La Cible - February 2025

While technical competencies are clearly foundational, what we call “soft” skills play a decisive role in a profession like ours. They lend us the ability to communicate effectively, to understand and manage emotions and to build solid and trusting relationships with our clients. These competencies are at the heart of the Competency guide for F.Pl., because they are essential to our professional success and our ability to provide well-rounded service to our clients.

Remember that these skills are not necessarily innate. They can be acquired and honed over time by anyone who is willing to work on them. And it’s well worth the effort! But developing these competencies isn’t easy. It requires sincere – and sometimes uncomfortable – introspection. We have to be ready to look at ourselves in the mirror and honestly assess our strengths and weaknesses. This is a process that takes time, patience and the desire to change.

The first step for improving relational competencies is to seek feedback from our colleagues, mentors and even our clients. These comments can be difficult to hear, especially if they point to aspects of our behaviour we might prefer to pass over. But it is only by being open to this feedback and making the required changes and improvements that we can really advance.

It's also crucial to be ready to step out of our comfort zone. Developing relational competencies often means embracing new behaviours and attitudes, which can be intimidating. This may include developing empathy, improving our active listening skills or learning constructive conflict management techniques.

While working on these skills, it’s important to be authentic and true to our own values. Personal development does not mean changing who we are fundamentally, but, rather, improving the ways we build relationships and interact with others.

These efforts bring us multiple benefits. They don’t just help us become better professionally: they also make us better human beings. When we refine our relational competencies, we become better at understanding and responding to our clients’ needs. This lets us offer more personal service, create stronger bonds and make a tangible difference in the financial and personal lives of our clients.

What is the Institute doing to support you on this journey? First of all, we’re including more and more relational concepts in our courses, for example, in our CAE specialization program. And that’s just the beginning! Over the next year, we plan to provide you with tools to help you carry out your own self-assessment. And we’re going to test new training approaches that will help you develop the skills that are pivotal to the success of every client relationship.

I really want to encourage you to invest time and energy in developing your relationship competencies. The road is not easy, but the destination is worth it! By becoming more empathetic, communicative and understanding financial planners, we’re not only elevating our profession but also contributing to a more connected, more human world.

I am eager to see the progress we will make together and to continue to support you in this personal and professional development journey.

Mélanie Beauvais, FSA, FICA, F.Pl., M. Fisc.
Chair of the Board of Directors of the Institute