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**Why do qualifications matter in financial planning, and what separates a financial planning professional from someone simply working in financial services?**

Financial planning is more than a job. It is a profession built on knowledge, experience, ethical standards and a commitment to putting clients first. But what role does formal education play in developing better financial planners?

In this episode of PROpulsion LIVE, we welcome **Leanne Ferreira, CFP® professional and Head of Department for Financial Planning at Milpark Education**, to explore why qualifications matter, what professional standards mean in practice and how education can contribute to better outcomes for clients.

With more than 10 years of experience in financial services and four years in financial planning education, Leanne brings perspectives from both working in the industry and helping develop the next generation of financial planning professionals.

**In our conversation, we explore:**

- What makes financial planning a profession rather than just a job.
- Why formal qualifications matter, even for experienced advisers.
- The challenges created by relatively low barriers to entering the industry.
- How education and qualifications can improve the advice clients receive.
- Why professional development should continue beyond obtaining a qualification.
- Practical ways for busy advisers to continue learning and developing.
- What advisers can do to contribute to higher professional standards.

We will also discuss an important question: **Does having a qualification automatically make someone a better financial adviser?**

This conversation is relevant to financial planners, financial advisers, business owners, managers and anyone interested in the future of the financial planning profession.

As part of our 2026 theme, *From Knowing to Doing*, we want to help you move beyond recognising the importance of professional development and take a practical step towards improving your own knowledge and skills.

Join us for a conversation about education, experience and building a financial planning profession that clients can trust.

**Subscribe to PROpulsion LIVE** for weekly conversations about building and running better financial planning businesses.

#FinancialPlanning #FinancialAdvisers #ProfessionalDevelopment #PROpulsionLIVE #FinancialEducation

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 Marketing doesn't have to feel complicated. What if marketing your financial planning business was simply about having better conversations?

In this episode of PROpulsion LIVE, we welcome **Samkelo Mkhize**, Digital Marketing Manager at the Financial Planning Institute of Southern Africa (FPI), to explore **Marketing, Money & Messaging**, and how financial planners can make their marketing feel more natural.

Samkelo believes marketing is something we already do every day. We introduce ourselves, explain what we do and talk about what matters to us. The challenge is learning how to carry those conversations into the digital world.

We'll explore why financial planners often struggle with marketing, how to explain what they do in one clear sentence and why the way we communicate matters just as much as the message itself.

*In this conversation, we'll explore:*

• Why marketing can feel harder online than in person.
  
  
• How to explain what you do in one simple sentence.
  
  
• Why your messaging is like choosing what to wear.
  
  
• How marketing and messaging help build trust before generating business.
  
  
• Where digital marketing fits alongside referrals and word of mouth.
  
  
• Practical ways to start marketing without a complicated strategy.
  
  

Samkelo also joins us for a practical, unscripted conversation where we'll put these ideas to the test.

*From Knowing to Doing*

By the end of this episode, you'll have a starting point for explaining what you do, choosing a communication style that suits your audience and beginning more conversations with potential clients.

Whether you're an independent financial planner, financial adviser or running an advice business, this conversation will help you approach marketing with greater confidence.

Subscribe to PROpulsion LIVE for weekly conversations about building and running better financial planning businesses.

#FinancialPlanning #FinancialAdvisers #DigitalMarketing #PROpulsionLIVE 

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Financial advisers spend their days helping clients manage uncertainty, make difficult decisions and feel more confident about their financial futures. But who is looking after the adviser?

In this episode of PROpulsion LIVE, we welcome **Zeyn Ally, Chief Operations Officer at Fairbairn Consult**, for an open conversation about the emotional pressure financial advisers face and the importance of looking after their own mental health and wellbeing.

Clients often reach out when something is wrong. Markets are uncertain, living costs are rising, and global events create anxiety. Financial advisers are expected to remain calm, provide reassurance and help clients make sense of it all.

But advisers are people too. They have their own worries, challenges and pressures.

Together, we explore:

• The emotional load advisers carry when supporting clients.
  
  
• Why advisers may feel they always need to be strong.
  
  
• How to recognise when pressure is affecting personal wellbeing.
  
  
• The responsibility advice businesses have to support their people.
  
  
• Setting healthy boundaries without compromising client relationships.
  
  
• Practical steps advisers can take to start looking after themselves.
  
  

Zeyn isn't joining us with a perfect formula or all the answers. Instead, we're creating space for a conversation that deserves more attention in our profession.

Our 2026 theme is **From Knowing to Doing**, and we'll close by exploring one practical step every adviser can take towards better personal wellbeing.

