Who's Who: The Most Successful Retirement Plan Advisers
Reprinted from PLANSPONSOR, 12/07
There is nothing like tumultuous times to highlight the value of, and reinforce the need for, expert help for plan fiduciaries and, yes, it surely plays to the advantage of a profession dedicated to helping plan sponsors construct the right programs, and participants make the best of them.
That is why, in 2005, we launched our Retirement Plan Adviser of the Year award (and, last year, our Retirement Plan Adviser Team of the Year award): to acknowledge “the contributions of the nation’s best financial advisers in helping make retirement security a reality for workers across the nation.” In the pages that follow, it is our privilege to highlight the standouts from this year’s nominations in terms of “success,” as measured by number of plans and dollar value of assets under advisement1.
This year, we received 332 nominations representing more than 200 advisers. We collected information from 216 advisers and, of those, 127 advisers (78 teams and 49 individuals) completed the entry form in its entirety, making them eligible for the award.
The criteria that underlie the award are simple but crucial: We want to recognize advisers who make a difference through increasing participation, boosting deferral rates, enhancing asset allocation, and/or providing better programs through expanded service or expense management. It is no accident that those criteria also underlie the Pension Protection Act’s designs for defined contribution plans, for only by getting more workers saving in these programs at effective rates, and invested in prudent ways, can they have any real prospects for retirement security.That the advisers nominated have enjoyed success is undeniable. Collectively, they represent $159.7 billion in assets under advisement and serve more than 3.5 million participants. Between September 2006 and September 2007, this group of advisers has added 1,274 plans, while only losing 102.
More than half have clients using automatic enrollment and automatic deferral increases, while enrollment meetings and ongoing participant education are offered by about 95% of the nominees. About three-quarters of advisers and adviser teams offer individual investment advice to participants, while 72.3% offer personal planning as well.
More than half (59.7%) of nominated advisers conduct quarterly meetings with their plan sponsor clients to discuss investments (investment monitoring is offered by 94.9% of advisers), and nearly all (97.8%) say they help create an investment policy statement for the plan. A striking 56.2% create a communication policy statement to better focus education efforts.
>> Read More
There is nothing like tumultuous times to highlight the value of, and reinforce the need for, expert help for plan fiduciaries and, yes, it surely plays to the advantage of a profession dedicated to helping plan sponsors construct the right programs, and participants make the best of them.
That is why, in 2005, we launched our Retirement Plan Adviser of the Year award (and, last year, our Retirement Plan Adviser Team of the Year award): to acknowledge “the contributions of the nation’s best financial advisers in helping make retirement security a reality for workers across the nation.” In the pages that follow, it is our privilege to highlight the standouts from this year’s nominations in terms of “success,” as measured by number of plans and dollar value of assets under advisement1.
This year, we received 332 nominations representing more than 200 advisers. We collected information from 216 advisers and, of those, 127 advisers (78 teams and 49 individuals) completed the entry form in its entirety, making them eligible for the award.
The criteria that underlie the award are simple but crucial: We want to recognize advisers who make a difference through increasing participation, boosting deferral rates, enhancing asset allocation, and/or providing better programs through expanded service or expense management. It is no accident that those criteria also underlie the Pension Protection Act’s designs for defined contribution plans, for only by getting more workers saving in these programs at effective rates, and invested in prudent ways, can they have any real prospects for retirement security.That the advisers nominated have enjoyed success is undeniable. Collectively, they represent $159.7 billion in assets under advisement and serve more than 3.5 million participants. Between September 2006 and September 2007, this group of advisers has added 1,274 plans, while only losing 102.
More than half have clients using automatic enrollment and automatic deferral increases, while enrollment meetings and ongoing participant education are offered by about 95% of the nominees. About three-quarters of advisers and adviser teams offer individual investment advice to participants, while 72.3% offer personal planning as well.
More than half (59.7%) of nominated advisers conduct quarterly meetings with their plan sponsor clients to discuss investments (investment monitoring is offered by 94.9% of advisers), and nearly all (97.8%) say they help create an investment policy statement for the plan. A striking 56.2% create a communication policy statement to better focus education efforts.
>> Read More