You may have heard about our new ‘not-for-profit’ initiative ‘We Are Change’, launched last month…

Our CEO, Cathi Harrison, recently spoke to Nucleus and explained more about how it all works, and why we have decided now is the time;

“We Are Change is a not-for-profit initiative and is open to anyone connected with the financial services industry: advisers, providers, asset managers, professional bodies, marketing agencies that work with advisers; all are welcome to get involved.

Basically, firms or individuals can sponsor a place (or a number of places) for a trainee to become level 4 qualified and trained in a range of practical skills that form the foundations of any financial career such as paraplanning, advising, support and compliance.

We already offer financial services training and career development through The Art of Finance, so we have a proven framework to deliver this.

Because of Covid, the vast majority of our programmes have been developed into online material, which also helps in terms of our own resources.

The cost is £85 a month, which is the cost of an individual getting their CII Diploma in Regulated Financial Planning over two years. That covers Chartered Insurance Institute membership, the R01 to R06 textbooks and six exam sittings.

Each cohort tends to have up to 15 trainees, and people can choose to study over one or two years depending on their preference, much like any other distance learning course (Open University style).

That money goes into one pot, which will be used to drive a campaign to attract people to finance.

After a thorough recruitment and selection process, we’ll then deliver the training, both in terms of help with exams and practical skills to the successful applicants.

A benefit for those getting involved is that firms that sponsor a place have a first port of call when it comes to recruiting, as when and they are ready to hire. That could be straight away, or it could be next year.”

Read the full article here.