Building a successful career as a financial planner doesn’t happen overnight. Completing your education and earning your CFP® certification can take a while. But once you’ve completed these steps, you’re ready to start working with clients, right?
Well, maybe. But for many planners, there’s a significant gap between completing the educational requirements and actually feeling ready to confidently navigate real client scenarios.
If you’re a new planner who feels overwhelmed by the idea of running a client meeting or developing a financial plan for someone with a complicated situation, you’re not alone. And it’s not your fault!
Traditional financial planner education is valuable, but it doesn’t always do a great job of showing you how to apply foundational concepts to real-world scenarios. How do you bridge that gap? How do you gain the real-world financial planning experience you need to impress employers and confidently work with clients? Let’s discuss why hands-on experience is so important and how you can build practical skills early in your career.
Top Challenges for New Financial Planners
Most financial planning programs provide in-depth training on technical subjects. Topics like ax strategies, investments, retirement accounts, and estate are usually covered in great detail in financial planning programs.
But most planners don’t have the chance to dive into practical applications of those theoretical concepts during their training. They don’t get to practice decision-making or use industry tools to address the complicated issues that most clients face.
So it’s normal for new planners to feel unprepared for various aspects of the job:
- Using industry software: Many firms expect planners to feel comfortable with industry tools like eMoney, Nitrogen, Redtail, EncorEstates, and Asset-Map. But licenses for these platforms are usually expensive, so most schools don’t provide them or cover how to use them.
- Navigating complex client conversations: Financial discussions with real people are often emotional. Clients may be hesitant, skeptical, or even hostile, and textbooks can’t teach planners how to react in those challenging situations.
- Making data-driven decisions: Financial planning is a mix of art and science. There isn’t a set cookie-cutter solution for any given client. Planners need to approach situations with nuance and use the specific details of a client’s situation to determine the best course forward. Textbook examples can’t possibly cover all the potential scenarios a planner will face, so it’s hard to feel confident about developing a customized plan for a client.
Planners can deepen all of these skills through hands-on experience as their careers progress. But this creates a chicken-and-egg scenario — without practical experience, how do you land that first job to gain the experience you need to impress firms and confidently work with clients?
Real-World Experience Builds Confidence and Key Skills
Working with real clients helps planners gain these essential abilities:
- Decision-making: Planners can learn how to use critical thinking and problem-solving to address complicated financial situations.
- Communication: Client meetings give planners the chance to ask essential questions, practice active listening, and build trust.
- Coaching: Money is a complicated topic for many people, and clients don’t always make rational decisions. Planners can learn how to provide encouragement and compassionate guidance.
- Using planning software: Hands-on practice helps planners get the most out of these powerful tools.
Experienced planners can guide their clients confidently because they have built technical knowledge and vital soft skills throughout their careers. How can new planners gain the same experience?
CORE Offers Real-World Financial Planning Experience
Real-world experience doesn't have to stop after one program or one season. Amplified Planning CORE is our monthly membership for financial planners who want to keep building practical skills year-round. Inside CORE, you get ongoing access to a library of nearly 60 real client meetings so you can see financial planning at work across a wide range of scenarios, clients, and complexity levels. Each month also includes live learning sessions with guest experts, small group coaching calls with Hannah Moore, CFP®, and a community of planners who are doing the same work and growing together. Whether you're early in your career or looking to go deeper in areas you haven't fully explored, CORE gives you a place to keep showing up, keep learning, and keep getting better. Learn more at amplifiedplanning.com/subscribe.
Grow Your Financial Planning Career With Real-World Experience
While there are many opportunities for new financial planners, professional requirements are higher than ever. Firms want to hire planners who can step into client work with confidence, running effective meetings and using industry tools to create comprehensive financial plans.
The planners who build lasting, confident careers aren't the ones who learned everything in school, they're the ones who never stopped finding ways to learn from real work. If you want ongoing access to real client cases, expert sessions, and a community of planners committed to doing this work well, CORE is where that happens every single month. Learn more and subscribe.
