#71 Carmen Venter – Transcript

Louis van der Merwe
Welcome to another episode of Financial Planners, South Africa. This will be the second one for the brand new year and I’m really excited to have common fainter with me. For those of you that haven’t heard of common FinTech, I’m pretty sure there will be very few of you. Carmen is very vocal in our industry has a string of qualifications. And if you ever want to know something common is the person to ask she if she doesn’t know she’ll find out. Common. Thanks so much for making the time to join me today.

Carmen Venter
Louis, thank you so much. Hello to everybody. Thank you for the invite, I really appreciate especially speaking about a topic that is very, very huge passion in my life, that is financial planning profession. So thank you so much appreciate.

Louis van der Merwe
Before we started this conversation, you were, I think, largely bragging about the sound of the ocean behind you and kind of where you staying. Give us a little bit of a glimpse of where you are in South Africa and and how you ended up where you are right now.

Carmen Venter
I’m in what I call an own retirement village. That is Ramsgate. I think everybody knows the Waffle House. I’m about five kilometers away from the Waffle House, South Coast and the house. I’ve been so blessed that house is about 1515 meters away from the actual beach. So it is a very, very different lifestyle. So Louis, I’d spend, I’m not going to tell you how many years I was in job where I spend my whole life in Johannesburg. And one day I woke up and I thought is this where I want to live the rest of my life? That’s city, I don’t know, I just I was struggling to find any form of value in love. And I woke up one day and decided I’m going to bring my dog and I have to live with my little doggie, I decided I’m going to bring my dog down to the coast and let’s just have a little bit of a holiday. And somehow they just said, Sell Your House pack down, pack up and just move down and everything happened in a space of three months. sold the house and journalists were packed up pandemic heat. So that wasn’t that wasn’t fun. Move down to a new house. And gosh, I just wish I had done it much earlier in my life. But then perhaps it wouldn’t have worked out so well. So yes, sound of the ocean, sound of tree frogs, sound of birds, it’s just It’s paradise. Total.

Louis van der Merwe
It’s wonderful how you had the courage to actually just follow that meet and say, Hey, this, I can create this life. And I think that’s one of the wonderful pros within our industry, you know, even if your client facing more or not? How did you set up kind of income streams to allow you to create this life?

Carmen Venter
So Louis, yes, I think I agree with you in that it was not something that many do, because there is a huge fear factor. There were many times I had to breathe and, and calm down and know that this was the right move. So I did let all my plants know that I was going to make a move, and they have the option of me moving them to my ex husband, he’s also a financial planner. So then at least they have faced face to face or they could stay with the most beautiful financial planner ever. But understand that I wouldn’t be doing things online. And I was so fortunate I think 90% of my clients online is fine. We don’t we don’t need to see you, you know, we know what you do. excetera. So I was very grateful from that perspective. But that was that was of course fearful. But I think, to me, the most fearful was my education setup, I had up until end of 2019 only done face to face workshops, although I had done online before, but my business was face to face. And that’s what I deliver. You know, I want to see people’s faces, I want to see their expressions. I want to be able to touch them and hug them and so don’t worry, you’re going to make it and all of a sudden to leave that behind and go online. Yes, basically a half the income I said goodbye to just had to bet had to happen. And I’ve had to sort of rebuild it here and it’s just working perfectly. I think maybe I’m one of the lucky ones that the pandemic eat. A lot of people don’t enjoy the fact that the whole pandemic and the lockdowns that I was going. I’m feeling guilty because it’s working for me. So I rebuild the business pretty quickly online. And I think people will be very surprised in the profession. It’s not always about you know, If I take our can now sorry, Louis, I know you’re about to ask me the next question. But I’m just finding that I because I don’t spend time traveling. And because I can be easily accessible, my client knows that if they need me at seven o’clock in the evening, and I don’t have anything to do at seven o’clock, I’ll leave it, I’ll just do a quick zoom, and we’ll meet one another. That time that I’ll would be traveling, I can now give the client I can find out everything about the client, whether they’re crying, whether they’re smiling, and they just so love that, you know, even if I switch off, and I haven’t spoken about products, or financial planning, that’s cool. I’m happy, the clients happy, I’m happy and off we go. So let’s not worry too much about the fear, let’s not focus, it just always look at the end result. But it’s what it is we want to achieve.

