As part of an ongoing campaign to make financial planning more a part of Canadians' lives, Financial Planning Standards Council (FPSC) spearheaded Canada’s first Financial Planning Week in October 2009.
The goal of the Week is to raise awareness and invite a call to action to all stakeholders to collaborate and enact meaningful change for the benefit of all Canadians. Similar weeks have been held in Quebec and the U.S.A.
As the standard-setter of financial planning, FPSC has been at the forefront of the financial planning profession since 1995. "We are in a unique position to highlight the need for and contribute to a heightened effort to enact change for all Canadians. Every stakeholder - individuals, industry, regulators, educators and others - needs to be part of the solution," says Cary List, President & CEO, FPSC.
THE HEART OF FINANCIAL PLANNING WEEK: VISION 2020
Imagine if, by the year 2020, Canada becomes a nation of organizations, a regulatory environment and a populace that:
- Values financial planning and its role in the betterment of people’s lives
- Shares responsibility for ensuring the financial planning needs of Canadians are well served
- Has a viable, trusted and respected financial planning profession that provides competent, ethical financial planners for all Canadians in need of professional advice
Financial Planning Week uses the following items as guiding principles for its activities and discussions. By the year 2020, we hope to see that:
- every high school graduate has experienced some introductory financial planning curriculum and thus can make better-informed decisions about their finances, ultimately putting them on the path to a better financial future in later years;
- there is a regulatory environment that provides the support and landscape to encourage the various stakeholders such as industry, employers and individuals to adopt the values and associated behaviors of financial planning.
- industry responsibly promotes financial planning and clearly distinguishes financial planning from product advice
- Canadians understand the distinction between product and financial planning advice and recognize the value and appropriate place for each
- there are a sufficient number of duly licensed financial planners across Canada whom all Canadians who seek professional financial planning advice can count on to help them meet their life goals;
- Canadians see value in financial planning and are incorporating more of it in their lives;