The U.S. population is 13.4% African American; however, only 5% of financial advisors are African American. While Black employees at financial institutions represent 13% of all staff, Black representation among senior positions fell from 2.87 % to 2.62% during the years 2007 to 2018.

With a public that has grown weary of corporate America's lack of progress with diversity, equity, and inclusion, and new research pointing to Black Americans' lack of trust in financial service providers, the financial services industry needs a new plan starting from the inside out.

Financial services is essential to the economic growth of America. The services, products, and advice provided enable individuals and families to grow in financial knowledge, improve financial decision-making, and save and grow wealth. Lack of trust in financial services stemming from institutional bias is a primary contributor to the racial wealth gap in America.

The American College Center for Economic Empowerment and Equality conducted the Black Women, Trust, and the Financial Services Industry study in 2021, finding 60% of respondents expressed difficulty locating financial professionals or advisors they trust.Another study, conducted by Edelman in 2021, revealed that "the majority of Black Americans say they've experienced systemic bias and discrimination across all industry sub-sectors."

Financial institutions are awakening to the economic opportunity from building a relationship with Black America. JP Morgan has committed $30 billion to address racial inequality. Goldman Sachs has committed $10 billion to build trust with Black women. Citi and the Citi Foundation have already invested over $1 billion in their three-year plan to close the racial wealth gap.

Initiatives across the industry have launched with fervor focused on investing in Black communities, increasing access to financial education for Black Americans, and providing increased access to capital for Black entrepreneurs. Yet, solutions to address the lack of Black leadership within organizations are not as easy to find.

"Organizations need to look at their hierarchy from the bottom up," says Karim Hill, executive director for the Center for Economic Empowerment and Equality. "Building trust with Black America can only succeed if you are also committed to building trust with Black professionals within your organization."

In Spring 2022, the Center for Economic Empowerment and Equality will launch the first Black Executive Leadership Program, an innovative approach to executive education designed to open dialogue, identify gaps, and remove the obstacles to advancement for Black professionals within financial services organizations.

The Black Executive Leadership Program is about building trust between Black mid-level managers, the program's fellows, and white senior-level executives, serving as the program's sponsors. Black business leaders facilitate the program, and because they have lived similar experiences to the fellows, they can help guide discussions about racial bias.

Building trust requires three components; competence, sincere interest in the issues and concerns of others, and consistency in effort, meaning you need to want to build a relationship. The Black Executive Leadership Program builds competence with a rigorous curriculum, incorporating advanced behavioral, interpersonal, leadership, and technical financial skills. The forum allows sponsors to impart their wisdom regarding networking and leadership. In return, fellows feel safe to share their experiences, challenges, and perspectives as Black professionals in their organization.

Fellows are selected for their demonstrated potential to lead at an executive level and sponsors, for their eagerness to be a bridge towards change. Through connection and candid conversation, a relationship is born. Through greater understanding and acknowledgment of the issues, agreed-upon action is initiated. The desired outcome is lifelong connections between fellows and sponsors, career advancement for fellows, and meaningful and lasting organizational change.

"Critical to the program's success is ensuring connections last, and the wisdom shared grows and expands long term," explained Martha Fulk, PhD, program director for the Center. "It's about creating a community. Fellows are equipped with the means and platform where they can continue to network and share their experiences with other fellows long after they have completed the program."

Since the Center announced the development of the Black Executive Leadership Program, interest from the industry has been very positive. Truist Financial Corporation donated $500,000 to the Center for Economic Empowerment and Equality, with the first cohort’s in-person events occurring in Charlotte, North Carolina.

"The Black Executive Leadership Program has the potential to advance multicultural success in the financial services industry by serving as a pipeline through which up and coming Black professionals can gain the insight and support they need to advance their careers," said Fulk.

The Black Executive Leadership Program is part of the Four Steps Forward initiative developed by the Center for Economic Empowerment and Equality to narrow the wealth gap for underserved communities, beginning with Black America. Through research, course development, programming, and scholarships, the Center seeks to infuse a perspective of "do well by doing good" in the financial services industry, nonprofit organizations, corporate America, and government agencies.

Learn how you can get involved in helping to narrow the racial wealth gap and create economic justice for all here.

The annual “40 Under 40” are chosen by a team of reporters and editors from nearly 1,000 online nominations. “The 2021 class of 40 Under 40 honorees stood out in a remarkable year,” said George B. Moriarty, Chief Content Officer of InvestmentNews. “This diverse group represents the great things the financial advice industry will accomplish in the future.” This year, The American College of Financial Services is proud to announce that Lindsey Lewis, Director and Chair of The College’s Center for Women in Financial Services, has been selected as one of the featured professionals!

In her current position, Lindsey oversees most of the Women’s Center’s day-to-day activities, including original research, social media activity, event coordination, podcast production, and more as she works to promote the advancement of women in the financial services profession through research, education, and awareness. Prior to joining The College, Lindsey worked as a CFP® practitioner for Soltis Investment Advisors and Vanguard. In these roles, she served clients as a CFP® professional to facilitate holistic financial planning for individual clients and meet institutional clients’ needs. Lindsey is also an active mentor to women pursuing degrees or careers in financial services, and helps operate Utah Valley University’s Women of the Woodbury Polished mini-conference—an event dedicated to women and girls pursuing careers in financial services.

Congratulations, Lindsey! We’re proud to have you as part of our team.

How does an advisor add value? What makes an individual investor turn to their financial planning professional for guidance? What leads a client to act on that guidance? Ask an experienced advisor, and they will tell you that the ultimate answer to all of these questions boils down to just one word: trust.

