The 26th of November marked my five-year anniversary at Serenity. My first thought was – how on earth did that happen (?!), followed by a feeling of real achievement.
When I first joined Serenity in November 2018, I had little background in financial services, so the first few months were a steep learning curve.
Professional Development
After some time, I started supporting Ian Kemp and his clients, which I really enjoyed. Working alongside an experienced adviser gave me a great insight as to how financial planning really works and how to best support our clients. With time, I gradually started to support more advisers, clients, and took on more responsibility. I also dabbled into marketing where I ran Serenity Insights, our monthly client newsletter. This was a lot of fun!
Clive Thompson encouraged me to look at taking a couple of financial exams to help with my technical knowledge and I started with FA2 Pensions Administration. This led me on to sitting R01 Financial Services, Regulation and Ethics, and then onto starting an apprenticeship course to complete R02 Investment Products, R03 Personal Taxation and J09 Paraplanning – which I’m currently still working on.
The support from my colleagues and tutors has helped me massively with my confidence and technical capabilities and I feel confident to be able to support our clients and their advisers in the best possible way.
Over the years I have built solid relationships with all of my colleagues and in August I was asked to take on the role of Support Team Leader. This is another learning curve for me, but I love working with our team and hope to be able to support them in the same way I do our clients and advisers.
Looking to the Future
I’m currently working on completing my J09 Paraplanning coursework and assignments to complete my apprenticeship. I will then be a level 4 qualified Paraplanner (woo!!)
I look forward to being able to use the technical knowledge I’ve gained to better support our advisers and elevate the work I do for our clients. The plan is to continue learning and complete further exams to gain a diploma in financial planning.
A special thank you to my friends at Serenity, I would not be where I am today without them. I am extremely grateful for the experiences, growth, and connections I’ve gained over the last five years.
