TAP launches adviser academy to 'raise the bar for professionalism'

Ryan Edwards

The Adviser Platform (TAP) has announced a professional training and development academy to help advisers grow their own advice firms.

The managing director of TAP, Ryan Edwards told Good Returns that “there’s a real gap in the market in terms of bringing new people into the industry and giving them the tools to be successful”.

The academy aims for participants to learn the skills to be a successful adviser, focusing not just on client facing skills, but also business management, compliance, legal and most importantly to Edwards “raising the professional standards of how people conduct themselves in the industry”.

TAP will be working with established firms both to identify new candidates and to provide training and development pathways to bring that adviser through a 12-18 month programme. The end result being an “aim to increase the pool of professionals giving advice in NZ”.

Edwards said that, “this academy was designed around having a positive outlook as to how the new regulations [will] mean that advisers [are] running a much more professional operation in 2021 and onwards. We want to spread that message to advisers who have a similar mindset and who are looking to take the next step in the next two or three years.”

The first intake is scheduled for February. But people should expect to see more professional development programmes from TAP as Edwards has said that “we have worked hard to build it into a professional platform that enables it to be repeated”.