Louis van der Merwe
I think it’s such a wonderful case study, in a way, you’ve actually gone something through something which we often plan for clients, you know, I have this major life transition, and I’m moving and kind of changing my income. There’s a lot of moving parts. And I think your brain naturally is very analytical, you know, you have this kind of wealth of knowledge. How difficult did you find this process? Did you find that you have to plan out every single part of it? And, you know, what was? What was helpful for you thinking, kind of through this process before it happened?

Carmen Venter
If I have to say to Louis, um, I don’t plan. Sorry, I really don’t plan I’ll wake up. And my whole career has been like that. I mean, for clients, I plan. But for myself, I’ll wake up and something says, Oh, that was that is a brilliant idea. I think it’s going to work well. It’s going to fit a particular market, it’s going to ultimately meet my objectives. I just, I just did. I just, I just take out a writing pen, and I go, okay, what are all the boxes that need to be ticked to meet that objective, you know, venues, brochures, funds, whatever, I write it all down, and then just stick as I go along. And I just found that, I found that if I plan, so many things can go wrong. And it can sort of, after a while I look at it and go, Okay, this is not it’s not worth my while. There’s just too many things to worry about. Where if I just do what I’ve been doing, and I’m not going to change, you know, this is a great idea. Just sit down and do it. Don’t think about it. The minute you start thinking about it, the negative thoughts come in, and the challenges come in, and the hurdles come in. You’re just giving your brain too much time to think you’re like don’t just, that’s what you want to do just do it.

Louis van der Merwe
Less planning too much for clients, like should we be doing more things actively and getting them that momentum? Or kind of how do we translate this to clients? Because I’m hearing financial planners saying, Hey, I didn’t plan but it just sounds like you maybe plan on a different way than what would have been expected.

Carmen Venter
Yeah, yeah. With my clients are always say, You know what we’ve got to think about tomorrow. But please, let’s live for today. I don’t want to plan to a point where you feel that you cannot move. So it is yes, let’s, let’s look. Let’s look after retirement. But you know what, let’s have fun at the same time. And if the client picks up the phone and says, Carmen, you know, I know that we’ve been planning for education, etc. But I need a little bit of money because I need to go on holiday now or want to whatever it is they want to do. It’s not about sorry, you can’t do that. It’s unfortunate. You can’t. To me, it’s like Fine, let’s take that bit of money, knowing that we have not allocated money somewhere else. Let’s have fun and start all over again. Let’s just build up again. Does that make sense, Louis?

Louis van der Merwe
To be you becoming that enabler, instead of saying, Oh, no, no, we have to scare you into saving all your money for retirement or saving for for someone else. Because ultimately when clients come to you, they sometimes think oh, you’re gonna you’re gonna tell me not to spend money gonna tell me to do all these things. Do you think financial planning has evolved compared to how we did it? 10 or 15 years ago,

