Financial planners are expected to be in great demand in the very near future. Experts say with baby boomers nearing retirement, and more people seeking monetary advice, the financial service industry is looking for new blood. Financial services deals with things like securities and investments, and planning for retirement. WUWM’s LaToya Dennis has more.
Bernie Fiedler has one thing in common with financial planners across the country: age.
“I am two months away from being 60. I’m 59,” Fiedler says.
Fiedler is president of Wealth Management Services for Waukesha Bank. At the age of 59, he’s one year older than the average financial planner.
“It’s a bunch of old guys,” Fiedler says.
Fiedler says most people in his line of work are older for a couple reasons. He says first, you can make a lot more money doing other things, which is what younger people tend to do. And second, most people don’t want to leave their financial future in the hands of someone fresh out of college.
“I still remember when I was at Dean Witter Reynolds; I had a client that I had for two or three years. He finally came in and visited me in the office, okay. The first thing he said when he walked in he looked at me he said I had imagined you much older. And that wasn’t a compliment. You know, I learned I gotta get some gray hair here or I’m in trouble,” Fiedler says.
But now that Fiedler is actually old enough to have that grey hair, he’s thinking about retirement. Fiedler says with the baby boomer generation starting to exit the workplace, financial planners are going to be in high demand. According to Peter Pavone, that’s where Bryant and Stratton College comes into play. He’s over the college’s three Milwaukee area campuses. He says the school recently rolled out a bachelor degree program in Financial Services at its Milwaukee area campuses.
“Integrated within this degree program, is the training to sit for the certified financial planner degree,” Pavone says.
Pavone says it was a no brainer to institute the program in Milwaukee, because it’s now the only school in the area offering a BA in financial services. Around 12 students are enrolled. One of the required classes, financial analysis, which deals with budget forecasting and analyzing financial statements, meets on Monday nights. Don Circo is one of the students in this class. He decided to go back to school after finding out his job with Midwest Airlines was being eliminated. He says after losing around 60 percent of his retirement during the economic downturn, he figured why not learn how plan and invest his money himself.
“With me going into this, and at least learning it for myself, everything involved, it will help me to make much more educated, wise decisions,” Circo says.
Circo also hopes it will open the door for a new career. He says he’s interested in jobs in a few areas.
“One is strategic management. That appears to be to me a really interesting and would align with what I’m currently doing in the maintenance side of aviation. Another one is maybe I could get into investment planning or retirement planning or estate planning,” Circo says.
While Circo has some big decisions to make in the near future, one thing that should not be a factor when considering a career in financial planning is age. Unlike Bernie Fiedler when he started, Circo is 48 years old. All 12 of the students enrolled in the financial services degree program are looking to a second career.
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