Professional Planner celebrated its 10th birthday last night with a party for nearly 150 esteemed guests, including industry heavyweights and some of the publication’s most loyal and longstanding supporters.
The function, held at the Park Hyatt in Sydney, featured speeches from: David Gonski, chairman of ANZ Bank; Peter Kell, deputy chair of the Australian Securities and Investments Commission; and Bernie Ripoll, the former minister for financial services and superannuation and chair of the Parliamentary Joint Committee Inquiry into Financial Products and Services in Australia who spearheaded the Future of Financial Advice (FoFA) reforms.
Gallery: The Professional Planner 10th-anniversary celebration
Gonski spoke about the future professionalism of the financial services sector. but noted the good strides that had been made in the last 10 years.
“Today…How we seek to be more professional. And yes we do stumble, and yes we do make mistakes, but we do have good regulators and above all we should repair the mistakes,” he said. “My message, I decided… is to compliment Professional Planner for its 10 years and ask myself, ‘What do I get from Colin (Tate, founder and publisher of PP and chief executive of Conexus Financial) and Professional Planner?’
“I get the impression they are inspiring us…to note that we do, do good things, that we do help people and that we should never forget it.”
Kell and Ripoll reflected on financial advice in the last decade and the juncture where the industry sits now.
“My view is while there are many terrific professionals in financial planning, it is not yet a profession,” Kell said.
‘All we had to do was water it’
Simon Hoyle, former editor of Professional Planner, shared some personal highlights of his nine years as editor and said PP still has a clear remit and the support of many financial planners who are on the journey to professionalism.
“While we provoked a certain amount of ire by challenging the industry’s norms of behaviour and attitudes, I do not want for one moment to suggest we didn’t find a receptive audience among financial planners – we did. It just wasn’t all of them,” he said. “There was a latent desire within the industry to be seen as better than just product salespeople – and to be seen as the providers of a truly valuable professional service, delivered with ethics and integrity.
He said there was early recognition of what had to happen, both from within the industry and from Tate.
“In short, it was like there was already a seed of professionalism planted in the ground, and all we had to do was water it. Give it sunlight. Nurture it. And spray it regularly to kill the pests and parasites.”
It affects all Australians
Tate said his motivation for starting the publication was personal, as he had seen the impact of bad financial advice; however, he acknowledged that conflicts in financial advice had broad ramifications for all Australians.
He also thanked Professional Planner’s early and longstanding commercial supporters.
“Each of them committed to supporting Professional Planner when others were withdrawing from the market,” he said. “Their vision and foresight was instrumental in assuring the future of the publication. They were also leaders in their respective businesses, and acted as change agents in the industry more broadly.”