Carmen Venter
Louis just before the podcast I had a financial planner call me is rare one said the surname but we’ve known one another for seven years when asked Started at at Liberty laugh. And we were just talking about, he eventually decided to leave the business because he just felt we weren’t doing things right anymore. And we were talking about, Well, what did we do in those days that we are not doing now. And we actually agreed that in the beginning, and I’ve been in this business now since, Gosh, 3040 years, I can’t even tell anymore. And we spend a lot of time with clients, we didn’t have computers, we didn’t have all these analysis, we just went to a client with our little rate box, etc. And we got to know our clients, Israel was saying that they never had a lapse, and Philip as well, I know them all, from Liberty days, this is common in my 23 years, I never had elapsed, the retention rate is what we concentrated on. That was our success. If someone had to say to you, Well, I’ve written so many case, new business cases or whatever those CPRS those points are can’t even recall what they are anymore. We would that’s not what we would concentrate on, we would concentrate on what is your retention percentage, how many of your plans that you wrote 20 years ago are still with you. And to do that, you’ve got to develop a relationship with your client. And it’s not about we can’t just go there with an analysis and say, look, you’ve got a shortfall Yeah, and a shortfall there. Let’s plug in life insurance. It’s, it’s been with the client, I think we’ve, we’ve sort of lost that. And with my clients when I’m with them, I have not lost a client. Unless, of course, from a desk perspective. It’s because it when I’m sitting with them, I do not talk about financial planning, I do not talk about life insurance, I do not, I don’t I don’t talk about those things. I wait for the client to talk to me. Whatever the client has, in his mind, I will address then I start hearing about, you know what, my daughter’s not put a wall together and and she’s just given birth to a baby. So now I’ll make a mental note, I don’t take out a pet, sadly, I make a mental note. Okay, that becomes a problem. I’m picking up all the shortcomings of my clients love, lifestyle objectives, etc, purely by conversing with him. That’s all I’m doing. Then, from that sort of conversation, you the client starts telling you what his priorities are. That’s what I find the time is, tells me how many you know what the will is very important. Please, can you help us? Is there someone you can refer us to? Sooner or later I get the business. But what I’ve done is I’ve created a beautiful relationship with my client, I’m addressing what the client wants. And that’s where they enjoy doing business with me, because it’s not about the insurance. To be honest, half of them don’t even know which companies I placed my business with. To them. It’s like, common are you sending me so much? Am I getting so much cover? Yeah, they don’t know which insurance company I’m going to. That’s the relationship that that we’ve developed. So I think I think our youngsters, the way I see them being taught, it’s all about technical knowledge, completing an analysis and selling as much as you can. I don’t see any form of education that we are giving our young planners and I say young planners, I’m not necessarily talking age. But young planners in the profession, we are not giving them skills to deal with humans to actually start a conversation with with a with their clients and talk about everything else. But maybe saying financial planning is the wrong word. But about insurance, what about you know what, when you die, this is going to happen? Am I making sense, Louis?

Louis van der Merwe
Absolutely Carmen. And I completely agree with you. And maybe we can use this opportunity to kind of dive a little bit into and create sort of a master clause of how should this be done? I mean, the one thing that comes up to me is what kind of questions would you ask your clients to prompt these conversations?

Carmen Venter
I think it’s just listening. I don’t have anything prepared. But then I am slightly different person to the norm. Because if I don’t plan for myself, then you know, when I go see a client, I don’t actually have anything planned. So admittedly, not everybody can do what I do. I’m hoping they can because you know by the Thomas soul, it’s probably six, seven months down the line, but I know that I’ve got a client for laugh because I’m not pushing him into him or her into anything. So I will sit and chat to them and you know, I’ll call in. So I will recall Before I go to the one thing I do do is just go back to their filings and look at what was our last conversation? What was he concerned about last time? And then when I see them the second time around, I’ll recall, I said, Okay, so you had that concern last time? Did you manage to sort it out? I’ll give you a small example. Just recently, my client had to get a trustee to resign from his trust. So I referred him to the two attorneys, etc, to do that. And I haven’t heard anything. So when I went to see him this the first thing I said, James, so did you manage to, to remove that trustee, and then they told me about all the problems, they haven’t removed the trustee and I start talking about, you know, the difficulties. If you start any form of transactions in the trust without the trustee being involved, then they’ll you’ll start no calm, and I didn’t realize that and I’ll please can I see your trust deed? He shows me the trustee, I started reading the provisions in the trustee that while I’m doing that, I’m starting to see a lot of opportunities. Okay, then I write down those opportunities and say, Well, you know, client, were you aware of this? No, I didn’t know. Well, this is the impact. So can you see that? It’s not being planned? I’m just taking the concerns you had last time asking him about those concerns? Have they been addressed? Have they not been addressed? And because of the knowledge I have, I know, then what documents to ask for, or which questions will lead me to, you know, to business or to the next conversation. And I find, you must remember, really, when I started this, when I started in the financial planning profession, which was at Liberty life, which I love them to birds, not being biased, but there was a tick box, there was a framework, when you see a client, this is what you do, this is what you say. And please don’t forget, by the time you finish seeing the client, you ask for five referrals, because you need to keep your business going, make sure it doesn’t exceed 45 minutes. This is the framework that, you know, because I came in much later than everybody else. But this is the framework that we were expected to work in. And I lost to two years. So I can’t do this. I don’t like this profession. I don’t want to do this anymore. Because how can you work in a framework like that, and growing in this profession, falling in love with it, I just thought to myself, just be who I am. And let’s just be who I am, the client loves you. Not, you’re not all these is and graces. And you know, and that’s what I am all about. My clients just enjoy a concept that can’t love me because it sounds very egotistical, but they just enjoy my manner of presenting financial planning.

