Financial Consultant Job Description, Skills, and Salary
Are you searching for a financial consultant job description? Get to know about the duties, responsibilities, qualifications, and skills requirements of a financial consultant. Feel free to use our financial consultant job description template to produce your own financial consultant job description. We also provide you with information about the salary you can earn as a financial consultant.
Who is a Financial Consultant?
Career choice has been, and will always be a delicate and problematic topic and issue for years; that is why there are so many articles online to guide you as to the right choice of a career. Choosing the wrong career will make you an unhappy person and as such, you will fail to find joy in it. Parents and school teachers are advised to assist students on time in finding the right career for themselves, to avoid confusion at a later stage. Whatever task or assignment relating to finance is a demanding one, hence, the work of a financial consultant is a very tedious one that requires accuracy and carefulness. This can be an option for you when seeking a choice career.
First and foremost, who are financial consultants? Finance means the control of money, or the money needed to carry out a task or project. A consultant provides advice in a particular field, otherwise known as a professional adviser. A financial consultant is a professional who provides professional advice to people as regards finance. He helps customers build a plan for their financial development and well-being. He furthermore assists clients to create plans for asset purchases, retirement investments, and insurance decisions. They expose the blind spots of their clients, thereby reporting to them, the consequences of particular investments or expenses; for example the consequences of spending from your savings.
A financial consultant can either be self-employed or employed within a financial firm. They assist their employer in making wise and astute financial decisions, while also developing a workable business and investment plan. As a financial consultant, it is your primary duty to assist your client in understanding properly his assets, and what those assets will be to them in the nearest future. Depending on the level of experience gained, level of education attained, or certifications obtained, a financial consultant can assist his client with complex issues such as tax preparations and insurance activities. They also direct and guide a customer towards his expenditures, the buying or the selling of investments and stocks. Just as the client is always free to communicate with the financial consultant, so as the financial consultant is free also to, at any point in time, communicate with his client or employer regarding issues needing urgent attention, to offer suggestions, or proffer better financial solution to issues. Some individuals implore the urgent services of a financial consultant to solve an imminent issue, such as in the case of inheritance.
Financial consultants can also be referred to as financial advisors but not financial analysts. Though at first glance, one would want to confuse the two terms or see them as being the same profession, especially when it has to do with finance, they quite engage in different activities when you dig deeper, even though are few similarities. Financial analysts spend more time analyzing economic data and historical trends, while financial consultants focus more on personal circumstances to determine what investment fits best. Financial consultants travel often, while financial analysts are more like office workers.
Financial Consultant Job Description
What is a financial consultant job description? A financial consultant job description is simply a list of duties and responsibilities of a financial consultant in an organization. Below are the financial consultant job description examples you can use to develop your resume or write a financial consultant job description for your employee. Employers can also use it to sieve out job seekers when choosing candidates for interviews.
A financial consultant has studied the language of wealth and finance and knows how best to organize, spend, and budget money. He then works on a client, by making him understand his financial life and how best to develop his financial well-being; this he does by having a deep study of the client’s financial engagements including debts, debits, credits, profits, assets, and so on, and then assist them to determine what their financial goals should be, and how best to go about it. The financial consultant can sometimes oversee the client’s investments. There is so much work related to the financial consultant, they are as follows:
- Create financial plans and roadmaps to enable customers to attain their short and long financial objectives.
- Advise clients on investments, taxing, insurance activities, and retirement planning.
- Travel to clients’ offices and homes to meet and discuss financial issues, and to inquire from them if life challenges could affect the nature of their investments.
- Observe the financial trends, market, and economic situation.
- Canvass new clients through hosting seminars, calls, and writing emails.
- Relate with accountants, legal practitioners, real estate agents, and other professionals to ascertain the reception of original and legit documents, and to verify the information.
- Research constantly on investment opportunities and positions for clients.
- Analyze the company’s financial situation.
- Assess clients’ financial status and point out their shortcomings.
- Recommend solutions to financial and investment shortcomings.
- Develop relationships with existing and prospective clients.
- Search for means of capital expansion.
- Supervise current and future tax payments.
- Guarantee acquiescence with the law.
- Evaluate day-to-day dealings and note areas that need to be improved.
- Arrange financial statistics and reports and explain in detail to the client what the figures entail.
Qualifications
Before embracing a particular career, there are expected qualifications that you should possess relating to the career you are about to embrace. These qualifications act as your green card, without which you cannot become or forge ahead with becoming your chosen profession. These qualifications also determine how far you would advance in your journey to becoming a professional and successful financial consultant, the more relating qualifications you obtain, the more chance you have over many others. The necessary qualifications for the role of a financial consultant include:
- Bachelor’s, master’s, or associate degree in business management, finance, accounting, economics, or any other related discipline.
- 2 years minimum experience in any financial position or role.
- The capability of using all Microsoft Office software.
- Great business insight.
- In-depth knowledge and understanding of the financial industry and its regulations.
- In-depth knowledge of investment and investment strategies.
- Ability to evaluate financial situations of clients and organizations.
- Flexibility and capability of making adjustments.
- Ability to explain difficult financial situational reports in a clear and understanding manner.
- Target-driven personality and a goal-getter.
- Ability to keep confidential information.