*Subscribe to PROpulsion LIVE* for weekly conversations about building better financial planning businesses.

#FinancialAdvisers #MentalWellbeing #FinancialPlanning #PROpulsionLIVE

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Can your financial advisory business keep growing without you having to work longer hours or personally serve every new client?

Many financial advisers build successful practices through their own hard work, relationships and expertise. But as the business grows, the very things that made them successful can start limiting their ability to grow further.

In this episode of PROpulsion LIVE, we welcome *Marius van der Merwe* to explore how financial advisers can move beyond their personal capacity and build businesses designed for sustainable growth.

Marius brings extensive leadership experience in financial services, having held regional and management roles at Liberty and Sanlam. His background in financial planning, management, strategy and design thinking provides a valuable perspective on what it takes to build and grow an advisory business.

*We'll explore:*

• Why advisers often become the biggest constraint on their business's growth.
  
  
• How to develop a clear growth and go-to-market strategy.
  
  
• Why repeatable systems and processes matter.
  
  
• How technology, people and compliance support business growth.
  
  
• The difference between growing income and building lasting business value.
  
  
• Why income diversification and succession planning deserve attention long before retirement.
  
  
• Practical steps advisers can take to reduce the business's dependence on them.
  
  

Whether you're an independent financial adviser, part of a growing practice or leading an established advisory business, this conversation will help you think differently about how your business grows.

*The big question: How do financial advisers build businesses that can grow beyond their own time, capacity and involvement?*

Our 2026 theme is *From Knowing to Doing*, so we'll finish with practical steps you can start applying in your own business.

Join us for a conversation about building a financial advisory business that is not only successful today, but valuable and transferable in the future.

Subscribe to PROpulsion LIVE for weekly conversations about building better financial planning businesses.

#FinancialAdvisers #PracticeManagement #BusinessGrowth #PROpulsionLIVE

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When the technology behind a financial platform changes, advisers can feel the impact long before the project is finished.

In this episode of PROpulsion LIVE, Georgina Smith joins us to unpack the recent migration of assets from the legacy STANLIB LISP platform to INN8, an 18-month project involving multiple channels, advisers, clients, products and internal teams.

We explore what made the migration work, what the team learned along the way, what Georgina would do differently, and why communication, preparation, feedback and expectation management matter so much during major technology change.

Georgina also shares the parallels between managing a prozject of this scale and her 72 km open-water swim from Fish Hoek to Hout Bay, including the role of preparation, resilience, teamwork and adapting when conditions change.
For financial advisers, the conversation turns practical.

We discuss:
- Why advisers should care when platform technology changes
- What questions they should be asking
- How technology change can affect advisers, support teams and clients
- What good communication and support from a platform should look like
- Why adviser engagement matters before, during and after the change
- What advisers can do to prepare rather than simply react

The big question we explore is:
What can advisers learn from a major platform migration about preparing for and managing technology change?

PROpulsion LIVE helps financial planners and advice businesses move From Knowing to Doing.

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What does it take for financial advice to be experienced as a profession, rather than a product-driven sales process?

In this episode of PROpulsion LIVE, I speak with Jeff Paul about what needs to change if financial advisers want to build client-centred, professional and intergenerational advice practices.

Jeff has spent almost three decades in financial advice, leadership and adviser development. His career has taken him from financial adviser to senior leadership roles within Liberty, Managing Director of EQ-FIN, and now co-founder of Curated Wealth powered by Adviceworx.

We explore:

- Why some clients still question whether advice is driven by their needs or by products
- What client-centred financial planning looks like in practice
- How advisers can move from a financial plan to an intergenerational life-map
- The impact of incentives, product structures and business models on advice
- What professionalism demands beyond qualifications
- Why lifelong learning matters
- The role technology and AI should play in the advice process
- What advisers can start changing in their own practices

The big question guiding the conversation is:

**What needs to change for financial advice to be experienced by clients as a profession, rather than a product-driven sales process?**

PROpulsion LIVE helps financial planners and advice businesses move from knowing to doing, with practical conversations about building better financial planning businesses.

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Is your technology making your business simpler, or are you changing the way your business works just to fit your technology?

In this episode of PROpulsion LIVE, I speak with Pieter Teessen of Teessen Consulting about how financial services businesses can use technology to reduce operational friction, connect information and give their people more time to focus on clients.

We explore an important question: How do you use technology to simplify your business rather than forcing your business to fit the technology?