Louis van der Merwe
It sounds like the quality of your interactions is in a manner where you are solving problems, or you’re helping them to unpack their problems and fix that. And you know, the story that you’re telling about getting into the insurance space, being really frustrated, considering your options is one that I’ve heard many times on this podcast, I want to ever talk you through kind of that step of when you made the decision to leave liberty, what went through your thinking process there? Was it very similar to you moving out and saying, cool, I just need to take some action and take the leap of faith did you have something set up that you move towards?

Carmen Venter
So when I joined liberty, I was actually in the internal stuff. I wasn’t a financial planner at the time. And so I’ve done some drastic steps in my lifetime now that I think about, and for many years, one of the areas I was responsible for it was to help clients, you know, walk in plans to make sure that they were addressed, especially on the claim side. And there were so many woman really was so many woman who would come in there crying and needing help with not only a disclaim, but not realizing what their husbands had been doing during their lifetime the debt that they had created. There’s just so many things that they came that came to light when their husbands died. And that was so very traumatic for me because I was going I’ve got to help these women. So I left as an internal staff member and then I became a financial planner. But there again, it was that. Well, you know, it’s the while there was that fear, of course I’m leaving a salaried employment to go into commission not knowing that thing about life insurance. I was internal. But the drive, there was you see this is the thing is the drive to help people the drive to be able to educate women. That’s when I started education as well. I co founded a 21st Century woman When he was one of my attorney friends, and that that was to help women understand financial planning to understand business or to establish with their husbands in on in debt or not, what the next steps is. So that is what pushed me into financial planning was this traumatic events are these woman who they were so lost, my heart just broke for them. So this would made me move into financial planning, but then I was still with liberty. And what made me go independent was, you know, chemistry age where Liberty said, look, you’ve got to only be a financial planner, you can’t be a financial planner, and a tax planner. And heaven knows what else, because you’re working under our logo. And also, okay, there’s another framework I can work with in frameworks, I need to be as free as possible,

Louis van der Merwe
Not fitting the mold common, breaking the system.

Carmen Venter
That seems like that’s what I do all the time. And there is again, I there again, and this is what I say to financial planners, don’t be afraid of your move, I gave up everything I earned was liberty as an agent, to move into my own space and build it up again, in Euro M 3040 years later. So don’t be afraid of breaking the mold. Don’t be afraid of moving, you can build it up again. It’s the passion that is important. It’s the love for the plant, and not necessarily the love for the product, or the love of the many Sorry, I’m saying this, but we all do, of course need finance, we need money. But it will follow, it will follow if you if you just follow your passion that will follow concentrate on the client.

Louis van der Merwe
I love that kind of reinvention. And going out and actually doing it. I mean, one of the greatest compliments that I get is you don’t look like a financial planner. Yes.

Carmen Venter
Not in a suit with a tie and

Louis van der Merwe
lift the time behind a while ago. Is there not enough creativity in our profession, or people not living out these different ways of kind of expressing themselves as financial planners or as professionals? Or is it you think it’s frowned upon to do something like that?

Carmen Venter
I think it’s I think it’s frowned upon. I think I know talk about look, I do do something I do different to financial planning in terms of the profession itself. So it’s all sort of explained. So I have sort of stuff studied specialized kinesiology, which is all about holistic, healing. And on the other side, on the financial planning, and very other finance money, you know, there’s no energy, there’s no holistic healing of the, I’ve found that we in the financial planning profession, there’s an expectation is an expectation for you to always look, your best is an expectation that no one knows your weaknesses, is an expectation that you’re always doing well. So concentrate on on material stuff. You’ve got to be tough. You just can’t do that. You can’t do that. There’s just you got to be who you are. I was told by someone. Many years back, when I started the education side, I was told, you will never tell anyone, your areas of weaknesses. And I was going well, I don’t see that as a weakness. I just don’t see it as an area that I’m passionate about all that maybe my brain is not designed to go mathematical, it’s just set out I found that strange, why would I not? Why should I not tell people areas that are not my strength? Why must I hide that? But you see, that’s what the professional expects, you have to be good at everything. Just don’t let everybody don’t let anyone know what you’re not good at. That’s weakness. And this is how we are seen by our clients. Our clients do see us as value you saying that, you know, you don’t look like a financial planner, or client see this person that you know, probably doesn’t have a smile and if you do have a smile, it’s your it’s not real. We need to change. We need to change we need to show our clients that we are human. We are human and we’ve got our own dreams and likes and dislikes. And so yeah lujah I do think if I now look at the specialist kinesiology side, which is the more realistic I’m like, it is so beautiful to go from financial planning during the week to kinesiology in the weekend because it’s like a totally different space. We are who we are we talk about our disappointments. You know, if you want to cry amongst 20 people, you cry, no one judges you two totally different walls, and yet to be the same person.

