How does the journey to diversifying the financial planning industry begin? With a single step.

There are now well over 75,000 CFP professionals in the United States, notes CFP Board CEO Kevin Keller, and as demand increases for fiduciary advice among women and within minority communities, the profession should continue to diversify.

The ceremonial 75,000th CFP, Gigi Guerra of the Miami, Fla.-based Guerra Group of Morgan Stanley, was held up by Keller as the face of the future of the planning industry.

“We think this is what the future looks like -- a millennial Latina career changer,” Keller says. “The profession is full of people who look like me, people who are blue-eyed and grey-haired, but this is where we are heading.”

Guerra, the daughter of Nicaraguan immigrants, enters financial planning at a time when the need for diversity along ethnic and gender lines has been frequently aired by CEOs and professional organizations, yet the proportion of female CFP professionals has stalled at 23 percent and representation among ethnic minorities, while growing, remains low.

There is hope, says Keller, who notes that 30 percent of the students who recently took exams for their CFP credentials were women.

For her part, Guerra is taking part in a National Women’s Networking Group within Morgan Stanley, starting her own chapter in Miami.

“We’re trying to foster an environment for women that promotes transformative change through professional development efforts,” Guerra says. “We want an environment where women feel empowered, have a little more visibility, and are able to freely exchange their ideas with one another.”

At 27, Guerra says younger generations will come to embrace traditional financial planning as a service much as its forebears did, but more of them will view it as a career option, especially as the industry demands more women and minorities in the business.

“I think the profession has come to understand that investors want to work with planning professionals who understand their background,” Guerra says. “They want advisors they can relate to, even when it comes to their age cohort. The profession needs to do a better job of addressing barriers to entry like education and training. Ultimately, that happens by providing opportunities like mentorship and professional development.”

Guerra is also evidence of the urgency the CFP board feels around bringing more youth into the profession-- Keller notes that the number of CFP professionals over the age of 70 exceeds the number of those under 30.

Women -- and young people in general -- are likely less aware than men and their elders of financial planning careers, and may harbor negative opinions of the financial industry in general.

“Ten years ago, we weren’t having these discussions,” says Keller. “There may have been some talk of diversity, or encouraging young people to become planners, but they weren’t topics that were seriously addressed. Now these are issues that our Board cares very much about, and we’re spending a lot of our time thinking about ways to address this issue.”

Keller says the CFP Board is continuing to ramp up its efforts to improve the pipeline from universities into financial advising, and to increase overall awareness around the CFP certification.

The recently launched CFP Board Center for Financial Planning was designed to focus the Board’s work around diversity and linking the industry with serious academic research. One of the Center’s first efforts was a mentoring program for female CFPs.

The Center’s efforts have also focused on the college level, encouraging schools to launch their own financial planning programs.

“We sit at the intersection of 240 universities and colleges and all of the firms that are hiring planners,” Keller says. “We’re not the gatekeeper, but we are the entry way, the door that people have to pass through to become members of the financial planning professions.”

The CFP Board Center for Financial Planning recently hosted an online job fair to connect financial planning students with CFP professionals, and a newly launched forum to assist CFP certification test takers has 60,000 registered users and 3,000 certification-seekers actively engaged in its discussions.

Yet the Board’s efforts don’t yet extend to students younger than college age who are often faced with making pre-college decisions that will impact their eventual course of study.

“Women and minorities especially are unaware of this career and what it takes to become a successful financial planner,” says Guerra. “I really think it stems from lack of mentorship, a lack of role models and insufficient professional development efforts throughout this industry. If firms can step up and do their part, more young people will understand how great this career can be.”

Part of the Board’s effort will be to make sure that the CFP designation is seen as the pre-eminent certification for financial planners in the U.S.

“There are 170 certifications out there, the public is confused, and that’s why we’ve invested more than $60 million over the past five and a half years to promote the value of the CFP certification,” Keller says.

In fact, Keller says, the DOL’s fiduciary rulemaking, which goes into enforcement in 2017, should increase the number of advisors who get the CFP certification. But the CFP Board doesn’t want all advisors to become CFPs, says Keller.

“Quite frankly, we would have to water down the CFP standards to the point that we would lose what makes the CFP such a desirable designation, but we also recognize that 76,000 CFPs isn’t enough to serve the country’s needs, either,” Keller says. “We’re working on creating access for the public to a more diverse and sustainable supply of competent and ethical financial advisors.”

The CFP designation was born in 1973 when the first College for Financial Planning class graduated. In 1985, the college helped establish an independent, non-profit professional certifying entity which eventually became the CFP Board.