Being a financial adviser is about investing in people 

Journey to Adviser – Oli’s Story  

It’s such a great feeling when you know you’ve really supported someone to achieve their goal. In the Journey to Adviser series, we asked some of our delegates to share their success stories and what inspired them to pursue a career as a financial adviser.  

In this episode, Oli shares his story. Oli had already achieved impressive qualifications obtaining his degree at the Royal Holloway University of London and obtaining a master’s degree from Exeter University. However, when he saw a loved one struggling financially in retirement due to a lack of financial planning advice in their youth, he found his calling. 

Tell us about your journey, what made you decide to pursue a career as a Financial Adviser? 

Well, I read history at Royal Holloway, University of London. Then I sort of decided to read International business for my masters at Exeter University, which I guess is sort of where I found myself wanting to pursue a career in financial services. I then decided to take up the journey as a financial advisor, with the mission in mind, I guess to help break down the barriers of personal finance, being a taboo subject by again providing that personable, accessible and friendly, financial advice. 

Another reason, I guess, why I chose to build my career as a financial advisor stems from witnessing a family member who is in a difficult financial situation in their retirement instead of having not had access or adequate financial planning in their youth. 

So ultimately, my goal is to financially educate individuals to make sure that they don’t fall into that same trap and that they can achieve their financial freedom. 

Tell us about your learning experience. How did you find the Redmill platform and materials? Did you find the weekly structure helpful. 

 First impressions was it’s well structured and it set out a really clear picture of how to develop my knowledge on what I needed to work on and crucially, what is needed to pass the exam, because at the end of the day, that is the main goal. 

And again, yeah, so building on that, the weekly content which focused on all the main topics again broken down into manageable chunks leading up to the exam was really great. 

Get what you get with the CII is that I’ll say right read 500 pages, 100 pages a week of text. So, I thought it was great that the revision modules didn’t just do that. 

So yeah, I mean, each week a different topic, again, broken down into a mixture of tasks, quizzes, activities, which I thought sort of really helps the learning process. It was really easy to follow the weekly modules and it allowed me to focus on the topics I wasn’t so comfortable with. 

And so again, being able to revisit tasks, quizzes to make sure that I sort of nailed down everything to find a detail.  

What other support did you get from Redmill? 

Jon and John were very, very good. The workshops, I’ve got to say were probably the best part of everything. So every two weeks you have the catch up session to sort of cover all the fortnightly topics and you’re able to ask questions about anything. So, when I was struggling with something, they would easily iron out any confusion, which is great. 

And then probably even better was the end of course workshop, which lasted two days to sort of round off the course as a whole really great. And again, making sure no stone was left unturned, going over all the topics again. 

What was really good from Jon and John again was the advice around exam technique, because that can really sort of trip you up in the exam, especially the AF papers. 

So I thought that was really invaluable, the advice that they gave.  

Would you recommend using Redmill? If so, why? 

I absolutely would recommend Redmill. I think the materials and the platform are brilliant. But again, what made it so successful for me were the trainers. They were on hand by email during the week, and they usually replied within the hour pretty much all occasions. So that was really good. 

And again, the workshops, I just can’t say enough about the workshops. They were great. When we got all together, those two days, hash everything out, hash any misunderstandings out, and then go into the exam full of confidence. 

What’s your plans for the future? What’s the next step? 

I’m building my client base within the practice that I’m at and gain traction in the local area, which is really important. And then I think further down the line, 5 to 10 years, hopefully I can either buy into the practice or set up my own practice going forward. And yeah, just go strength to strength and advising clients. 

[End of Interview] 

Starting your journey to becoming a financial adviser?  

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Future Financial Adviser is a community where young people can access career advice and learn about opportunities within the financial advice profession. If you are already in the profession, we can help you find the right roles and progress your career.