Louis van der Merwe
So I’m gonna think what you’re starting to touch on is kind of that the way you showing up and how that’s impacting your clients. And this is something Mary Morton talks about a lot, you know, just being the being present and bringing your true self can already change a client relationship? What can we learn from the work that you’re doing in this holistic healing and bringing that into the financial planning space, you know, you’re not mentioning don’t look like a soldier that’s going to war with a mission to maybe sell a product. What else is there that really strikes you as contrasting that might be obvious with someone for your training?

Carmen Venter
You know, Geology actually taught me a lot about my relationship with my clients. And since I started that, I’ve been far more relaxed as well, because there’s a module that actually teaches you to speak to a person. And the holistic healing side is I’m really having to delve very, very deeply into your emotions, to the point where you’re prepared to actually told me every traumatic event that you’ve had in your life, so that’s one of the modules that we are trained on, and I’ve used that, try and use it with my clients. And I actually find that it’s, it’s amazing, have far closer to my clients and than ever before, to the point that the client even told me, why are you dressed the way you dress, put on your sandals? Give her a pair of shorts, can you see the change in? In relationship? It’s it’s just been a total fundamental change. And I think financial planners, you know, I was taught by a financial planner many years ago, as well. So I’ve been taught a lot of lessons, take a look at your client. If your client is a farmer, you dress like a farmer, you don’t turn up there with, you know, your suit and things like it, just be like him. And then when you’re always that client, you’re going to understand everything about farming, talk about farming, never talk about yourself, or ask questions that makes him passionate about his profession, because you’re gonna get far more information if you do that. So to me, it’s small, you know, here, Louis, I think you’ve just wrapped it up in going just be you. Listen to the client, look at the client, listen to the client, as the client questions about the client’s feelings, their emotions, you know, easily say, you don’t look good today, you look tired. Why don’t you take a break, or you don’t, you don’t even have makeup. It’s such a difference. When you don’t have makeup, you see, I’m getting to the client and becoming personal with the client. Louis, you’re asking even the same thing all the time, because I keep coming back to you know, it’s like listening to the client. And just being with the client, I’m trying to find a different way of putting it together. But it’s just been you.

Louis van der Merwe
It’s been you. And as you just said, that kind of mirroring that person, you know, if you’re with this person dressed this kind of way, I think that might be part of the problem. We’re almost ingrained or kind of trained to do whatever it is to, you know, potentially close the sale, make that person feel better. But what you’re saying is just show up the way you are, don’t disrespect the relationship, but actually be their authentic self. And if, if that maybe doesn’t resonate with a client? Well, there’s many other financial planners, and there’s many other clients. How difficult has it been for you to maybe turn away from relationships that didn’t work? Can you tell me a little bit about client relationships that didn’t work out? Well, maybe at the beginning, maybe in the middle, maybe in the end?

Carmen Venter
Difficult question. Because I can only recall of two, that didn’t work out well. One was a client who went out for dinner, she can’t recall the whole thing. But she went out for dinner came back at about 11 o’clock in the evening. Send me a message, which I only responded the next day. And she was very, very angry that I was not available for her at 11 o’clock, to deal with whatever you shared. I said who is that? Is that your expectation of me? She said yes. I said, well, then we’re going to have to terminate our relationship because I’m not going to do that. That’s totally disrespectful. And that was the end of that. The other one was actually a client, a corporate client that was unhappy with me. They were very, very small company. And I was doing everything that I felt occurred. But one of the principal officers didn’t just we just clashed pose from a personality perspective, from day one. He didn’t like me. So he was making it very difficult. But I was trying very hard. So this was at the beginning, I was trying very hard to be what the client expected me to be. And I wasn’t getting it right. And then he just phoned me up one day and said, We don’t want you as a financial planner anymore. It was a huge shock, because to me, it was going, but I’ve really worked hard. I’ve tried to be who you wanted me to be. And the yellow still got fired, was a shock. But it taught me that I can only be who I am. And as a result of that, being fired by a client, to me firing a client, because, you know, she was asking me to be something or someone that I could not be. I was, I couldn’t. So those are the two. Those are the two only occasions that I think that we ended a relationship. All the others have just, you know, been natural death, or they’ve left the country. But otherwise, no newbie.