It’s no secret that trust is at the core of the financial services industry. Clients need to trust their advisor is acting in their best interest, offering sound advice, and is there even in the most tumultuous of times, helping to navigate through cataclysm as steadfastly as the calm.

But it hasn’t always been this way. While trust has forever been a component, historically, the expectation and often most revered benchmark was an advisor’s ability to deliver the highest performance, building their reputation on edging out an extra half  percentage point in total returns. The returns, it was thought, spoke for themselves, but it was a pursuit that would too often backfire as advisors were steered into chasing overvalued securities. As a result of this and other factors, Wealth Management Certified Professional® (WMCP®) Program Director Michael Finke, PhD, CFP®, says that financial advice’s standards have evolved in recent years, and education has been changing with it.

Since joining The College in 2016, Finke has led the effort to reinforce the WMCP® program with the latest in industry thought leadership, as advisors across the industry are moving toward a more holistic approach to serving their clientele. He says the public is starting to understand that a relationship with a financial planning professional is not just about picking a lineup of stocks and bonds. Especially with the rise of investment vehicles like target-date funds, Finke says advisors are competing in an environment where they are expected to do more than deliver marginally higher returns.

This new mindset has led to a more goals-oriented approach, one where the advisor acts more like a trusted partner than a delegated agent. This mindset requires an  understanding of the entire lifecycle for a client investment journey.

“The traditional way of teaching investments is that you construct an investment portfolio, and then when you have a spending goal, you just grab some money from the investment portfolio to fund that need,” Finke says. “Nowadays, we try to begin with the client’s goals and then develop investment strategies to meet each one of those specific goals. And then we construct the portfolio so that it is most efficient at meeting that goal,” Finke explains .

Oftentimes, that means advisors first need to build a fundamental understanding of a client’s aspirations and their reservations. For example, the urge to pull investments in a down market can be an elusive and enduring impulse among investors, one that advisors must work to overcome with their knowledge of behavioral finance. Educating WMCP® students to do just that has become a central tenet of the program.

“When we were developing the WMCP®, we knew that behavioral finance touches every single topic in the program. So when we're developing an investment strategy, if you introduce the behavioral finance aspects, that'll help the advisor do a better job of constructing a portfolio their client can live with,” Finke says.

As with all things, there’s a healthy dose of human psychology at play, particularly when the market is not working in an investor’s favor.

“Behavioral finance is all about recognizing the way the human brain responds to a stimulus, and often in investments, the stimulus that we care the most about is loss,” Finke explains. “We can educate advisors to help people cope with the inevitable short-term losses they will  experience in their investments.”

That approach is part of a long-coming paradigm shift across the financial services industry, one that has taken root across The College’s programs, but is particularly evident for those training for the WMCP® designation.

“By helping contextualize loss in the context of a long-term investment strategy, you create a deeper engagement, a mutual understanding, and a more trusting relationship between the client and their advisor, because they understand each other better,” Finke notes.

At the end of the day, it’s all about the trust advisors have in the education they receive from The College and, in turn, the trust they build with their clients. Their customer base comes to understand that their goals are their advisor’s goals.

“When you think about building a goal-based investment process and starting with a client's goals, it requires you to understand the client more deeply,” Finke says. “It also requires that the client reflect on what's important to them in the long run, and having those types of deeper conversations helps establish a stronger bond between the advisor and the client.

It's a different orientation than what some advisors entering the program have grown used to throughout their careers. The learning experience covers not just how to talk to clients, but also fosters an understanding of where they and their families may be coming from. The goal is to introduce their clients to a new way of thinking about how to save and plan for retirement.

“It’s not just about teaching advisors what questions to ask. It’s about helping them to recognize a client’s goals and then building a plan that will put them on track to achieve those goals, all while keeping in mind their client’s unique circumstances,” Finke says. “We have also introduced case studies to help advisors become more comfortable with some of these more complex planning situations that they're likely to face in their career. It's really all about educating them to provide the professional service that clients aren't looking for.”

The College’s alumni are already on the vanguard of this evolving school of thought through applied knowledge across designation programs. Joshua Gonzalez, CFP®, ChFC®, CLU®, says The College’s focus on financial plan building, investment advice, estate planning, beneficiary concerns, death benefits, and other features of life insurance policies allows him to speak confidently to many different people.

“My usual clients are 40 to 60 years old, high-paid professionals or small to medium business owners with kids at home, who want to pay off their house, pay for college, or get out of working for a living. Others may need to handle complex life insurance needs and business concerns,” he says. “The College’s training lets me holistically tie all these things together and help people in almost every major financial consideration of their life.”

In his experience, Gonzalez says understanding the behavioral finance underpinnings of his client’s behavior helps him be a more effective advisor, adding, “Some days I feel like a psychologist as well, because if you’re doing your job right, you’ve become a friend and confidant to clients rather than just a tool.”

Finke’s studies on the convergence of behavioral science and financial well-being extend past investors’ earning years. As defined-benefit pensions have disappeared for most workers, some of his most recent research suggests that the long-running shift changes spending habits in retirement.

“In the defined-contribution age, many retirees get to retirement and have this big lump sum of money in their 401(k). They roll it over into an IRA, but they don't feel comfortable spending it. They don't feel comfortable seeing that number get smaller,” Finke says. “But of course, that's irrational, because that's why they saved it in the first place, especially in a low interest rate environment.”

Cash flow, he says, can be more comforting than a lump sum, leading retirees to live more freely without as much anxiety about outliving their savings.

“If you have your wealth in some form of pension income or annuitized income, then you're more likely to spend it and live better than if you simply have investments alone, and that's the kind of behavioral science that we help advisors understand for when they are creating a retirement strategy for a client,” Finke says. “How much of their money should be in investable assets? How much of their money should be annuitized for meeting lifestyle goals? Because, it may make sense to actually annuitize a portion of their savings.”

