Fidelity, Peak Launch Training Program
Fidelity Clearing & Custody Solutions and Peak Advisor Alliance have combined their resources into a new growth-oriented advisor training program called eLearning Exchange.
The program offers Fidelity-custodied advisors access to Peak’s online resource portal, peer learning opportunities and one-on-one coaching. Topics covered by Peak’s online programs include client segmentation, referrals, recruiting, client experience and business continuity.
“This offered us a way to scale our practice management offering and extend the model to go beyond the clients we otherwise have served,” says David Canter, Fidelity’s executive vice president for practice management and consulting. “This allows more advisors to leverage our practice management consultants and our relationship managers, and gives them greater access to one-on-one offerings with Peak personnel as well as Fidelity personnel.”
One-on-one coaching will be available on topics like running a business, succession planning, recruiting and retaining talent, income and equity, driving growth and referrals.
Peak’s training opportunities are tailored to Fidelity’s culture and the advisor’s individual learning style. Via the online portal, advisors will be able to access a community of fellow advisors as well as coaching from Peak.
Peak already provides e-learning, coaching and other educational opportunities to more than 1,000 advisors nationwide.
“Advisors are starving for actionable, high-impact ideas,” says Ron Carson, Peak’s founder. “We’re leveraging Fidelity’s tech model and relationship managers along with Peak’s resources to satisfy that demand.”
The program will be available starting in January 2017.
PCS Introduces DOL-Ready IRA Rollover Tool
PCS has introduced a new IRA rollover tool to help advisors transition from commissions to fee-based advice.
The advisor-initiated rollover system is fully compliant with the Department of Labor’s fiduciary rule, which will take effect in April 2017.
Using the tool, advisors can quickly and easily capture rollovers out of qualified plans, and transition existing IRAs to fee-based products, ensuring DOL compliance.
PCS’s mobile-ready platform maintains all the necessary documentation to support the best-interest standard and ensures client acknowledgement of all relevant disclosures.
In addition to serving ongoing clients, advisors can also use the rollover tool via text or email with “off the street” IRA holders.
LifeSite Offers Collaborative Online Document Vault
LifeSite has introduced LifeSite Pro, a digital vault designed to streamline information exchange and document management.
LifeSite’s portal already allows advisors to securely share, store and organize client information and documents in a secure place. LifeSite Pro enables financial professionals and their clients to collaboratively manage and share information and documents while enjoying the protection of LifeSite’s encryption and security protocols.
Advisors will also be able to monitor activity within a client’s document vault, so they can follow up to correct any errors or fill in any gaps in records as they occur.
LifeYield Enhances Social Security Benefits Features
Software provider LifeYield has enhanced its Social Security Advantage product, adding two new features: Benefit Delay and Benefit Replacement.
The software recommends the kinds of investment and/or insurance products that could provide income during the years that clients might choose to delay Social Security benefits, or after the death of a spouse when income must be replaced.
Morningstar Rolls Out ESG Index Family For Advisors, Other Investors
Morningstar has launched a family of environmental, social and governance-focused indexes.
Indexes within the new Morningstar Sustainability Index Series include companies that exhibit high standards of sustainability while maintaining risk-adjusted return profiles similar to the broad market’s.
The company hopes the new set of 25 indexes will help investors and advisors track the sustainability of their investments and shape strategies that leverage research on ESG-based issues as interest in environmentally and socially responsible investing grows.
The indexes are based on ESG research and ratings from Sustainalytics, an independent provider of ESG and corporate governance ratings and research.
Orion Adds Intuitive Software Education Course
Orion Advisor Services has rolled out Ascent, an interactive training course to help advisors become fluent in the Orion platform as well as its integration partners.
The Ascent program includes video tutorials, interactive quizzes and staff training materials. The course engages advisors in a questionnaire that helps customize teaching materials to their skill level and learning style.
Orion says that 1,400 advisors passed 3,077 different courses and engaged in more than 1,200 hours of online training during Ascent’s beta testing in August, September and October 2016.
Ascent is now available free to all Orion clients.