Grey hairs, Birthdays and Goals!

What do birthdays mean to you?  For many people it means presents, spending quality time with family and friends and having a few of your favourite beverages of choice!

It may also mean that you spend 5 minutes counting how many more grey hairs you have this year!  ( It's the first time I've done it this year, and I've got 3.....bit worrying for a man in his early thirties! )

I love all these things about birthdays, but for me ( and especially as I get older ), it's also about taking some time to understand what I've achieved personally and professionally, and more importantly where I want to be in the future.

Charlotte, my 6 year old ( or as she has recently been saying - "No daddy, I'm not 6, I'm nearly 7" ) doesn't worry about this when birthday comes around, and neither should she.  I want her to enjoy her childhood, stay young and carefree as long as she can and let Cassie and I worry about her future.

However I not 6 ( or nearly 7 ) any more, I'm now 33.  I've got responsibilities as a business owner, a husband and most importantly a Dad!!  Living up to my responsibilities means that, probably not unlike you, I'm always busy.  

I understand this, but let me ask you a question :-

"When was the last time you took time out of your day to take stock of where you are are both personally, professionally and financially?"

I help both individuals and business plan for their financial futures all the time, and as a great believer in practising what you preach I ensure that financial plans for my family are in place and review these plans on a regular basis....so, let me ask you another question:-

"Do you do the same?"

Some of you may take the time to put in place these plans(I'd imagine some of you do, and some of you don't).  If you are one of these people who doesn't plan, do yourself a huge favour.....next time you get a chance, make yourself a cup of tea (or pour yourself a glass of your favourite tipple), sit down, take a deep breath and take stock.

Grab a pen and paper, write down where you feel you are personally, professionally and financially.....and then write down what you a looking to achieve in the next 1, 3 or 5 and even longer.  Once it's written down, put some definitive plans in place to achieve these goals in your life.

By striving to achieve these goals, your life should be wealthier, happier and healthier.....regardless of whether the grey hairs come or not!!

Who's up for a Come Dine with me challenge?

Let me ask you a few questions.....

Do you love Come Dine with Me?

Can you Cook? or more importantly, Would you like to try?

Do you live in Essex, Herts or East London?

3 of my friends and I recently had a mock "come dine with me" challenge.....and it was so much fun, I want to try it again!! This time from people I'd like to see more often, but don't....my Twitter and Facebook friends.

So, who's up for it?  If so, email me at Chris@Principalifas.co.uk

A litte story....

Let me tell you a story...

A young high earning city gent, let's call him Steve, books a meeting with an Independent Financial Adviser. He had a 2 year old daughter, his priorities had changed and he felt that private education was the route to go for her future and wanted to start saving now.

"I've got a problem" said Steve "I want to save for my daughters future, but I've got an issue....I've no spare money at the end of the month". "That's fine" said the financial planner "We'll take a look at your income and outgoings as part of the work we do and we can see where you spend your salary."

Steve and his adviser got to the stage where they discussed his budget, completed a budget planner and it left both of them scratching their heads.

"Based on what you've told me" says the adviser "You should have £800 per month spare!!"

"Well, I haven't" Steve replies "Where does that money go??"

"Ok" says the adviser, "Tell me about your typical weekday?"

"Ok" says Steve, feeling confused about why the adviser asked

"I jump on the tube to work, before work I pop into Starbucks and buy myself a coffee and a Sandwich for breakfast. I then go to work, but, I love Starbucks!! So I pop out at about 10:30 and buy myself a coffee and a snack....."

The story continued and the adviser, and eventually Steve realised that he visited Starbucks 4 - 5 times a day. Then Steve with the help of the adviser calculated that he spends £320 per month in Starbucks!!

"I think we're getting closer to finding out where your spare money goes" says the adviser

"Yep" says Steve feeling slightly ashamed about his caffine and snack habits "I've never looked at it this way before."

"I understand" said the adviser "and it's not unusual if you've never had the chance to budget plan before. Also, I'm not suggesting you stop visiting starbucks...but what this information allows us to do is to prioritise realistically."

Then the meeting continued.......

Moral of the story:-

If you've never budget planned before, do so now!!  Any professional adviser will be prepared to do this as part of the financial planning process, but you can also do this yourself by downloading This Free Template from the office of fair trading.  Also, if you're not sure where your money goes, dig deeper, think about what and how much you spend on a regular day.

Once you understand where your money gets spent, you have the power to change your spending habits (if you want to).....and the budget planning exercise will be time well spent.

Networking, Meerkat's and Honesty.

I love networking. For me, it's about meeting new people, building relationships and eventually working together. One of my new favourites is 4networking where the meetings are relaxed enough to be fun, but structured enough to be productive.

4networking works slightly differently to other groups like BNI and BRX. Where the more formal groups only allow one member from each discipline, 4networking allows as many members from one discipline as possible.

Now, you may be saying, "What a nightmare, 4 financial advisers sitting in a room", but for me, It has been an interesting experience, but perhaps not in the way you expect.

