi-sor in Ontario. “There is something minor on the website, but it isn’t good financial planning software.”

A Manulife advisor in Sas-katchewan is also unimpressed with the firm’s lack of financial planning software: “We do it ourselves. I don’t think it’s critical that my dealer provides it, but it would be nice to have a little bit more from them.”

However, Rick Annaert, Manu-life’s president and CEO, says self-sufficiency accords with his vision of the firm as a home for independent advisors: “We do not dictate what’s mandatory. We want to make sure people have a planning-oriented approach to their business, but we don’t say, ‘You have to use NaviPlan or PlanPlus,’ or that this is what the tool is.”

The sentiment was not unanimous. An advisor in Nova Scotia with Toronto-based Desjardins Financial Security Investment Inc. says, “[My firm doesn’t] help with the plans, they help with the products. They want us to be planners, but they force us to be salespeople. I should be able to offer my clients the choice between paying me for my time or paying me for my products.”

It is interesting that such a high proportion of advisors are performing financial planning services in spite of the fact that so few are charging clients for the requisite time and effort. As in 2008, only 1.5% of advisors’ reported gross revenue came by means of the fee-for-service model; an almost 50/50 split between asset-based and transaction-based compensation still persists. IE