For this and more stories, get our full President's Report.
 

Download the Report

In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic put the world on its heels, but with the development of vaccines, the increase in remote working and learning, and other adaptations, some thought 2021 would be the year things went “back to normal.” The truth, however, was far more complex. The rise of COVID variants and changing political and social climates exacerbated by the virus have led to a “new normal” many are still trying to navigate.

Through it all, young professionals stepped into the breach and continued to grow their expertise in using technology and building relationships to overcome the challenges of the ongoing pandemic and shifting business landscape—especially in financial services. Those under 40 have played a critical role in helping the industry evolve and persevere when many vital sectors have struggled to hold on.

Get to know the next-gen professionals you should be watching in the coming year as we announce our 6th annual NextGen Financial Services Professional Award recipients!

Amie Agamata, CFP®, AIF®, RICP®, ChFC®, CLU®

Amie Agamata is the Director of Investments & Planning for Leonard C. Wright’s team in San Diego, CA. She manages the team’s ERISA plan practice, investments, and financial planning process to ensure all recommendations are in the best interest of clients. “It’s a privilege to be acknowledged as a NextGen leader in our industry and I aspire to encourage anyone interested in or starting their career in financial services to invest in your education, because it does pay off in the long run,” she says. “No one can ever take it away from you, and it makes you a better servant to your clients.”

Agamata says her education through The American College of Financial Services has made a measurable difference in her life. “It’s sometimes harder to be taken seriously in the financial services industry not only as a younger person, but also as a woman in a male dominated field,” she says. “After furthering my education with The College, I’ve experienced higher respect from people in our industry and, more importantly, clients have better trust knowing they’re working with a highly educated individual. It’s key to stay open minded; I recognize the more I learn, the better I’ll be able to serve those in our community.” She also identifies her business partner, Leonard Wright, CPA, PFS, CFP®, as her most important mentor figure, even though they are decades separated in age. “COVID-19 changed him from a Baby Boomer into a Millennial,” she says. “He offered me the position of his right-hand associate when I was only 19 years old, and from that point on, he’s always taught me to achieve and demand exceptionalism in everything I do. I’m blessed to work with someone who shares the same core values as me and truly has my best interest at heart.”

Five Things You Didn’t Know About Amie

Favorite Hobby: “I love traveling and seeing live music or…traveling to see live music! There’s just something unexplainable about experiencing a new place. You learn a lot about yourself when you’re in unfamiliar surroundings. Live music gives you a greater appreciation of the artists and I love the notion that it brings together so many people with different backgrounds and views to enjoy the performance as one.”

Favorite Book: Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens—“It’s a coming-of-age story mixed with a murder mystery that has an unexpected ending. I know I’d enjoy reading again because I’ll learn something different.”

Last Meal: Chicken strips and French fries with a side of ranch—“A classic millennial meal growing up!”

Favorite Vacation: “I backpacked in Thailand for a month with eight of my girlfriends after graduating in 2015. It was an adventure of a lifetime and an experience that we’ll always share and never forget.”

Coffee or Tea: “A hot chai tea latte with oat milk always makes my day a little brighter.”

LeTian Dong, CFP®, RICP®, ChFC®

LeTian Dong is Chief of Staff, VP of Planning, and co-founder of a boutique retirement income and distribution planning practice with partner Tom Morris, MBA, CFP®, with offices in Long Island, NY and Durham, NC. She began her financial planning career upon graduation from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2013, and as a retirement income specialist, she helps clients design strategies that exceed their goals and empower them to live joyfully and confidently.

Dong says the greatest challenge of the COVID-19 pandemic is also an old one: “The number of hours in the day. We held four times as many meetings in 2020 as we did the year prior, with the same team. The sheer amount of work was overwhelming,” she says. “I feel guilty saying we did very well helping clients when so many people were hurting. There were so many starfish stranded on the beach, but we helped as many as we could by going as fast as we could. Our team had to revamp some of our processes to deal with the speed.” She also says she has a passion for mentoring young planning professionals, and her goal is to lead future financial professionals in creating innovative strategies to engage with their communities in this rapidly changing global environment. “Getting established in this industry is challenging, especially for young professionals who may not have as much experience or technical skill set,” she says. “We need to dedicate more resources to helping young advisors build their practices.”

Five Things You Didn’t Know About LeTian

Favorite Hobby: “Dance, especially ballet, jazz, hip-hop, and urban; reading fiction in Chinese and English; and tennis.”

Favorite Quote: “…The credit belongs to the [wo]man…in the arena...” from Theodore Roosevelt’s “Citizenship in a Republic” speech.

Coffee or Tea: “Neither – I generate my own caffeine, so water is all I need!”

Spirit Animal: “The nine-tailed fox. As legend has it, the magical nine-tailed fox earns each tail by being of service to others and granting their wishes. The final tail is awarded in the form of a kind stranger’s wish for her.”

Next Designation: Wealth Management Certified Professional® (WMCP®)

Shellie Haluska, CFP®, CLU®, ChFC®, AAMS®

Shellie Haulska is a financial advisor based in Carroll, IA. She attended Iowa State University (ISU) to earn a bachelor's degree in accounting in 2009 and graduated summa cum laude, before getting her master's degree in 2010. During college, she also played on the ISU women's basketball team before returning to her roots in Carroll. She describes herself as a hometown girl who wants to make a lasting positive impact in her home community. She regularly partners with clients during times of transition, such as retirement or receiving an inheritance, and many of her clients are multigenerational families faced with advanced wealth transfer considerations. She and her husband, Sean, have three daughters, and she serves in a variety of volunteer roles.