Our conversation covers:
- Why businesses can end up adapting their processes around generic systems
- How to tell the difference between a technology problem and a process problem
- The cost of having client information spread across multiple systems
- Where automation and AI can reduce repetitive administration
- How better internal processes can improve the client experience
- What to consider when choosing a technology partner
- Where to start if your current technology environment has become too complicated

Pieter brings more than 25 years of experience working with financial services businesses through Teessen Consulting. Their work includes technology platforms such as InsureSuite, InsureCRM, CommSplit and InsurePortal, alongside consulting focused on business processes and operations.

If you work in a financial planning, advice, insurance or brokerage business, this conversation will help you think differently about the relationship between your processes and the technology supporting them.

The goal is not more technology. It is technology that helps the business work better.

Subscribe to PROpulsion for weekly conversations about building and running better financial planning businesses.

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 What changes when financial planning starts with the person, rather than the product?

In this episode of PROpulsion LIVE, Francois du Toit speaks with Russell Ho, CFP®, one of the 2026 FPI Financial Planner of the Year finalists, about the human-first approach he has built into his financial planning practice.

Russell works through what he calls his Three Hats.

First, he approaches the conversation as a financial therapist and behaviour coach, seeking to understand the client’s money story, fears, beliefs and behaviour.

Second, he steps into the role of lifestyle financial planner, helping the client build a roadmap around the life they want to live.

Only then does he put on the third hat, financial adviser, where technical advice, products and solutions enter the conversation.

We unpack what this looks like in practice, including:

Why understanding the person comes before analysing the numbers
What happens in Russell’s first conversation with a prospective client
How therapeutic listening can help planners get beyond surface-level answers
Why vulnerability plays a role in his client process
How he structures a personalised first-year client journey
Where AI may change the technical side of financial planning
Which human skills planners may need to develop further
What Russell has learnt from becoming a 2026 FPI Financial Planner of the Year finalist
Practical changes planners can make in their own client conversations

The bigger question behind the conversation is:

What does a human-first financial planning process look like in practice, and why does it matter more as AI gets better at the technical work?

If you are a financial planner, adviser or practice owner thinking about the future of advice, client relationships and where human advisers continue to add value, this conversation will give you plenty to think about and apply.

Subscribe to PROpulsion for weekly conversations about building and running better financial planning businesses.

#FinancialPlanning #FinancialAdvice #HumanFirstAdvice #FinancialPlanner #ArtificialIntelligence #ClientExperience #PROpulsionLIVE 

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Financial planning is changing, but what should financial planners be doing now to prepare for 2030?

In this episode of PROpulsion LIVE, Francois du Toit speaks with Lelane Bezuidenhout, CEO of the Financial Planning Institute of Southern Africa, about the trends shaping financial planning in South Africa and around the world.

They explore what these changes could mean for financial planners, practices and the clients they serve.

The conversation covers:

• The trends shaping financial planning today
• What the financial planner of 2030 may look like
• The skills planners need to start building now
• Why human skills matter as technology and AI develop
• The challenges facing financial planning practices
• What FPI's Vision 2030 means for the profession
• The role of professional bodies and lifelong learning
• Practical steps planners can take to prepare for what comes next

The big question for this episode is:

**What should financial planners start doing now to stay relevant as the profession changes towards 2030?**

PROpulsion LIVE helps financial planners and advice businesses turn ideas into action and build better financial planning businesses.

Subscribe to the channel and join the conversation live.

#FinancialPlanning #FinancialAdviser #CFPProfessional #FutureOfFinancialPlanning #PROpulsionLIVE

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What does it take to build a financial planning practice around better client decisions, not just better financial outcomes?

In this episode of PROpulsion LIVE, I speak with Gareth Collier, CFP®, founder of Firecrest Group and one of the finalists in the FPI Financial Planner of the Year competition.

We explore how Gareth approaches financial planning, how he works with clients, and what he has learnt from moving from an established practice to building his own.

The conversation goes beyond investments and technical advice. We look at how Gareth thinks about client conversations, process, implementation, technology, and the role of the planner in helping people make decisions that support the life they want to live.

We discuss:

• What good financial planning looks like to Gareth
• How he approaches the first client conversation
• The process behind understanding what matters to a client
• How he helps clients move from understanding to action
• What building Firecrest has taught him about running a financial planning practice
• Where technology fits into the advice process
• What should remain firmly in the hands of the human planner
• What the FPI Financial Planner of the Year process has revealed about the way he works

If you are a financial planner, adviser, practice owner or part of an advice business, this episode offers a practical look at how one planner is thinking about better decisions, better processes and building a practice around both.

PROpulsion LIVE Season 7: From Knowing to Doing.