Louis van der Merwe
I haven’t fits in so nicely with what we’re talking about showing up authentically, but also someone expecting something that you’re not willing to give, like, do you think we spend enough time talking about those expectations or maybe unsaid expectations in the coaching world? They talk about contracting and saying, Okay, these are these are the rules of engagement, right? It’s not okay for us to, you know, send messages that 11 o’clock, unless it’s an emergency, or maybe it is maybe that’s your, your role in your relationship? Have you crafted that and kind of solidified that? Or do you find that the clients that you’re attracting now are people that just intuitively understand you because you show up more authentic?

Carmen Venter
Louis? I’m so very, very fortunate to the clients. That are the clients are referred to me. I’m not looking for clients, which, which is always nice. So the clients have been referred to me by my clients. So yes, I’m finding that, you know, it’s the same sort of network that I’ve that I’m sort of involved with, okay, so if I have a client who loves who common is and the work that common does and the manner, then he’s going to refer me to someone who obviously is going to enjoy the same form of relationship. So. So I’m very fortunate from that perspective. But you were asking me, you were saying something earlier on, as you’re asking me this question. And I wanted to answer. Let me just answer, in part recall the question, you know, if you had to say to a financial planner, who’s been in this profession for a very long time, and his balled up a good book, I think that financial planner will be really comfortable to tell a client, this is the framework, you’re going to work within IE, you know, I’m only available from eight o’clock until five o’clock, you know, provide those those, those limits. Take a young person, young, not again, age, but a youngster who’s come into our profession, knowing very well what the expectation is, and that is your business. You know, our providers do that to our financial planners, I don’t enjoy it, I wish it could change. But if you do not sell so many policies, at the end of the year, you are going to terminate your contract. Now you tell that person who’s trying very hard to build a client base, and to retain the client base, that you’re going to tell your client please don’t call me at 11 o’clock at night, he’s not going to do it is going to allow it because if it means that I get that client and I can solve then I’m going to meet my contract. And that becomes the problem because we sitting there as the plant starts expecting that and you get to a point the planner gets to a point where how do you not change it? You’ve dug yourself a hole you can’t get out of it because you’ve got to keep those clients going. You’ve got to keep your your contract going. And there’s no one out there that comes in to teach them one not even to get into that space. Because as they come in, we just we just throw them into courses about products and sell and that’s it. There’s no one Well, I haven’t come across anyone really who can walk that financial planet to the position that you must be it should be in. And that is for clients to respect you as a planner. But at the same time you are giving your client for more than just an analysis with products I read my heart really goes out to young financial planners. And yet, it is the most rewarding profession I’ve ever come across. There is there is nothing like seeing a client, you know, just doing something for the client, the client has got a smile on their face. Just Louie just recently, I put a post on LinkedIn, about a client that I’d seen so many years ago. But I had to help them create a debt. The art of the case law was about or rather, the article was about debt is not so bad. And I recall when I started this profession, if a financial planner had to get any client into debt, you’re in big trouble, you just you know, the plan is to get the client out of debt, not into debt. And a marriage counselor referred a couple to me. I don’t know why she did that. But she did. The couple were divorcing because of financial problems. Not because they didn’t have enough, they probably had a lot. But and this is where Q put heater would come in. Because I picked up that she did not want to spend money, she wanted to hold on to all her money. And he on the other hand, was happy to spend everything in one day because it was the I live for today. And the other one was I live for tomorrow. And I’d actually met Kim quote heater by that time. And I knew all about this financial behavioral thing. I didn’t always believe in it. But sometimes I kind of go I doubt it. But it worked for me. Thanks to Kim, she’s very aware of this. And I’ve picked up that this came from the parents. Okay, so the teaching is really from the parents. And what I had to do is I had to really listen to the client, you must understand yes, clients that are saying to me, under no circumstances am I going to sell anything to them, okay, my responsibility was to get them to ensure that they remained married, and that they understood. Finance, they understood how to manage their finances. Again, nothing to do with life insurance is a bit of a

Louis van der Merwe
common was that also the expectation of this relationship?

