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This
year is my 20th year in the financial-services industry,
and I am a bit nostalgic. Besides the fact that I am not
as young as I think I am, I’d like to say that 20 years
have been eventful, to say the least.
I’ve
personally experience a personal roller coaster, but
just like the old Gladys Knight song, “I’ve had my share
of life’s ups and downs, but fate’s been kind, the downs
have been few.” Thank you, Lord. There are many things I
am thankful for in the last 20 years of my professional
life. Foremost is that for 17 years I have a wonderful
partner, my wife Mia, who has also embraced my zeal and
advocacies.
For many
years, I’ve been blessed to interact with countless
people, with whom not only do I get to share my
knowledge and passion, I get to learn a great deal from
them, as well.
Rolly
Robles, a former boss, once shared the concept of
SPICE—S for service, P for personal and professional
growth, I for income, C for challenge and E for
enjoyment. If I sum up my many years in this industry,
I’d like to say that the concept is pretty much
accurate.
So what
do I really do? Many things. I’m an employee and, at the
same time, a “trying-hard” entrepreneur. But to be more
accurate, I mostly help people plan their financial
future or teach people on how to help other people. For
the past years, I’ve been doing more of the latter in my
capacity as a teacher.
Is it
easy? Sometimes it is, but most of the time it isn’t.
Acquiring the necessary technical skills can be
challenging, but financial planning isn’t really rocket
science. There are gazillion books, web sites and
training programs on personal finance. Obviously, my
favorite personal-finance site would be
www.income-tacts.com and the Registered Financial
Planning Institute. Acquisition of technical skills
isn’t all too difficult; learning soft skills so you can
apply the technical skill is the hard part.
Telling
people they need to take personal-financial planning
seriously is easier said than done. Majority of
Filipinos are more interested in many things other than
personal finance. Our savings rates are among the lowest
in the world. Filipinos with insurance coverage are,
likewise, just as low. Less than 1 percent invest in the
stock market. Mutual funds, UITF or index funds are not
something your average Filipino will know, let alone
understand.
I’m
really excited about the Pera bill, but I wonder if our
brothers and sisters will take advantage of it once
enacted. The average people are aware they need to plan
for retirement, but still fail to do so.
The
common reason you would hear is they don’t have enough
money to plan with. I agree; that’s enough reason. But
isn’t that enough reason to take planning seriously, as
well? If income is hardly enough today, isn’t it logical
to concern ourselves with proper financial planning? If
living expenses are not enough with our income, how will
we survive when we don’t have the capacity to produce
income anymore?
Convincing people that they need insurance, long-term
savings and a healthy cash flow is not that easy. You
would hear all sorts of excuses and you would see people
uninterested. However, during sale of flat TVs, cameras,
cell phones, branded clothes, etc., you would see long
queues.
I
visited a gadgets sale a few weekends ago and saw an
extremely long line. Going through a madness sale in a
mall is really, well, madness. It makes one wonder how
people are taking financial planning seriously. Not
many, I assume.
The
biggest hurdle of a “would-be” financial planner is not
so much on the acquisition of technical skills. People
will not be so interested in the time value of money or
financial-needs analysis until it’s too late. Creating
awareness and motivating people to do something are the
biggest difficulties.
The fact
that many in this profession are more interested in
making a sale than actually helping people only adds to
the difficulties. Making a sale is not an issue; one
needs to earn from his profession and sales of financial
instruments is a very honorable profession. However,
when a practitioner starts to misrepresent and mislead
clients, that’s a big problem.
Many
practitioners would make unfounded claims for their
products, like a low-risk and high-yield product.
Unscrupulous practitioners should be behind bars or at
least barred from practicing. These practices make it
very difficult for legitimate practitioners from gaining
the trust of prospective clients.
Trust is
the key to helping people plan their financial future. A
financial planner needs to build his competency and
exhibit utmost professionalism at all times so people
would listen to him. If one wants to experience success
in the financial-practitioner profession, he needs to
really build himself well.
Unscrupulous practitioners notwithstanding, Filipinos
really need to hear from professional practitioners and
must have open minds and open hearts. Our average
financial condition is really disturbing and causing us
a lot of difficulties in life. Further, the economic
impact of a nation of uninsured poor savers is really
precarious.
What
should we do? Well, we should continue to build more
professional practitioners, teach them well and make
them adhere to values like competence, integrity and
commitment.
At the
same time, those who are in a position to create
awareness should go double-time. Write more books, have
more seminars, build more web sites, write more
articles, etc. Take awareness to more mainstream avenues
like the mass media. But it can go beyond that.
I was
ecstatic when our pastors at Victory Christian
Fellowship Greenhills announced that for five weeks, our
topics would revolve around money and personal finance.
Wow! The church needs to look after its flock; money
issues are foremost in their concerns. Church
celebrities like Bo Sanchez and Chinkee Tan have been
talking about money and personal finance from a biblical
perspective and are convincing people that God truly
wants them to live victorious lives.
I
recently taped an interview by a bishop for his TV talk
show. The topic was personal finance. I asked the bishop
why he felt there is a need for it. He told me the
church is really concerned about the welfare of the
people, spiritually and physically (or financially). The
Bible is full of verses that relates directly to money
issues, and when you read it, you can really feel that
God wants us to be living great lives in all aspects.
Bo,
Chinkee and many more are making people realize that. I
am encouraged to see more authors write about the topic,
and its great that their books have been selling. My
good friends Efren Cruz (Pwede Na!), Al Sembrano (10
Sikreto ng Mayaman) and Chinkee Tan (Till Debt Do Us
Part) are great literatures to help people. The
country’s leading motivational and inspirational guru,
Francis Kong, has been encouraging people to take
control of their financial lives through many of his
seminars and talks. These are all great and we need
more.
Sometimes I wonder if I’m making any impact at all, even
a miniscule one. I guess only time will tell. However, I
will continue to do what I am doing for the next 20
years and longer, I hope. I want to encourage people in
the profession not to give up too easily when their job
becomes too challenging. I would like to encourage my
peers in the training profession to continue to teach. I
would hope that people like Efren, Al, Chinkee and
Francis will continue to write books and speak to as
many Filipinos as they can. I pray that there will be
many of us who will help our brothers plan for their
future.
Twenty
years in the industry. The past was good and the future
will be bright if we do the right things in the present.
Looking forward to my next 20 years! Let’s go and help
the people plan for the future.
****
J. Randell Tiongson is a training specialist,
personal-finance educator and coach and a director of
the Registered Financial Planning Institute. He has been
engaged in the various facets of the financial-services
industry for nearly two decades. He is also the
cofounder of www.income-tacts.com with Efren Ll. Cruz,
an interactive site dedicated to the financial literacy
of every Pinoy. For inquiries, you may send an e-mail
to randellt@gmail.com. Join the 12th RFP Program
(September 27 to November 29, 2008). Visit
www.rfp-philippines.com or inquire at info@rfp-philippines.com/tel.
no. 634-2204. |