Haluska says families and clients need financial advice more than ever during the COVID pandemic. “There are so many families out there that are underserved or not served at all,” she says. “We need a large number of truly dedicated professionals in this industry that are intentional about fine tuning their craft and helping the vast numbers of families out there that need better, deeper advice and service.” While she was sad to see others hurt and suffering in their personal lives and did what she could to help, Haluska says the pandemic also offered her a personal opportunity. “The world shutting down gave me the gift of time, and I tried to use that time wisely by being present at home with family, spending time learning and growing personally and professionally instead of traveling, and being more intentional about connections and caring for my clients, colleagues, and friends through phone calls, care packages, flowers, etc.”

Five Things You Didn’t Know About Shellie

Favorite Hobby: “Spending time with my family, reading, and working out.”

Favorite Organization: “I am the President of the Carroll High School Foundation, our local public school's academic foundation.”

Favorite Quote: “I can do all things in Christ who strengthens me.” Philippians 4:13

Last Meal: “A big bowl of Kraft Mac ‘N Cheese. Is there anything better?”

Last Show You Binge-Watched: Fuller House

Michael Sise, CFP®, ChFC®, CPFA®, AIF®, CRPC®

Michael Sise, a graduate of Stephen Decatur High School and Liberty University, began his career as a financial advisor in 2013. In his first five years in the business, Michael became a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ (CFP®) professional, as well as achieving his Accredited Investment Fiduciary® (AIF®) and Chartered Retirement Planning Counselor® (CRPC®) designations. He worked as an adjunct professor at Salisbury University’s Perdue School of Business for two years teaching Retirement Planning, and in 2019 was named a partner at Comprehensive Financial Solutions (CFS). He is also the host of CFS’s The Financial Planning and Game Theory Podcast. He lives in Maryland with his wife, Allison, and their two daughters.

Sise says receiving the NextGen Financial Services Professional Award is a great honor for him. “It validates the late nights of studying, networking, cold calling, presenting, teaching, and client meetings,” he says. “Our business is ever-changing, and it’s important to keep up with or stay ahead of those changes. Yet ultimately, this business is all about relationships, and an advisor who can build and grow the trust with their clients will have a long and fulfilling career.” He also says the self-doubt young professionals feel can actually be an asset to them in the financial services field. “Any new career is overwhelming, but this career path absolutely requires a young person to know what they don’t know. An intelligent and determined young advisor will be more likely to cherish and capitalize on every learning opportunity they meet professionally. Complacency is always corrosive, and a committed young person in the financial services profession’s greatest advantage is their hunger to learn and grow.”

Five Things You Didn’t Know About Michael

Favorite Quote: "Give me six hours to chop down a tree, and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe." – Abraham Lincoln

Last Meal: “Surf & turf with a caesar salad, fresh bread, and a chocolate shake.”

Favorite Vacation: “A Caribbean cruise in 2014. I put on ten pounds in seven days.”

Next Designation: “The College’s Master of Science in Financial Planning (MSFP) has always appealed to me. The curriculum looks excellent.”

Last Show You Binge Watched: Cobra Kai

Andrew Tudor, CFP®, RICP®

Andrew Tudor is the Founder and Chief Wealth Coach at Alchemist Wealth. There, he helps professional women and dual-income couples transform their relationship with money. His group combines financial planning and coaching to help give dynamic women clarity and confidence with their money. He says receiving the NextGen Financial Services Professional Award “means that we are successfully changing the conversation about money. Our business is about serving our community, being fully transparent, and coaching people to be more fulfilled humans. The market and now the industry is telling us that this new conversation about money matters to people.”

Tudor says young advisors enjoy many professional advantages in today’s financial services industry. “Young professionals and people of color experience financial success and money differently,” he says. “They need someone who understands their unique dreams and potential hurdles with context. That’s why our generation prefers working with younger advisors who understand the aspirations and fears of our peers.” He says younger advisors are also better equipped to lead conversations about wealth creation as well as wealth management. “I understand and can articulate the desires and fears of my peer group. We experienced the Great Recession, Housing Crises, and Cryptocurrency Boom in the same life stage,” he says. “That gives me an advantage because I’m hearing the meaning behind the goals and the fears. The most important thing is that our clients feel understood.”

Five Things You Didn’t Know About Andrew

Favorite Hobby: “Cooking. It’s my creative outlet and I love eating my creations.”

Favorite Podcast: “Revisionist History with Malcolm Gladwell. I love history and reexamining the things we hold to be true.”

Favorite Book: “The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. It explores how life is an uncharted journey that you have to chart for yourself. You must follow your personal legend and create your uniquely satisfying future. I believe that to my core.”

Best Vacation: “Accra, Ghana, in 2019. It was the Year of Return for people of African descent. It was beautiful, insightful, and powerful. It changed my life.”

Favorite Organization: "Professionally, CHIP, NAPFA, and XY Planning Network. Personally, I-Rise Investments (my investment club), the Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce, the Leadership Center, and Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc.”

Lauren Yamaoka, CAP®

Lauren Yamaoka is a Director of Development at The Fuller Foundation, where she works to help clients and donors achieve their philanthropic goals and support Fuller Theological Seminary and its community. She earned a BA in English from Hope College and an MFA in Creative Writing from Roosevelt University. She has worked in nonprofit fundraising for nearly a decade, holding positions with Northwestern University, Southern Methodist University, and the Children’s Medical Center Foundation. “As a fundraising professional among so many traditional client-facing financial advisors, it is truly an honor to receive this award and to represent the nonprofit seat at the planning table, as we are all working together—client, advisor, and fundraiser alike—to make a positive difference in the community and world,” she says.

