The 3 Skills needed in the Financal Advisory Industry

3 skills are needed in order to lead a meaningful career in the Financial Advisory Industry. If we apply these skills on the correct market, coupled with the right process, success will be in sight for us. I'm currently trying to master the 3 skills and at the same time finding the right group of people to serve. So what are the 3 skills I'm talking about here?

1) The Core skills of acquring knowledge
* A Financial Planner needs a lot of knowledge before he can complete a proper financial plan
* He need to be kept updated of many news around the world, investment opportunities, new insurance plans, etc
* He need to know where to acquire the right knowledge in order to strive and grow. Formal learning such as acquring his CFP, keep reading and going for countless seminars, be humble and learn from others as well as teaching and coaching others.
* My blog itself is like another avenue for me to learn because I learn as I teach and write for other people.

2) The Life skills that apply to yourself
* A Financial Planner needs to be continually motivated and positive.
* I was being trashed and insulted during my journey of being a planner. In a recently case, I was being described to be a monkey just because I recommended unit trust portfolio to a prospect I know through my blog. He said that Fund managers cannot do better than a group of monkeys picking stocks and I'm just another monkey trying to add another layer of cost from him.
* Well, he is not entirely wrong but deep inside, I know there are people who need me and I'll stay on to earn my wage in an honest and ethical way and NOT through monkey business.
* If I believe that I'm a monkey, I will have resign long time ago.

* A Financial Planner need to be very self disciplined. He need to wake up on time to work and do the necessary work inherent in the whole Sales and Advisory Cycle. People do not wake up and call you to buy an insurance or investment plan, we somehow need to call for people and work hard for the next referral.
* For a planner who sell plans with lower commission, he need double the volume, double the dose of passion to work and doubly hard for half the income a normal adviser earns.

3) The soft skills towards other people
* Its useless if you have all the knowledge, be very disciplined and hardworking but people simply don't trust you.
* We need the right communication skills to convene the message to our clients. We need to show clients that we are the pilot of their money and we are able to bring them to the right destination.
* We must impart confidence so that they will act on something. A financial plan is useless if we cannot convince our clients to act on it
* We need to be connected with their heart to gain such trust and confidence. To make it simple. That person must simply like you...

If I'm going to rate myself in term of the 3 skills. I think I can get 7-5-4. I'm not very disciplined in my prospecting and too comfortable with my current group of clients. I also need to improve on my soft-skills. Many people find me to help them with a Financial Plan, but I always can't convince them to take action. Obviously, I'm not convincing enough...