Tips for entering the CFP of the Year Award

The CFP of the Year Award is designed to identify top financial planners in New Zealand who have the Certified Financial Planner designation.

The Awards are supported by the Financial Planners and Insurance Advisers Association, which controls the CFP designation in New Zealand.

A CFP entering the award will need to do three things.
==> Prepare a written submission which outlines a case for why they should win the award
==> Submit a financial plan as part of their entry
==> Provide a testimonial from the client whom that plan was prepared for.

Submitting a plan
The idea of submitting a plan is to show the judges a piece of your work, and most importantly demonstrate how that plan has worked. The plan should be a full financial plan and show that it has covered all areas, including risk.

Ideally the plan needs to be at least three years old. This allows the judges to see how the plan has worked and met the client's goals. Any entrant who provides a plan which has only been in existence for less than a year won't be considered by the judges.

It is not necessary to provide physical copies of all the Investment Statements, however it is important to show that they exist.

When considering a plan it is useful to provide one which has addressed specific issues, as opposed to a plain vanilla plan.

The key point of this exercise is to demonstrate your skills and how the plan worked.

Testimonial
The judges require a written testimonial from the client of the submitted plan. This testimonial doesn't need to be long. It is best if it provides a candid view of the relationship.

Contact details must be provided as one of the judges will call the client at some stage during the judging process.

Judges
There are two sets of judges in the process.

The first is Massey University which selects a maximum of four finalists. These finalists are then flown to Auckland at the organiser's expense and are required to do an interview with the judging panel.

The interview lasts for about an hour. The judges have a standard set of questions which are used for each entrant. However there is some variation in questioning due to the way each entrant answers questions.

The interview process is designed to give the judges a better feel for how each finalist operates. It is not adversarial.
One of the strengths of the Awards process is that the people on the Judging Panel are people who have knowledge about financial planning issues, however they are not day-to-day participants in the market.

These judges, by human nature, do have their own views on various investment and financial planning matters. However as professionals their views do not form part of the judging process.

For instance if your plan uses a product that one of the judges doesn't particularly like it will not count against the entrant. However, it is important that the entrant can demonstrate to the judges why a particular product or asset has been used.

The judges put aside their personal preferences when making their assessment.

As a matter of policy the organisers have decided that representatives from the sponsors and associated companies should not be judges. To use them would cloud the objectivity of the process.

It should also be noted that if there is a relationship of some sort between a judge and an entrant then this is declared at the appropriate time.

The Judging Criteria
There is a set of criteria the judges use to determine the awards.
These are:
> Competency
> Communication skills
> Professionalism
> Client Testimonial
> Knowledge of Current Issues
> Input to Profession
> Marketing
> Career Achievements
> Community

Each of these carry a weighting on the Judges' scoresheet reflecting their relevant importance. (Eg: professionalism is more important than marketing ability).

These weightings are for the judges use only.