Early in her career, Yamaoka was a nonprofit recruiter, and she says she’s most grateful for  those who took a chance on her when she decided she wanted to transition into a frontline fundraising role as a major gifts officer. “As young professionals, we have been raised to be successful in a business world that has shifted toward a focus on social responsibility, values, and impact,” she says. “For those of us in the nonprofit sector, we are in a prime position to use these skills to better articulate our organizations' impact in the community and progress toward mission fulfillment, which can in turn inspire better confidence among donors and volunteers.”

Five Things You Didn’t Know About Lauren

Favorite Hobby: “Reading! I typically read an average of one book per week and love sharing my thoughts and recommendations with others.”

Favorite Quote: "It is something to be able to paint a particular picture, or to carve a statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we look, which morally we can do. To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts." —Henry David Thoreau

Best Vacation: “My husband and I visited Thailand and Vietnam in fall 2018 and fell in love with the culture, cuisine, and the people.”

Next Designation: “The Master of Science in Financial Planning (MSFP) with a concentration in legacy planning. My three CAP® courses count toward this degree!”

Last Meal: “All my favorite dishes at Gather in Chicago’s Lincoln Square neighborhood.”

New Inroads with Black Women

In late 2021, the American College Center for Economic Empowerment and Equality finalized and released a study based on the first pillar of the Center’s Four Steps Forward initiative – to provide empowerment and educational opportunities to Black women. As Black women are often considered the gatekeepers of their families and communities, understanding their needs and situations is key to addressing the persistent issues of inequality that adversely affect the Black community as a whole.

The study's results were revealing and continue to make waves across the industry. As a result of this leading industry research, The College took home the 2022 WealthManagement.com Wealthies Award for Industry Research Provider. A second phase of research focused on Black women will begin in 2023.

Solving for Public Trust

At the same time, the American College Cary M. Maguire Center for Ethics in Financial Services was conducting a parallel study: this one focused on the general state of trust in the financial services industry. Fourteen years after the 2008 financial crisis, the research found reasons for optimism after interviewing consumers nationwide, but also areas where the industry still has a long way to go.

The results show the industry has made progress in recent years, but more still stands to be accomplished by financial professionals. Among the pressing proof points are greater transparency, simplicity, and focus on cultivating relationships that transcend transactions.

Identifying Barriers to Career Success

The American College Center for Women in Financial Services built on the theme of forming connections with important communities through their own study aimed at financial advisors rather than consumers or the general public. The research was designed to understand advisors’ perceptions of success and to help financial services companies in their efforts to recruit, support, and retain financial professionals.

Advisors were prompted to self-identify their level of success as financial professionals and explain the reasons for that success or lack thereof, as well as what they needed to feel more successful and happier in their work. The results across the board were mostly encouraging: 7 in 10 advisors identified themselves as successful by their own personal metrics or by their ability to meet their employers’ business goals.

A Drive Toward Evolution

This triad of studies clearly shows the industry must take calls for greater community involvement, communication, education, and transparency seriously. Clients and advisors want more than a strict business relationship in financial services: instead, they desire a  partnership built on trust, respect, and opportunities for continued growth. As the financial planning landscape continues to shift and change, it is up to industry leaders to open new doors and walk through them.

Read this story and more in our 2022 President’s Report.

As an alumnus of The American College of Financial Services with over four decades in financial services, as well as the founder and CEO of Rosenzweig Financial Services—the company that bears his name—Rosenzweig has been an influential supporter of The College and its students, faculty, and staff for much of that time. This year, Rosenzweig will be inducted into The College’s Alumni Hall of Fame, a select group of graduates who have made extraordinary contributions in time, talent, and treasure to The College and to the financial services industry and society as a whole. And it likely won’t be a surprise to learn that Rosenzweig has quite few stories to tell—but the story of his journey to the financial services profession might be.

“I graduated college in 1973 and was planning to go to law school,” Rosenzweig recalls. “I decided on about a week’s notice to take a ten day vacation overseas before my term started. That ten day trip became eight and a half months living in over 20 European and Middle Eastern countries, and when I came back, I realized I didn’t want to go to law school after all. I needed a new direction for my life.”

Rosenzweig credits his brother-in-law with first suggesting he consider financial planning as a potential career—something he had never before considered. “I was definitely a hippy,” he says. “A month earlier, I was living in Goa, India, with long hair and a beard and had been to Woodstock, and a month later I was walking into Penn Mutual to interview for a position as an insurance agent, clean-cut and ready to go.”

While at Penn Mutual, Rosenzweig worked under the watchful eye of Lou DiCerbo, CLU®, ChFC®: a well-known titan of the financial services industry, longtime friend of The College, and the first-ever inductee to The College’s Alumni Hall of Fame. Naturally, this seemed like the start of a successful career. Cue plot twist.

“I worked there for four and a half months, did very well, and then left, never wanting to go back.”

Oh. Okay, then.

“I told my brother-in-law I didn’t want to do insurance,” Rosenzweig says. “I just didn’t think it was for me. So he told me he was opening up a beer brewer and distributor in Brooklyn, and that when they opened a second location, I could be a partner. Four and a half years later, I was working 75-hour weeks in the beer industry and had a wife and year-old child to support. But the partnership fell through, and I was devastated.”

It was now 1979, and Rosenzweig was looking for another career change at a time most people were having great difficulty finding jobs. But he certainly wasn’t looking to go back to financial services, because—I’m wrong again, aren’t I?

“The people I had known at Penn Mutual told me to come back to financial services, and there were potential places for me both there and at MassMutual,” he said. “I had no money, there weren’t many other options on the table, and I saw the people I had worked with years before were doing well now. My father taught me to always do the best job I could wherever I worked, and to never burn a bridge. So I sat down, thought it over, and decided to go back to insurance, and to Penn Mutual. In the end, it was the people there that convinced me.”

