It is time for all members of the SMSF Professionals’ Association of Australia (SPAA) to commit to standards of ethics and behaviour and technical competence that befit a true profession, according to SPAA’s chief executive officer, Andrea Slattery.
As SPAA prepares for its 2014 national conference in Brisbane, Slattery says SPAA has made enormous strides over recent years to not only secure a future for the SMSF sector but to lay the groundwork for the emergence of “a profession of the future”.
But Slattery says it’s no longer acceptable for practitioners in the SMSF space to do anything but commit wholeheartedly to professionalism.
“They’re all things that we have been talking about for so long, but probably in the past couple of years haven’t talked about so much, because we presumed that people knew,” Slattery says.
Obligations and opportunities
But she says the time is right to remind SMSF practitioners of their obligations and the opportunities professionalism will bring.
“This is not just about are you interested, this is about do you want to be successful, and making your commitment to it – and the only way to do it is through SPAA,” she says.
“If you aren’t a member of SPAA or with SPAA, then you’re probably going to miss out.
“SPAA has built a profession, and now we need to see people commit to the profession, not go to the minimum [prescribed by law].
“The new profession, which has never been around [before] is a career opportunity, a succession opportunity, an opportunity for you to grow your bottom line, to network with your peers and to provide value-added services.”
Solid foundation
Slattery says there’s a solid foundation on which to build.
“We’re looking to the future, and we’re going to be thought leaders in the future with our research, with our specialist competencies, with our new diagnostics to help people who are emerging in this area to understand what they need to do and how they need to go about it to provide guidance to the three inquiries, develop research and continue to develop research,” she says.
“At the moment SPAA’s research is leading in all areas and we’re the only voice for the SMSF industry. So it’s really a challenge. You can’t sit back and expect your organisation or somebody else to build your own professionalism.”
Strong rationale
Slattery says that the rationale for SMSFs is as strong as ever.
“SMSFs, according to the ATO, in the good times are much of a muchness or are a little bit better performing [than other kinds of super funds]; in the bad times they are significantly better performing,” she says.
“Rice Warner research also confirmed the same ting, and APRA has always suggested the same thing. So this is about direct, professional advice with engaging the consumer and helping the consumer of the future to be involved in making decisions about their own future.”
Slattery says establishing a profession is a critical safeguard against potential future attacks on the SMSF sector by competitors. The sector only just survived one such onslaught, about a decade ago, which laid the groundwork for the establishment and growth of SPAA.
“I know as well as the regulators [know], but the industry doesn’t, that the SMSF sector was going to have barriers introduced to get rid of it,” Slattery says.
Every single incentive
“There was every single incentive to get rid of it by everybody else in the market, and there was no interest by anybody else, no awareness by anyone else, that there was a problem.
“That was back in 2001-02. That’s why we started [SPAA]. The ATO commissioner kept approaching everyone he could find to try to get them to advocate for this sector, because nobody did, and when I said if I did it the only thing that I would do is build professional standards, codes of ethics to create a profession, which I could see by the work I was doing through the 1990s. That was my work: I used to build SMSF and financial planning departments in tier-two accounting firms and legal firms. That’s what I did. So I knew it was the largest profit centre you could have in a business – all you had to do was work it out.”
Professional Planner is an official media parter of the 2014 SPAA SMAF National Conference starting on February 19, and will be exclusively publishing the conference Daily News in print and online.
