The launch of a new Financial Planning firm, Schroders Personal Wealth (SPW), is exciting news and I believe new entrants to the financial advice market must be welcomed not feared, writes Simon Goldthorpe of Beaufort Group.

The client should be at the forefront of everything we do in the financial planning profession. Along with the members of my team, it’s our clients who make our business. Without them, we simply wouldn’t have a business.

I’ve never been a particularly big fan of events for Financial Planners and I'm not alone on this.

Towards the end of June I had the pleasure of attending a special conference for dads. The purpose was to help equip each other to be better in our role as parents.

Over many years the big insurance and investment companies have been portraying retirement as one big vacation where sensible savers can play golf or lounge about on sandy beaches, living their retirement dreams.

I went to a financial seminar recently and on returning to the car park at the end of the day, the number of fancy cars got me thinking about measuring success and whether the Financial Planning community is as bad at coveting material things to demonstrate success, as some of our clients are.

When I was considering what to write for my column, I thought you might be interested in hearing about the “No Spend Challenge” at Magenta.

Another year arrives and with it another opportunity to gear up your business for spectacular client service; sensational staff engagement; brilliant personal fulfilment; clarification and targeting of some amazing goals and dreams as well as turning in a splendid profit.

If I had a penny for every time someone asked me how I got into financial services I would be pretty rich by now.

What is CPD? According to the Personal Finance Society: “Continuing Professional Development (CPD) is activity undertaken to ensure members' skills and knowledge are up-to-date.”