As you may know, a "Financial Adviser" or "Financial Planner" can come in many guises...you have fully independent whole of market financial advisers, multi tied or single tied financial advisers. You also have individuals who can only provide protection and mortgage advice compared with individuals who can provide advice across a range of different advice areas ( including retirement planning and investment planning needs ).

Let me make this clear, I'm immensely proud to be a fully independent, diploma qualified financial planner who can provide a wide range of advice in a number of areas. I also appreciate and understand that it takes all sorts, and there are individuals out there who are multi tied, protection only, or commission only.

However, what I've found is, and how do I put this politely, there is a degree of, erm, misrepresentation some individuals display when talking about their business.

I've heard advisers who are linked to a limited product range call themselves "Independent", as well as protection only advisers call themselves "Financial Planners". For me, as a little meerkat would say, "It's simples"...be open, honest and transparent about how you work, and provide your clients with the full picture before you engage with them.

Now, whilst the behaviour of these individuals is no threat to my business ( I'm happy to continue to build long term sustainable relationships with clients who trust me ), it does mean that the clients of these "Advisers" are not provided with all the information they need to make an informed choice and are therefore may be put in a position where they understand that their adviser is independent, when in actual fact they recommend the same providers day in and day out.

In my opinion, this can only lead to greater distrust in a profession where there are a number of great independent financial planners who can genuinely help you manage your money more effectively. For me, that's a huge shame!!

What do you think?

Relationships and Elephants

A couple of weeks ago, Charlotte and I completed the 10 bridges walk in aid of Richard House. A great day was had by all ( over 200 people came out to help support a fantastic cause ) and although the 10 mile journey was a tough one, for me, walking around London is always a pleasure.

One great thing about London at the moment is the Elephants. "Elephants....in London" I hear you say, "What Elephants?". At the moment, there are over 250 brilliantly designed elephants all over London, it's called the Elephant Parade London and are going to be auctioned off to raise money for Asian elephants and 20 UK based conservation charities.

Professionally, I'm helping a number of companies at the moment help retain their employees by providing their staff with the right employee benefits. I'm a great believer in ensuring both the directors and the employees of these businesses have the most appropriate provisions for their business now.

But my job doesn't stop there, as the most important thing is to ensure that these benefits remain appropriate. It's about building long term sustainable relationships with the professional adviser you work with. As you know, companies can grow or shrink, employees can leave and join, and the directors ambitions for their business can change...therefore it's not only important to ensure the benefits for directors and employes are appropriate now, but make sure that these benefits remain relevant...and I do this by ensuring that companies are reviewed on a regular basis.

If you are a individual or the director of a company ( or both ), it's important that you sit down with your adviser on a regular basis. For this to be a pleasure and not a chore, you should work with a professional you like, you trust and you feel confident can manage your financial affairs.

Family and giving something back

The most important thing in my life, like many of you, is my family. My daughter comes home from school every day with a brand new story of life in the classroom and playground. My wife is my best friend, greatest advocate and puts up with all my little foibles. However it's easy when you are busy dealing with the challenges of daily life to lose sight of this, and really how lucky I(and most of you) are.

At a networking event this morning, I was chatting to Viv Talbot of Richard House. Richard House supports families with children who have life-threatening illnesses, and the admirable work they do ensures the families they help are provided with a range of services including respite and end of life care.

I'm a firm believer in giving something back, and therefore I've decided to do get involved in helping Richard House raise some money. Therefore, I'll be doing the 10 bridge walk on the 23rd may with Charlotte coming along to keep me company.

I'll be setting up a just giving page over the next couple of days, and I'll make sure once this is done, it's posted on this blog.

The assets of your business and the impact of NEST

What do you consider the most important assets of your business? There are many answers to this question including intellectual property owned by the business, the relationship with your clients and the reputation of the business. However, for most medium sized businesses, all of these potentially valuable assets are underpinned by one often ignored asset..your employees.

Your client relationships are defined by your employees, the reputation of your business is either damaged or enhanced by your staff, and although business strategy and guidance comes from the directors of a company, many of the ideas and concepts relating to implementing these strategies come from the individuals within your business.

So, what can a medium sized company do to motivate, encourage and retain the right staff. The right working environment is important, as well as an appropriate salary level. However, an interesting survey from insurer Canada Life highlighted the importance of employee benefits when employees look for prospective employment.

When asked,"How important do you consider benefits when choosing to accept a job?", 68% of employees said it was an important factor, 27% were neutral about additional benefits and 5% considered additional benefits to be important.

When employees were asked about the most important benefits, the top 5 were Pensions, Income Protection, Holiday Allowance, Life Assurance and Basic Health Insurance.

However, another important factor which will have a major impact on how all businesses look at their employee benefits is the introduction of NEST. This video from Steve Bee highlights the need for employers to look at the benefits they provide to their staff. The new auto enrollment legislation has an impact on 1.1 million employers. Around 100,000 workplace pension schemes are currently in place. This means that 1 million employers will be in a position where they may need to put in place a workplace pension in the next 5 years.

