As a business, you may have heard about the paraplanning niche. But what is it? How does it help your business? Let’s learn more!
What is Paraplanning?
If you haven’t heard of the paraplanner role, you aren’t alone. Often, people will ask if you mean paralegal because the alternative has always been in its shadow. Look back twenty years and you’ll find frustration with the financial planning industry. The reason for this is that professionals were spending less time on financial services and more time on the admin side of things.
Every day, most of the working hours would be spent completing administration tasks, report writing, research, and similar tasks. As a result, they were getting less and less time to spend with clients doing what they enjoyed.
While many financial planners had developed advanced skills, they weren’t getting opportunities to show them off. The problem got so severe that some professionals were leaving their jobs and changing careers.
Thus, the paraplanner niche developed. Although the minutia of the role isn’t defined, paraplanners generally try to help free up time for financial planners. While paraplanners deal with the documentation and administration processes, financial planners have more time to offer value to clients.
Ultimately, paraplanners are flexible in their services and this is because the demands from financial planners are wide and varied. Each financial planner has unique requirements, and this means that a paraplanner’s day can alter depending on the planner they attach themselves to Huawei Ideahub.
How Can It Help a Business?
Firstly, let’s deal with financial planning businesses since this is the reason the role developed in the first place. If you run a financial planning business, you might find that you spend more time doing admin tasks than helping clients. Soon enough, you get bogged down in admin tasks and start resenting your career choices.
With a paraplanner, you alleviate the pressure on your team. Suddenly, you can outsource the boring admin tasks to the paraplanner while you continue with what you love. One of the best things about paraplanners is that they adapt their service to their clients. Therefore, you can outsource as much or as little as you want.
What’s more, the paraplanner can also help with the execution phase. The very best quality paraplanning services implement recommendations, prepare technical reports, prepare annual reviews, maintain client compliance files, and much more.
Even if you aren’t in the financial planning industry, paraplanners still have value. In fact, some say that they have even more value. Why? Because they can produce important financial documentation and complement the other departments in the business. While larger organisations are hiring specialist paraplanners, smaller businesses are outsourcing the task and getting just as much value.
Summary
At this stage, it’s important to dispel a common myth. Some believe that paraplanners are essentially administrative assistants and secretaries. In reality, they have the specialised financial knowledge and implement this knowledge to aid the business.
Generally speaking, paraplanners are highly trained individuals with qualifications in finance or accounting (this is a bachelor’s degree in many cases). If you want to access professional and trained paraplanners, the best way to proceed is with a third-party service. With the very best services, you can outsource the tasks you need and only pay for what you use. The second you hire a paraplanner, you need to pay lots of recruitment costs (while also keeping this worker busy every day).
