I’ve just spent a few days at the Celtic Manor Resort in Newport, attending the Institute of Financial Planning (IFP) annual conference.
This was my first time at the conference, an annual event which attracts around 700 Financial Planners from across the UK.
In addition to a number of keynote presentations, there were exhibitors from various suppliers and providers, and (most importantly) plenty of opportunities to catch up with other Financial Planners.
On Monday morning I hosted a screening of my documentary; Boom! Demographics Are Destiny was shown to an audience of Financial Planners and very well received, with several asking how they could use it with their own clients.
Here is how I introduced the movie.
Yesterday lunchtime I was on a panel discussing marketing and communication in a digital age, one of the Meet the Experts sessions.
I sat alongside Dr Adrian Garcia-Sierra, Head of Digital & Customer Experience at AXA Wealth, and Pete Matthew, host of the Meaningful Money Podcast, to answer a number of questions from Financial Planners about blogging, writing books and time management.
In addition to these sessions, I attended ten different keynote presentations and technical workshops over the two days, covering topics ranging from philanthropy to the neurobiology of high performance.
It was this keynote presentation by Dr James Rouse, exploring how we move from excellent to genius, which was my favourite of the conference.
I recently read his book, Think Eat Move Thrive (my review here), so I knew it would be a very useful session. James injected real passion into a room of over 600 Financial Planning professionals and sent us away with practical tips for living life in a more meaningful way.
Another valuable session was presented by Rory Percival from the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), and explored the issues Financial Planners need to consider when carrying out due diligence on investment platforms.
It was this mix of inspirational keynote presentations and practical technical workshops, combined with networking opportunities, which makes the investment in time and money to attend an annual conference worthwhile.
I return to the office today with pages of notes to review and a number of action points, as well as several people to call to follow-up on ideas.
Apparently every session from the three-day conference will be made available to delegates as podcasts, so over the next few months I should have plenty of additional content to devour as I’m walking the dog or out running.
I’ve got one more annual conference to attend this year, the one-day event being hosted by the Personal Finance Society (PFS) in Birmingham at the start of next month.
As Financial Planners, it is vital we occasionally take time out of our busy working lives to obtain new skills and knowledge, which can only benefit our clients and our businesses over the longer term.