Carmen Venter
They didn’t know what to expect, okay. They just know that they went to a financial planner that I was told by the counselor,

Louis van der Merwe
You’re gonna fix the marriage now.

Carmen Venter
You gotta you got to do something, they get a divorce. I didn’t know what to do. But in chatting about why do you feel like this? And why do you feel like I don’t? Why do you think that’s a problem and, you know, ask you these type of questions. I eventually discovered that she wanted him to save for tomorrow. And he wanted her to spend for today, a balance. And I had to actually go outside of all my teachings as a financial planner. And so okay, for you, I’m going to create a debt for you to see the debt can actually be managed, it’s not a bad thing. You just need to know how to manage it. But it does help you accumulate wealth. And then with the other individual, I’d say, Tim, you can spend as much as you want, but for every round you spend, you are going to save the same for tomorrow. And, Louis, it worked. I mean, I wrote on the LinkedIn. And I didn’t sell insurance at all, by the way. For five years there after I had her phone, to say, I just want to let you know, we are still married, I’ve managed to buy another house which we are renting it’s my responsibility to look after the budget. They were happy. Because all I addressed was the emotion and the thought patterns about what money was all about. And this is, and this is the beauty of this profession. So all those planners out there who think that this is just very scientific, then it’s all about new business. And, you know, sooner or later, I can tell you now you’re going to want to get out of this profession, because it can be soul destroying, if this is all you do. But if you live if you walk the past with your plant from the beginning until the end until they die, hopefully they die before you have. But do for them. Look after them, listen to them, and just work for them. Not for your insurance provider, not for your employer. I normally get a lot of people being very angry with me but if you walk With your plans with passion, and understanding, and patience, you will build a beautiful business. And it will be successful and the finance and the rewards will come along with it. But you have to start right at the beginning, just loving your clients working calm. And

Louis van der Merwe
I want to know from from this these interactions that you had with specifically with this couple, right? So it’s you came up with something that most financial planners would probably not come up with, you know, you gave them a elegant solution, how difficult was it for them to actually take action, because what we seen a lot is that, you know, we might have the right solution or a solution, but for client to take that step and actually implemented actually go out and say, okay, cool, I am saving a bit more I am getting myself to spend, what do you think the trigger was in your conversation for them to actually take action now, on something that may be relatively rudimentary, like, you need to say spend a bit more, and you need to save a bit more.

Carmen Venter
That was it was follow up and reporting back. So we would say, by next week, we meet into look, they basically lived in my house, because he’s just come to my house. So I would say, by next week, you have opened up a credit card with a facility of 1000 rent, so I need to see that card with you, etc, then with the individual, I would say but you know, so we would actually have timelines that things had to be addressed.

Louis van der Merwe
And I was super granular and accountability around those actions. And I

Carmen Venter
was, I was falling up every single time, every single time. So there had to, I wasn’t really kind there had to commit. Because I was saying to them, I’m committing my time. I’m finding ways to help you. I’m committed to this process. Or once I want this to work, but you got to be as committed, if you if you have a client who also once those very same objectives. But you need to know what that objective is, that’s the thing can’t be yours, there’s got to be this. But if the client wants to address that objective, or if they wanted to save their marriage, they will commit, they’ll work for it. But if you do say, Okay, fine, look, we’re gonna have to save for education. But they don’t really have that. Okay, fine, I’m gonna have to put a policy in place for education. Sooner or later, they’re going to probably keep cashing their policy, because they weren’t really committed to it. So it’s a very, very, it’s, that’s, that is perhaps the only time where I actually truly do plan. But I don’t do it. Like, you know, in six months time, no, six months, time is not going to happen. Because that’s too far away. It is. Next week, we’re going to see one out in two weeks time, we’re going to see one another. So it is time consuming, Louis, it is but it’s helped me be in the position. I mean, at the moment,

Louis van der Merwe
when it’s probably not too different from helping a student come up with a process to understand content, you know, through the work that you do in synergy. And it’s very It strikes me how similar it actually is where you break down a complex or relatively complex situation into bite sized actionable steps and, and you hold someone’s hand through that process.

