“10 years down the line hopefully things are better, but I think that first year is difficult.”
What would you say is the biggest change in financial advice since you entered and now?
Mba said the consumer duty is the biggest change since he started but admitted the whole industry is new to him.
He explained that based on what he has seen, and what life was like just a few months prior, consumer duty is having a massive impact, depending on the scale of a firm’s operation or what their previous fee structure was.
“I think it's needed though,” he said.
“The perception across the industry is not great with clients, especially retail clients and that needs to change otherwise people will not seek advice when they should.
“They’ll sell out when they maybe should be seeking professional assistance and for a number of reasons, that can be dangerous for the finances, but people don't trust the financial industry.”
Mba explained that with his own business, the duty has had no real impact as it has been built to reflect the consumer duty.
“I've no other experience,” he said.
“But in terms of making sure that things are logged correctly, and the admins done, that side is super important.”
When you first started out, is there anything you would have liked more help on?
Mba said during the time when he was deciding what to do, it was difficult to work out how to get into the industry.
“There's not a lot of help, he said. “And the help that you do find is quite narrowly focused.
He said it would have been useful to have tips on running your own financial advice business given its a skill that you need to learn and cultivate.
Do you have any thoughts on diversity and inclusion in the industry?
“I'm seeing positive changes in that respect,” Mba said.
“I work on my own so it's a bit different but in the broader space across M&G, it's very diverse.”
However, the perception still is that it's quite dominated by a particular demographic.
“This will have to change over time as people retire but what I'm seeing coming through is positive.”
Given you recently started out, do you have a particular book that you'd recommend to anyone considering a career as a financial adviser?
“It would probably depend on the individual and what else they were interested in,” he said.
“There's very specific books that you could read that talk about financial markets and financial advice. As you speak to clients, you realise that people think in very different ways and they view money differently, with different risk profiles and so on.
“If I was to pick one, I'd pick the Psychology of Money.”
So far, what is the one thing you can't live with as an adviser?
“My tablet is quite useful,” he said.
“Just in terms of taking digital notes on the fly and then having them all categorised.”
Mba said this helps with the consumer duty as they can be put on the system and it's contained, as opposed to lots of bits of paper.