Because of his values and work ethic, and having parted on good terms previously, Rosenzweig found DiCerbo was more than happy to hire him back and says he remains in his debt. The rest, as they say, is history. When asked why he came back to financial services after resisting for so long, Rosenzweig laughs. “I came back for the money, and you can make a lot of money in this business. I won’t apologize for that,” he says. “Having said that, I love helping other people and I love to work hard. There’s always more people to see, and my love of the profession grew from there.”

These days, Rosenzweig works with clients whose needs run the gamut from life, disability, and long-term care insurance to pension administration, employee benefits assistance, and more. “My objective was always long-term client retention and being a trusted, knowledgeable partner for them,” he says. And that’s where The American College of Financial Services came in. “Lou was my key to The College. He would always preach that applied knowledge is power in our industry, and that The College was the citadel of that knowledge. So if I wanted to sell a lot of insurance and be competitive, I needed more and better knowledge.”

Despite resisting going back to school and the time drain of returning to studies, Rosenzweig says DiCerbo’s encouragement was the push he needed to earn his Chartered Life Underwriter® (CLU®) designation, and later his Chartered Financial Consultant® (ChFC®), with The College. “I’ve met incredible people over my time here and in my different roles with The College that have helped me grow dramatically.” He lists his three primary areas of expertise as insurance planning, estate planning, and qualified planning—and credits The College with imparting much of that knowledge. “I’ve always believed in treating other people like I’d want to be treated and offering the best value and service for my fees to clients. Sharing knowledge with clients helps them make better and more informed decisions. I don’t ever tell people what they should do; I tell them what they could do, and the rest is up to them.”

Now approaching 50 years in the industry, Rosenzweig says his focus has shifted to giving back to the profession and his community. He says it hasn’t always been easy, but doing the right thing and helping others is its own reward.

“I once met an attorney who had lost his law license for something he did. He needed insurance and came to me, but I couldn’t stand working with him as a client and was glad when we parted ways,” he said. “Several years later, his wife called me out of the blue and told me he had passed away. The police wanted to do an autopsy, but she couldn’t allow it for religious reasons and wanted to know how it might affect their insurance policy. Keep in mind, this was at 4 p.m. on a Thursday and I was playing in a tennis tournament that night. I hadn’t liked him much, but I immediately called my wife and told her I wouldn’t be making it home.”

Rosenzweig says he worked through that evening and into the following morning getting in touch with detectives, medical examiners, and every life insurance contact he could find to get answers for the widow. “I went to his funeral and listened to his son deliver the eulogy, and I learned that thanks to that insurance money I’d helped them get, both his children were able to go to college,” he says. “I’ll say it again: treat others the way you’d want to be treated, and do what’s right. It’s easy to say, but hard to do.”

Rosenzweig is full of stories like this one—something that’s not hard to imagine given his professional and life experiences. “I’ve always felt it’s important to give back, whether it’s through education or charity, and not just be a taker,” he says. “On vacation in the Philippines, I saw a water carrier who would sell water to people. I paid him for all his inventory that day, which couldn’t have been more than $20, and told him to give out free drinks to everyone working at the small airport we were at. I changed his life that day. Another time, I was in Ireland and was listening to a storyteller trying to sell his tapes and books, but was getting booed by the audience. I stepped up to sell his merchandise for him, and he had to go back to his car and get the rest of it because it sold out so fast.” He chuckles. “I like to think I’m a pretty good salesperson, too.”

Over the years, Rosenzweig has been one of The College’s greatest supporters and champions. He made his voice heard in the organization serving on The College’s Board of Trustees for a nine year period, offering advice and guidance as The College navigated the shifting landscape of the financial services profession. He also showed his dedication to supporting and nurturing the growth of students and alumni like himself as President of The College’s Alumni Association, as well as expanding The College’s mission and reach through his Chairmanship of its Foundation Board. And if that wasn’t enough, he also served as Co-Chair for The College’s three-year capital campaign, raising the needed donations from friends, alumni, and sponsors to fund The College’s educational endeavors well into the future. It’s safe to say The College wouldn’t be the same without him.

Congratulations to Mickey Rosenzweig, CLU®, ChFC®, AEP® on his induction into The American College of Financial Services’ Alumni Hall of Fame!

Presented annually since 1975, The College’s Solomon S. Huebner Gold Medal is named for Solomon S. Huebner — a financial services, education, and insurance pioneer who founded The College in 1927. Individuals receiving the Solomon S. Huebner Gold Medal, the highest honor bestowed by The College, are those whose leadership and support have advanced the mission of The College in significant ways.

This year The College honors Davison, who is chairman, president, and CEO of OneAmerica, with this prestigious honor. As a College Board of Trustees member since 2011 and chairperson of the Board from 2020–2022, Davison helped lead The College into an exciting new era and continues to be a champion for diversity, equity, and inclusion in financial services.

With 2021 seeing the onboarding of a new executive director, a milestone in the number of scholarships awarded, and a landmark gift and continued partnership with Penn Mutual, the Center for Military and Veterans Affairs stands ready to extend its reach, offering even more scholarships, improving the lives of more military families, and acting as a trusted lifelong partner for students and alumni.

James A. Roy, PMP®, CMSAF (Ret.), was recently tapped to serve as the Center for Veterans Affairs’ new executive director. As the Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force, Roy represented the highest level of leadership among noncommissioned officers in the U.S. Air Force—only the 16th service member in Air Force history appointed to such a position—and in his role, he provided direction for enlisted men and women as well as representing their interests to the American public and at all levels of government. He served as the personal advisor to the Chief of Staff and the secretary of the Air Force on all issues regarding the welfare, readiness, morale, and proper utilization and progress of the force.