Carmen Venter
This was definitely there got to see the picture I didn’t actually realize are closer to actually is what I do in financial planning and what I do in education, but let’s just take education. As I had to study, I threw myself into studies many years before I started lecturing, and had great difficulty in studying. So I have to work very hard for every bit of knowledge that I have at the moment in my brain that I can remember. And I had to find ways to address that area of study that I wasn’t very good at, I had to find ways to study and to remember. And I found that if I had to break everything down and draw, have a little drawing, if I could, okay, so if it was a process, I would draw the process. So I would turn everything into pictures, break it down, turn it into pictures, because now I can actually see what I’m studying rather than just words. I was finding that that worked for me. And that’s how I actually got into the whole education again, thanks to Kim pocketed because she was a student of mine. And she started my career actually her and another lady is still because while we were studying, they they notice how I was trying to show them as a small group. How to actually do tackles something that is so overwhelming. Okay, see if p is overwhelming and advanced is overwhelming. So if you tackle everything in one go, it’s it’s just impossible. And it worked. That worked. And I started developing this huge career in education purely because I was assisting students to break it down into smaller components. Understand that component before you move on, if you don’t understand it, don’t move on, because it’s not going to work. So yes, quite right. It’s very similar to what I do is my clients, actually I didn’t, I didn’t realize that thank you so much that I do I take the, they laugh, everything they want to do in their life. And I do break it down a little bit by little bit. This is what we can achieve in the next month. And this is what we can achieve a couple of months down the line, etc. So So yes, that is, and it’s been successful. So

Louis van der Merwe
it’s easier to see that from the outside, you know, for me to make that observation. And some, it’s lot easier than for you to come up with that observation. I guess we we live in our own world so much that we can’t see our own blind spots, and we can’t observe ourselves. So it’s really difficult to do this

Carmen Venter
is I hadn’t I hadn’t noticed that before. Actually, to be honest. I think it’s because of the way I approach things. I just throw myself into it, it has to be done. Find the best way of doing it and just go out there and deliberate. That I haven’t sat back and thought, you know, am I following the very same patterns through to my clients and vice versa? But yeah, thank you, you have learned something new today.

Louis van der Merwe
I’m really grateful. What’s what’s on the horizon for you? Is there anything you’re working on? Or new challenges that you’re taking up with? Will? Will it be expanding on the existing base? Well, I’m

Carmen Venter
going to be a fantastic gentleman, who is very client centric. And I’m sure I can mention his name yet because he has put on on LinkedIn. So Bekithemba, I’m sure you know, Bekithemba. He is just formed his own consultancy, Citra. consultancy he worked at momentum before. So I am busy with momentum during training for the upcoming graduates. Very excited about that I’m trying to be I’m trying to teach them not only about the technical aspects of financial planning, but also, you know, the soft issues, which no one really teaches, so I’m doing that. And then with Becky and Citra consultancy, we also are looking at developing some programs to address many things not only financial literacy, but financial coaching, the whole technical aspect of financial planning as well and, and much much more. I’m not going to go into too much of that because I’m think Bekithemba can actually explain that far better. And I am going to continue mom, specialized kinesiology, to specialize in human healing. And of course, in animal healing, the animal always has to come in there. So those are the two parts that I’m falling at the moment.

Louis van der Merwe
That is wonderful. Beki was a guest not too long ago on the show. And what a great gentleman. I’m sure it will be a very successful venture

Carmen Venter
It will be I love his vision. I love what he’s doing for the profession. It’s just synchronicities. I mean, like it’s just worked so well, we have the same objective. He’s obviously just far better at knowing how to achieve those then than I just want to, let’s develop what we need to develop and if we educate. So I’m very excited about that.

Louis van der Merwe
Thank you so much for today’s conversation. I think it’s been a masterclass in listening to clients showing up authentically breaking down those complex elements and most of all that accountability that we bring to the relationship and kind of creating action steps and taking that leap of faith. Thank you for showing up authentically to your clients and making a difference in their lives.

Carmen Venter
Thank you so much for the invite. I enjoyed it really did. I’ve learned one or two things about myself as well today. So thank you so much for that. And your financial planners. Just Just have fun. Enjoy what you’re doing and, yeah, concentrate on the client. It’s very, very rewarding. Thank you so much, Louis.