There are many things that an IFA has to be doing, and many things that he should not be doing…lets look at the things that he must be doing. For Financial success in life a person needs to do a few things right. First of all he has to have capital to invest – either a lumpsum like inheritance or a regular amount like earnings. With this corpus, he can now expect his money to earn money. Assuming he has a lot of money to invest

• What are you supposed to talk?

• asset allocation, risk tolerance and time horizons.
• the use of debt, college education costs, savings plans, tax efficiency, estate planning, insurance needs, etc.
• comprehensive financial planning and emotional management.
• measuring your performance against your ONLY benchmark — your goals.
• about helping people define their goals, dreams, desires and fears.
• implementing a plan & making corrections along the way as life /market/economic forces intervene.
• about creating a financial plan that can survive severe life disruptions.
• deal with human capital
• about understanding why money is important to you personally/ your client.
• about how and when to invest a lump sum. How to create that emergency fund.
• helps you understand your own personal tax situation.
• about helping people make better decisions with their money in the face of uncertainty that is impossible to reduce.
• helps you understand how much you need to save meet your future spending needs.
• helps you figure out where to spend your money in a way that makes you happy.
• helps you plan and budget for future consumption needs.
• creating systems that allow you to spend less time worrying about your money.
• reducing the anxiety that comes from making important decisions with your money.

• THERE IS SO MUCH TO TALK ABOUT  Investment management to talk…

• managing investments.
• portfolio construction and risk management.
• measuring portfolio performance by comparing results to predetermined index benchmarks.
• allowing your money to work for you to help you reach your financial goals.
• Investment management..to talk
• creating a process that guides your actions in a wide variety of market environments.
• creating a portfolio that can survive severe market disruptions.
• about growing and/or preserving your wealth.
• where to invest a lump sum.
• Loss set on/set off – cap gains for example
• creating policies to guide your actions in the face of economic and market uncertainty.
• understand how much you need to earn on your investments meet your future spending needs.
• helps you figure out where to take your money from when you need to spend it.
• helps you grow your savings to meet future consumption needs.
• about creating a long-term process to guide your actions in the markets.
• about reducing the anxiety that comes from the volatile nature of the markets.
• involves growing your wealth so some day you can become wealthy.

You ignore all this and ask “Market mein kya hoga?”.

If you are an IFA go and talk all this first…..

Source: Own, A wealth of common sense, Morningstar, Thinkspendandsave,…. – its all there in the web out there!!