The alternative options for life after advising

There are many options within financial services that utilise the skills of a financial planner and advisers should not lose hope if they are deciding to leave the profession, according to an ex-adviser.

With 22 years’ experience in the industry, Anuj Shangle decided to transition into a new career outside of advice following the Commonwealth Bank’s decision to abandon the Financial Wisdom licensee in 2019, the licensee he worked under.

But providing quality of advice was already becoming increasingly difficult for Shangle prior to this, he told Money Management.

“In 2019, putting together any piece of advice became extremely difficult. [The licensee] set up a quality advice coaching team in the background.

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“Whether you were putting a new plan together, or you were just doing a review plan or, you know, whatever you were doing, you had to get it pre-vetted through them.

“It was just extremely difficult.”

For these reasons, as well as increasing compliance requirements and the effect that COVID-19 had on the advice industry, Shangle decided to approach his then-business partner to let him know he would be transitioning to a new area of financial services.

“[It] came to a point where I was spending more time ticking the compliance boxes, for the sake of doing it, as opposed to actually adding any value to the clients.”

Utilising his existing expertise, Shangle launched Melbourne-based firm Claims Advocacy, a firm specialising in assisting clients with complex risk insurance claims such as Total and Permanent Disability claims.

“There's too much I've learned over the last 22 years. And I wanted to make the use of the skill set and set up something different and so that's what I did.

“This space that I've now ventured into, claims advocacy, this is an area that I've always enjoyed. Even when I was working as an adviser, I would take on the cases that nobody thought would ever be successful.

“And that was something that I was really passionate about… helping the clients in a situation where nobody was willing to hold their hand.”

Shangle said his firm targeted a niche where an adviser might need assistance with a complex insurance claim due to a shortage of time or necessary expertise.

“This space of claims advocacy is traditionally dominated by legal professionals.

“So I said, ‘well, we are the technical people’. I really don't understand why the clients have to engage a lawyer to put a TPD claim in for them.

“I understand these terms better than them. I understand the process. I've done this so many times in the past very successfully. So why wouldn't I do it for the clients?”

Shangle’s message to other advisers who might be in a similar situation to the one he was in was that “there is life after financial planning”.

“If you are leaving the industry because the compliance is becoming too onerous - if you're retiring, it's fair enough - but if you’re still young and if you’re still hungry, the message is there are a number of other things that you should be considering, as opposed to giving up the industry altogether.

“And this is only one of the options that you can go down after giving up advising.

“You can coach junior advisers, you can… be a technical expert, for example. You could potentially look at reviewing compliance.

“[If you are] giving up advising after spending a number of years in the industry, you probably understand compliance better than the ones entering the industry now.”