How the last AFA president re-discovered his mojo post-merger

Reflecting on when he finished up more than a year ago with what is now the Financial Advice Association, Sam Perera says it took a few months to re-adjust to post-association life.

Perera returned to his day job as director of Perera Crowther Financial Services after the successful merger of the Association of Financial Advisers and the Financial Planning Association last year.

“Then [you] come back to a much slower paced and different mindset being a practitioner and business owner. It took some adjustment to get back into it,” Perera says.

Perera Crowther, which he founded with Josh Crowther in 2005, has been in business 19 years come October, but says he’s found a “second lease” in terms of his business life.

“Stepping back in I had to wrestle the business back to how I wanted it to be and thankfully it was the strength of our team that kept the business together for so long which enabled that quick recovery,” Perera says.

Perera is well known to the industry as the final national president of the Association of Financial Advisers.

“We finished the merger last June and wrapped everything up and then back behind my desk since about that time,” Perera says.

“It took me probably three months to get back into the game because I was essentially out of the practice for two to two and a half years working on the merger and Quality of Advice Review advocacy. It’s great to be back and I’m finding my mojo again.”

Perera is still on ASIC’s financial advisers consultative panel and the FAAA’s policy committee. He is also still in touch with the association’s CEO Sarah Abood, general manager for policy Phil Anderson and chair David Sharpe.

“To be frank, I had a bit of an existential crisis because I was running quite hard in those two or so years and then it suddenly stopped,” Perera says.

Leaning into a specialty

Licensed through Bombora, the Perera Crowther firm has a team of nine, including two advisers.

“We’re principally in the risk insurance space, serving the professional market and corporates with their group insurance arrangements,” Perera says.

“It’s quite a niche although there are many specialised practices in the country also doing similar work. We’ve found we have a niche that we’re working in – a significant unmet need, in terms of underinsurance here in Australia.”

He believes unless there is scale and a systemised operation it’s difficult for generalists to operate in risk advice, which leaves specialists to “do the job and do it well”.

“It’s that scarcity, that gap and the lack of supply of risk advisers that means from a business perspective it makes good sense for us to focus on that area,” Perera says.

Being back on the tools at Perera Crowther has given him a renewed focus on the strategy of the business.

“The same thinking that’s led us to this point over the last 19 years is not the thinking that will take us to the next 19 years,” Perera says.

“The focus is how to better engage with clients, how do we continue to grow without necessarily compromising our culture and our financial metrics?

“Because quite often the bigger you get, it can impede your financial success or profitability, so it’s getting that balance right. Turning our team’s mind to succession planning is also a priority.”

Although his time as AFA chair concluded after the merger, Perera still encourages all advisers to get involved in the new association and says it’s always valuable to have new people involved.

“Part of the reason I didn’t stay is that I felt…tired by the end of the merger and I didn’t feel that I was bringing my best to the table in terms of fresh thinking, energy and new ideas,” Perera says.

“We continuously need a refreshing of new ideas, new people, new leadership, aspirants to come through to keep the association rejuvenated and refreshed, and to continue to bring that energy and passion to the table to drive us forward.”

Perera says being involved in the association gave him more exposure to the profession, which provided him with insights into best practice in the market, as well as having high-level meetings with the CEOs of life insurance companies and other key stakeholders.

“I still maintain many of those connections,” Perera says.

“It’ gave me  the ability to zoom out and see what’s happening in the broader market and profession, and bring that knowledge and those relationships into what I do for our clients.”

Moving through generations

While Perera encourages his peers to get involved in the association, he says it is a heavy commitment which needs to be factored into future business planning.

“That was a difficult time and [I am] lucky I had a good team running the business,” Perera says.

“Without a trusted, established team it would have been very difficult. That time during the QAR advocacy and the merger was an unprecedented time for workload for our team at the AFA that required a lot of extra effort.

“We always work hard at the association, but that period of time was unprecedented.”

Perera was AFA vice president for a year under Michael Nowak, before succeeding him in the role in October 2021.

With the landscape of the profession changing drastically, the association had to make a challenging call about its future.

“When we looked at it…looking at the business model, our team’s assessment was given the resources we had at the AFA, we couldn’t really deliver on our primary objective – which is advocating for policy settings for financial advisers and their practices in Australia to thrive,” Perera says.

“That is what led our team to pick up the phone and reach out to Marisa [Broome, then FPA chair] at the time.”

He notes the radical change of the profession and consolidation as further drivers.

“We privately floated the idea of the merger with the minister and key opposition MP’s at the time and it was very well received,” Perera says.

“One voice, one legitimate voice that speaks for advisers and our practices.”