So, if you are an owner of a business, there are two important questions..

1) Do you review your employee benefits to ensure they are designed to encourage great staff to join your business, and motivate and retain your existing staff to stay?

2) Are you ready for the changes in law which will have an impact on your business within the next 5 years?

Chris Daems,
Principal Financial Solutions.

Personal Challenges, Leaders Debates and furrowing the NEST

I'm looking out the window of my office, and feeling positive. The sun is shining, spring has arrived, and I'm as busy as ever.

Last week was a challenging one, mainly because I had two professional exams. "A little bit stressed" would be an understatement of how I've been feeling over the past couple of weeks, as all my focus has been on ensuring these exams are passed first time...now I can relax, enjoy the weather, and wait tentatively for the results. My wife's glad they are over, as I tend to be a bit tetchy when exam season arrives!!

The second leaders debates were interesting to watch, especially for a currently undecided voter, but the area that interested me the most was when the subject came round to pensions.

Gordon Brown wins the award for best caveman impression, "Woman, and you are one of them"...however, that aside, he made a brief mention of NEST (the new name for Personal Accounts)....if you're not sure what this is, take a look at this :-

Personal Accounts Delivery Authority

Now, I appreciate NEST is a political hot potato. Which Party wants to tell every employer and employee in the Uk that they will be effectively obliged to contribute to a retirement plan ( or opt out on a regular basis ) within the next few years. However, the introduction of this scheme can only be positive.

Most people know they should save more for their retirement. They also understand that national insurance contributions currently go towards paying for pensioners today, as opposed to building a pot for their future. David Cameron during last weeks debate mentioned that he intends to increase the State Retirement Age to 66, however there is a good bet that it will continue to increase as time goes on regardless of which political party ( or any combination of the main three parties ) is in charge.

However for many people, taking responsibility for their retirement is too easy to ignore. Not only will the introduction of NEST bring the importance of saving for retirement back into focus, it will potentially motivate millions of people to make some form of provision for their future (either through NEST or independently). This has to be a positive step forward.

I'm a great believer in the Carrot as opposed to the Stick when motivating individuals to take action ( and NEST does feel like a particularly dirty stick ). However, I do believe that it could help individuals invest for their retirement, or as Gordon Brown might put it "Woman or Man, and all of you are one of them, must save for old age"

Chris Daems,
Principal Financial Solutions

David Beckham and your Financial Future.

It's a week before I've got to vote, and I'm still undecided on who to go for. However, my 6 year old daughter, Charlotte, has (sort of) made her mind up. In a conversation with her mum this morning, she announced, "I'm going for Gordon Brown". When asked why, she answered "Cause I like the look of him!!". She then changed her mind, and decided she liked the "the blue one who's always on TV.....you know, David Beckham!!"

Whether Beckham limping around with his wonky leg would do better than any of the current candidates is questionable, however, I hope Mr Brown doesn't meet Charlotte, finds out about her change of political affiliation and decides to call her something offensive off camera!!

One thing is certain regardless of the future government. Individuals need to take responsibility for their financial futures. Most people agree that the state pension age will increase, and the true value of this provision will decrease over time.

So, if many people understand the importance of making a provision, why are they not saving for their financial security in the future? There are many reasons for not saving for retirement, however one of the biggest is lack of knowledge. The way you solve this problem is relatively simple. Firstly, build the knowledge you need to understand the best method for you to build a retirement income. Secondly, seek professional advice from someone you trust and want to build a long term relationship with, ensure that they are appropriately qualified and have the integrity to look after your best interest and Thirdly, ensure you continue to review your requirements as your life changes over the years.

By taking simple steps, you are starting to take control of your financial future regardless of whether the next prime minister turns out to be either Gordon Brown or David Beckham!

Chris Daems,
Principal Financial Solutions.

Full house and the future

It's half term, and my house if full of people. There's the usual suspects....Cassie (my wife), Charlotte(my daughter) and I. In addition to that, my mum's visiting to help with the childcare whilst we're both at work (and possibly letting us have a rare night out) as well as my younger brother. Today my 3 year old nephew arrived and like any toddler in a new environment wanted to explore and demolish everything!

I'm looking forward to a busy couple of days ahead, where I'm out and about seeing my clients, networking breakfasts and studying intently for my next tranche of professional exams next week.

After a visit to the Gadget Show Live last week, I seemed to spend most of the drive back reminiscing over the old technology on display...ahh, the satisfying screech of a tape deck and the half hour wait for a game to load. I wonder what the future holds for technology....

I'm also wondering what the future holds for my profession, however I know for sure a number of things. A move to greater professionalism is a good thing, both for clients and the large majority of good quality financial advisers out there. Also, Darwin was right when he said "It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change."

I'm off now to enjoy a few seconds peace, a few hours sleep and then up again for another day....