Former FPA head passes away
Theprevious chief executive of theFinancial Planning Association(FPA), Michael McKenna, died suddenly on March 20.
McKenna, aged 61, held the role of chief executive with the FPA from September 1998 to July 2000, resigning 14 months before the end of his three-year contract. He was replaced by the current chief executive Ken Breakspear.
FPA chair at the time, Wes McMaster says McKenna came on board when the association was growing substantially, with members and students taking on the Diploma of Financial Planning (DFP) course.
According to McMaster, the association was expanding its staff numbers to cater for the growth and McKenna’s contribution was to deal with the administrative issues and to manage the association in order to handle the expansion.
Before taking on the CEO role, McKenna spent over 10 years working as executive director of the Australian Society of CPAs (now CPA Australia) and prior to that worked with the ACI Group and Arthur Andersen.
McMaster says while with the ASCPA, McKenna had promoted the CPA mark and it was this type of experience the FPA was seeking, as it had reached a critical mass in the number of members holding the Certified Financial Planner (CFP) designation.
“Michael was involved with the promotion of the CFP designation, as the FPA was keen to ensure it gained similar levels of recognition as the CPA mark,” he says.
At the time of his resignation, McKenna said he was leaving to “pursue other business and personal interests”.
AUTHOR
Jason Spits
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