His success soon carried over to an accomplished business career, where Roy most recently served as chief operating officer for Silotech Group, a company focused on advanced cyber, intelligence, IT, and modernization solutions. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Chief Roy brought on 20 new employees to the firm, expanded to three new business sectors as part of his vision to grow Silotech beyond small business status, and brought in nearly $20 million in annual revenue during a very turbulent time in U.S. history.

That mix of public service and private sector experience quickly caught the attention of The American College of Financial Services President and CEO George Nichols III in his search for an executive director who would be ready to build on the Center’s  past successes and take it to new levels.

“Chief Roy has the exact vision and value set that’s needed to lead the Center as we give back to our honorable communities of service members and their loved ones. His service record and professional qualifications truly speak for themselves, and he’s the kind of leader we want on our team,” President Nichols says, adding that he has high hopes for Roy’s tenure at The College.

And Roy has already been making rapid inroads in his new role. The Center successfully hosted its annual clambake and award ceremony in September and, in addition to welcoming esteemed guests and speakers, took the opportunity to award its 1,000th student scholarship. Roy says that’s just the start, explaining that the Center has plans to greatly expand its financial outreach efforts. Roy hopes to award 400 annual scholarships in 2022 and beyond, a four-fold increase from its historical yearly average. The expansion effort was jump started by a critical grant from the Center for Veterans Affairs’ longtime partner and financial backer, The Penn Mutual Life Insurance Company, which announced a 10-year, $3 million contribution to fund scholarships, transition support, job placement programs, and other services.

Roy says veterans and the broader military community come with a skillset and ethos that’s already a natural fit for The College and the financial services industry that it serves.

“Veterans come with a set of core values that makes them comfortable operating in an environment that requires attention to detail, integrity, and an appreciation of all different cultures and backgrounds,” Roy said. “Especially in financial services, there is and always will be a real need for those individuals of integrity to help others as they address life’s major milestones with confidence and success.”

In addition to what will amount to be a record-setting year for student scholarship awards, the Center is currently in the process of further expanding The College’s eligibility for scholarships under the Post-9/11 GI Bill. Currently, only master’s degree programs qualify for GI bill funding, but Roy hopes that securing federal funding for some of The College’s designation programs as well will greatly expand The College’s reach into the military community, including possibly for active-duty personnel.

In addition to expanding scholarship offers and other outside funding, Roy’s other immediate focus is on growing The College’s overall footprint in the lives of veterans and their families, both during and after their time spent studying for their designations and degrees.

“What we want to offer is more than just an education or a designation. It’s a lasting commitment to be there as a steadfast, dependable partner as they progress through their post-military financial service careers,” Roy says.

To that end, Roy and his team, including Bonnie Weinberger, Rick Nail, and Nicole Jones, are building out an academic and career mentorship program, where students are partnered with leaders in the financial services industry.

“Our vision is a program where current students and recent graduates are connected with industry leaders – maybe they’re alumni of The College or veterans themselves, or maybe others who want to make an impact and the idea would be to not only help them get a foothold in the financial services industry, but to then help them progress past those first few years. The point is to get to where the student is really on solid ground,” Roy says. “It’s mentoring, it’s career coaching, it's a partnership where the student has someone to turn to, someone who has been in the industry for a while and can help make connections.”

Roy sees the program as a way for new entrees to gain access to what can be a niche industry.

“Once you have those first few cohorts up and running, I think you’ll soon see a system that quickly becomes self-sustaining. The former students can turn around and help the next group on their way up,” Roy adds.

The mentorship program is just one core pillar of an expanding mission undertaken by the Center, one that includes job placement and career guidance.

“I know that there are a lot of companies out there eager to hire highly talented, dedicated veterans. It’s really just a matter of us making those connections,” Roy says . “Fortunately, we’ve been able to rely on our partners — our institutional partners and supporters, but also our financial backers who help fund scholarships — as we work to carry out our mission to help veterans.”

To learn more about the Center for Military and Veterans Affairs, visit their website.

There’s no easy answer to the quandary we find ourselves in. But one thing that could help is a good, healthy dose of ethics. That’s where the American College Cary M. Maguire Center for Ethics in Financial Services’ team is stepping in to help. As the only ethics center within an academic institution focusing exclusively on the financial services industry, the Center stands alone not only because of its singular nature, but because of the passion and dedication of those running it to change the industry, and society at large, for the better. And you might be surprised to learn that those fixes actually start small.

“If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that regulation isn’t the answer to every problem,” says Azish Filabi, JD, MA, executive director of the Center for Ethics in Financial Services. She’s a lawyer by training, and had her first glimpse of the importance of ethics in financial services during the 2008 financial crisis while working at the NY Fed. “We’ve all seen the evidence of rising inequality, financial and otherwise, and how unfettered some parties have become with taking advantage of people and hurting the environment despite all the laws on the books. Investors and the general public aren’t happy, and the problem has become so bad it needs to be addressed. Because of this, decisions at the individual and the firm level have become extremely important.”

Trust in the financial services industry has been famously low since 2008, with an oft-cited Edelman survey ranking it one of the least-trusted business sectors among most Americans. However, there have been encouraging signs of progress, including data from the Center for Ethics in Financial Services’ own in-depth study on the topic. Full results from the study will be published soon, and findings have been rolling out over the past year, including takeaways from interviews with corporate leaders on the importance of trust to their business models and an exclusive webcast discussing those findings.

