Scott West, a Van Kampen managing director who oversees the programs, says the focus is to eliminate codified, alienating language within the financial services industry.
"Jargon is the consequence of being in an industry for any period of time," he says. "In the case of financial advisors, we call it 'finglish.'"
West did a study a few years back of financial advisory literature and found the language and terminology used in the industry to be, at best, Byzantine. The unnecessary complexity was making it harder for advisors to fulfill one of their core job functions: making complex financial ideas understandable to clients.
West, the author of Storyselling for Financial Advisors and Your Client's Story, is a strong believer in the use of metaphor, especially in tough times. "In the advisory business, it really is about a number of stories as opposed to a story of numbers," he says.
The Recession Proof Advisor places emphasis on improving face-to-face communication with clients, with the end goal being a newfound sense of serenity and investing confidence, according to West. The focus should be on instilling a sense of calm in clients, allowing them to recognize opportunity at a time when many people are in a state of panic, he says.
In much the same way that airplane
passengers are instructed in case of emergency to deal with their own
oxygen masks before helping others, the program stresses that advisors
need to get their own heads screwed on correctly and take heed that, as
a whole, they are not being blamed for the hammering that their
clients' portfolios have taken. "First, advisors need to right
themselves," says West. "A key way to this end is for them to realize
that in large part they are not being held responsible for their
clients getting hurt in the market."