The winner of the Gwen Fletcher Memorial Award for the highest-performing candidate in the final unit of the Certified Financial Planner (CFP) course says gaining the accreditation is a way of sending a powerful message to clients about ethics and professionalism.
Cameron Obliubek, from Bridges Financial Services in Melbourne, says clients recognise that it is “the most important certification out there”.
“We had our client seminar on Tuesday, and we made mention of it then,” he says.
“They were very happy. It tells them that we have the highest level of professionalism, ethics and qualification; that it’s a global recognition for what we do, inside our industry; and that sets us apart from those who do not have that designation.
“It provides a level of trust, I suppose, that we have all these things and that should provide the client with the trust to say you should be engaging with us over anyone else when it comes to financial advice.”
Obliubek says of seven advisers in the Bridges office, six now are CFPs, including himself, and the seventh is undertaking the study to get there.
“Everyone in our office wants to set that level of standard, and I think the clients appreciate that,” he says.
“We’d like to the the point of being one of those FPA Professional Practices. We’re there, but we haven’t gone down that path. That’s something in the new year for us to do.”
Obliubek holds a Bachelor of Business degree with a major in financial planning, and has completed a Master of Financial Planning. This earlier qualification saw him exempted from units in the CFP program, meaning he obtained the designation within about a year.
“The CFP wasn’t something that was really on the radar, but then with this push for greater professional standards and the CFP and my view that it was a high designation to achieve, it forced me to come back and review that and say that even though I have other qualifications … this is something that I should have, to further my career and attract new clients,” he says.
Obliubek says he regards it as “a very personal accomplishment” to have obtained the highest mark in the course in semester two this year.
“Not in my wildest dreams did I think that would be me,” he says.
“You always think there are people out there who are better than you – and there still really are people who get wonderful outcomes for their clients – but for me it’s certainly a wonderful achievement that I can be proud of going forward.”