- Having nice interpersonal skills which include active attention to the needs of clients among others.
- Possession of other essential skills of a financial consultant.
- Certifications like CFA (Chartered Financial Analyst) and CFP (Certified Financial Planner) are an additional advantage.
These qualifications put together, build up a solid personality in a given career. Even though all of them might not be needed by your employer as their demands vary, getting hold of these qualifications puts you in a better position and sets you up for possible promotion or salary increase.
Essential Skills
Financial consultants are individuals that help clients or companies manage their financial development and well-being, and to become successful in this position, there are essential skills that should be acquired, as well as a proper understanding of the financial industry. The understanding and acquisition of these skills can help in your development as a financial consultant and would expose your professional strength. You would need a combination of both technical/hard skills and soft skills. The technical skills can be gained through education or training, while the soft skills are acquired from experience and even on the job; they help strengthen the technical skills and help enhance your interpersonal relationship with clients. Below are skills that employers look out for while accepting financial consultant applicants:
- Verbal and written communication skills.
- Sales and marketing skills.
- Organizational skills.
- Attention to detail.
- Problem-solving skill.
- Interpersonal relationship skills.
- Business development skills.
- Research skills.
- Wealth management.
- Analytical and critical thinking.
- Active listening.
- Empathy
- Risk management and assessment.
- Customer service skills.
The aforementioned skills are very important, and the acquisition of a greater number or all of them gives you an upper hand in the application process. As a financial consultant, you would come in contact with so many clients, and the way you relate with them would determine their readiness and willingness to hire your service or keep working with you. That is why you should possess good interpersonal relationship skills and good customer service skills. You would also engage in financial discussions and write professional emails to clients, and as such you should be an efficient speaker and active listener, that is, possess good verbal and written communication skills and be able to communicate well to clients and in a manner, they will understand, as some clients are not so knowledgeable in the financial field.
Financial consultants should capable of speaking about their services to potential clients and as such should possess good marketing skills. There are multitasks involved in this profession which is why a financial consultant also needs to be strong towards pressure and have organizational skills.
Furthermore, it is known generally, that risks are part of every business, but a proper risk management skill makes you an expert. As a financial consultant, you would not only assess risks but manage them as well.
Finally, you must have the ability to build and manage wealth. Clients need to understand how and where to make investments that will yield them greater returns, and this is the work of the financial consultant.
How to Become a Financial Consultant
To become a successful financial consultant, there are necessary steps to be taken. Firstly, you would need to gain formal education, by first finishing high school and graduating with a high school diploma, afterwards, you obtain an associate, bachelor’s, or master’s degree in accounting, financial management, business administration, marketing, or any other related discipline. This is the first and most important because it gives you a clearer picture of what you are going into, and how to go about it.
Secondly, you would need to consider completing an internship as a means of gaining experience. This internship though can be completed even while in school and can be done with any financial department. It gives you an insight into what the daily life activities of a financial consultant look like. This also allows you to connect with many other financial consultants, who in turn can be your stepping stone after you graduate or complete an internship. You can as well get recommendations from those you encounter. Some of these contacts will accompany you all through your career. Finally, so many employers love to employ applicants with internship experience; so completing an internship adds more worth to your resume.
The next step is to get the necessary certifications and licenses. There are various certifications you can get out there, which will give you an upper hand while competing with fellow applicants. Some of these certifications and licenses include:
- Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA).
- Certified Financial Planner (CFP).
- Insurance licenses
- Security licenses.
Finally, you can now organize your portfolio, prepare your resume, search and apply for your first job. You can as well seek further education in the field, as a means of showing your dedication to providing efficient services and solving complex financial issues.
Where to Work as a Financial Consultant
Financial consulting is a professional service rendered by expert financial consultants to various organizations and firms. As a financial consultant, you render your service on either a personal or business level. Financial organizations and companies who require the services of a professional financial consultant can hire a business financial consultant, while individual clients who seek to manage their investments, assets, holdings, and property, can hire the services of a financial consultant. Their work therefore may vary according to their employer.
Financial consultants are travel engaged and at times travel or work outside their work periods to meet up with the demands of the client.
As a financial consultant, you may work as a self-employed or may work in any firm or industry that deals with finance. But specifically, you would be able to work in financial institutions like banks, insurance companies, financial investment firms, wealth management firms, security and community brokers, and so on.
Financial Consultant Salary Scale
It is also worth noting that the demand for financial consultants is expected to rise in the coming years, this is as a result of more aged individuals globally; hence, you should not be scared of choosing a financial consultant as your career. the more the demands, the more salary increase.
Nevertheless, the salary scale of a financial consultant is dependent on some determining factors like the educational level attained by the employee, the experience of the employee, the financial strength of the industry, the location of the industry, and so on.
In Singapore, the salary scale of a financial consultant is rated at an annual average of S$42,000 to S$51,600 (Singapore Dollar), and can rise based on the experience of the employee to $72,000. In the United States, it is averaged at $71,786 annually and can rise to $107,000. In the United Kingdom, an average financial consultant earns £43,969, and based on experience, this can increase to £72,000. In Nigeria, an average financial consultant or advisor earns ₦2,740,000 annually, and more experienced employees can earn up to ₦5,520,000.