“We’re optimistic,” says Domarina Oshana, PhD, the Center’s director of research and operations, and the driving force behind the study. “There’s been some improvement over the past few years, to the point where our data shows financial services ranking in the middle, not the bottom, of trust among service industries.” A social scientist with roots in psychology, Oshana is no stranger to issues of trust herself. “Among scientists, we have a code of ethical conduct when doing research…so, ethics has always been part of my work,” she says.

As this duo runs the Center for Ethics in Financial Services’ day-to-day operations, they’re constantly inspired by the mission of The College to spread knowledge and education and benefit society. “I was excited to join The College because ethics is fundamental for the institution and our leaders, both professionally and personally,” Filabi says. “You’d be surprised how many business schools don’t put a heavy focus on ethics in their curriculum, and I think The College has the chance to be a guiding light in business education because of it.”

Trust as a concept is fundamental to human existence, especially when it comes to other humans: if we didn’t have a basic expectation that our fellow drivers would obey the rules of the road, for example, we’d never be able to drive well ourselves. This means ethics, as the foundation of building trust, must be equally fundamental. “When we interview people, we often hear them say they used to be more trusting, but now they’re not, and they’re sad about it,” Oshana says. “It’s elemental to want to have more trust because we need trust to survive, and that goes for organizations and people. Hearing they’re sad about losing it makes me hopeful they’ll want to rebuild it.”

Phase one of the Center for Ethics in Financial Services’ study focused specifically on financial services leadership, and phase two looks specifically at consumers. Through a combination of a nationally representative survey, focus groups, and one-on-one interviews with a mix of people across gender identities, race and ethnicity, and income levels, the Center determined that a sense of trust and an authentic personal connection between companies and advisors and those they serve is of critical importance. “Among consumers, we’ve seen they don’t always differentiate between brands and corporations in financial services,” Filabi says. “They see the industry as monolithic, and there’s a disconnect between their understanding of how it works; if companies are doing well, they must be taking advantage of consumers, and therefore, consumers can’t be doing well.”

Oshana says change on this front needs to start with CEOs and business leaders recognizing the trust problem in their own backyards. “Often in our interviews, we hear people at the top acknowledging that trust is an important issue, but the problem isn’t their company—it’s someone else’s,” she says. “They need to realize it can happen even within their business.” She also notes that people often hold financial services companies to a higher standard of behavior than other businesses. “We’re dealing with people’s investments, retirement, mortgages, and lives,” she says. “Having friendly employees and treating all people fairly is a start, but that doesn’t build trust alone. Building clients’ wealth, keeping promises to them, and delivering results while maintaining ethical standards is the key to progress.”

Much of these principles of trust can be seen in the upcoming phase three of the Center for Ethics in Financial Services’ trust study: stakeholder mapping. Filabi says an exploration of the term “stakeholder” and how it accompanies and parallels the more familiar concept of “shareholders” in business culture is at the heart of the Center’s work. “In the old days, the economy was all about shareholder capitalism and maximizing profit,” she says. “A company’s goal was usually to create a product and sell as much of that product as possible without an emphasis on innovation. Now, consumers are becoming more discerning, and they expect change and evolution in their products and services to stay relevant and useful. They want a voice in the decision-making process. We’re seeing that focusing just on pleasing shareholders is shortsighted, and it doesn’t benefit the company or society in the long run. Companies, including those in the financial services industry, need to start thinking about taking their consumers—the other stakeholders—into account to build trust and affect real change.”

That trust, says Filabi, starts on the individual level, with advisors, senior leadership, and other financial professionals agreeing to abide by their own codes of ethics, and companies policing themselves more effectively. “Consumers are seeing the connection between how companies treat their employees and their clients,” she says. “How companies react to their employees speaking up about concerns within the organization matters.”

Oshana says the Center for Ethics in Financial Services’ research links competence, authenticity, and credibility as important ingredients of building trust in financial services. “Of course, it’s important to consumers to be treated well by people working for the companies where they put their money, but they also don’t want that treatment to be based on high fees or excess compensation,” she says. “Capability and integrity need to go hand in hand, and most people we’ve spoken with agree that compensation should be based on performance.”

In this way, Filabi and Oshana see their work with the Center for Ethics in Financial Services to be vital in supporting discussions about ethics and building trust in the financial services industry, and spreading the word about The College as a champion of business ethics and a trusted name among professionals and consumers alike. “The COVID-19 era has seen decreases in trust across all kinds of institutions, and advisors and clients often seek an external trusted resource, where they can get information and acquire knowledge,” Filabi says. “The College is an ideal third party to collect, vet, and share that information with everyone so that all can benefit from it.”

As they work to raise the profile of The College and its culture of ethics both inside and outside of the financial services industry, the leaders of the Center for Ethics in Financial Services see opportunities everywhere, despite the challenging landscape of today—and their strong, close-knit bonds as a team, built on mutual understanding, respect, and trust, make it easy to see why.

“People often think there’s no reliable way to demonstrate ethics, but actually there is,” says Oshana. “For example, the accreditation The College has as an educator is just one of those ways, and it shows we have the best interest of our students in mind as they go through our programs.”

Filabi adds, “We have the opportunity to make a nebulous concept like ethics more tangible for consumers, individual advisors, and business leaders to speak about it more effectively and make society as a whole better. I can’t imagine a mission of greater import than that.”

The Center for Ethics in Financial Services works to expand its reach through leadership workshops with companies and by word about how financial services businesses, leaders, and advisors can put the principles of ethics and trust into practice for the benefit of themselves, their clients, and society.

Receive the latest information on timely topics and trends, as well as updates from the Center on its upcoming research and programs. Let us be your trusted resource of expert knowledge on all things ethics in financial services.

To learn more, sign up for the EthicAlly newsletter at Ethics.TheAmericanCollege.edu or email Ethics@TheAmericanCollege.edu and become a part of our growing community.