#390 Christine Bau – Transcript

James Wrigley
Hello, welcome back to the podcast another episode. I’m James Wrigley. And today, I’ve got Christine Bau with me, Christine, thank you for joining me. Thanks for giving up part of your day to have a chat.

Christine Bau
Absolute pleasure not a problem at all. James has to be here.

James Wrigley
Christine, you run your own business called people focused on we’ve worked together in the in the past, which we’ll get into in terms of your like, work history and so forth. But people focused what, what is it that you do for people that haven’t come across you because there’s probably some people listening that you may have worked with, in your business that wants people focused, maybe let’s start there?

Christine Bau
Sure. So people focused is a HR consulting business. And unlike other HR consulting firms, it’s primarily focused on financial planning and accounting firms. So my background is primarily in that space. In fact, virtually my entire career has been in with accounting firms and financial planning firms. So it was really about what the idea for it came about in terms of you had the Royal Commission and there was so much change that happened in financial planning, that I really saw an opportunity to say, I know this, I understand what’s happening in the industry, understand professional year and the impact yet, and so really being able to take those services out to a broader market. Because a lot of people or a lot of businesses, I should say in financial planning, really don’t have a need for a HR person ongoing. But they certainly still have people requirements. And that ability to create a great culture is certainly something that’s front of mind for them. So it’s about being able to offer them a service that they can tap into as they need it, rather than having an ongoing HR person, and at the same time, ensure that they’re getting that expertise, and someone who really does truly understand financial planning.

James Wrigley
So what are some of the things that you’re helping businesses with? I assume you’re well into your work with a range of different businesses, as you mentioned, accounting and financial planning, but what are some of the some of the issues? What like, what are some of the jobs that you’re doing? What is it that you’re working on?

Christine Bau
Yeah, it’s to be honest, it’s really quite varied. So there are certainly some organizations that are still in that infancy phase of really just setting up some really good HR practices, certainly lots of businesses, which is fabulous, are growing at the moment. And they’re really leveraging some of the opportunities that are coming up their way. So they’re increasing the number of clients, they’ve gotten the number of people that they have in the business. So for those organizations, it’s about helping them ensure that they’ve got some really good foundations in place. So the right HR policies, they’ve got clear position descriptions, they’ve got good contracts, all of that really fundamental stuff. And then for a variety of other organizations. There’s anything in everything from creating succession planning frameworks, and how do we actually help people work through the organization? What’s the pathway for them, dealing with other I suppose grievances and issues that do come up and and unfortunately, they’re increasingly coming up. I think in terms of, regrettably, I’ve got two investigations that I’m doing at the moment. And then there’s other things like work cover matters that are coming up, or just staff actually needing some support in terms of how do I have a good conversation or managers? How do I have a good conversation with a staff member? So that something that maybe isn’t quite right is being tackled really early in the piece? So I do a lot of that work with businesses in terms of helping them to have good review discussions, good, informed discussions, and really put things on the table so that you’ve got clarity of expectations.

James Wrigley
Got it and so you’re so prior to starting your own business where were you before and what I’m doing I know the answer but

Christine Bau
everyone else so I was thinking about this the other day actually, we saw I came across for everyone else joined First Financial really in its infancy. I think it just actually started the business and about six weeks later, I moved across from wh kg or Crowe hall with at the time to first financial and that was back in 2014. And I then spent what the next eight years working with First Financial and that was in various capacities, had kids and I set up this business so works anywhere from essentially full time to part time being one day a week towards the end of that. So your pre pre setting up my own business, largely First Financial. And then prior to that it was with some accounting firms. So as I said, w h k co Haworth. I also worked with RSM bird Cameron over I ran their HR team from Western Australia for a period of time because they are a Western Australian based firm. And then prior to that I actually did some stuff in the legal space. So I was an HR manager at the county court and the government solicitor’s office before that, and then, you know, anything pre that probably doesn’t really right, because that’s 20 plus years already of my career.

James Wrigley
So how long were you in Wi Fi for

Christine Bau
three and a half years, actually. So I was worked with RSM for that three and a half year period. Yeah, yeah. In a fabulous place to leave, I have to admit, a bit too far from family

James Wrigley
here. So you’ve been doing what you’re doing for for a while you kind of know what you know what you’re talking about. In terms of like her and recruitment luck, we’ve just had to hire someone new new here. What’s the what’s the general feeling? I guess? Do you have some exposure? I imagine to do but but what’s the general feeling out there? In other businesses? I know a bit of what’s going on within, you know, the walls of First Financial where I am, but general feeling out there in terms of finding good people and retaining good people like what? What’s happening out there?

Christine Bau
Yeah, for sure. Look, I think the reality is everyone, there’s a level of anxiety when you have to recruit, in the sense of ended beach seem to understand your experience, since you’ve recently done it. But you certainly with the clients that I’m working with, at the moment, the pool of talent is quite small. I think everyone, you know, once upon a time, I never really got concerned too much, because I felt like there was always a really strong pool of talent that you could draw from, and that has, regrettably, or unfortunately, I should say, slowly dwindles so that you’re getting good candidates now is just hard. And, you know, whether it’s me or whether I’m talking to some of the other recruiters that I know out in market, that it’s hard to find people full stop, it is even harder, again, to find really good quality people. And then there’s a price that also comes with that now, and I think that price has has certainly increased. You know, I’ve been working on a couple of jobs more recently. And I think, traditionally, probably most of the money was at that advisor level. And so if you’re paying a big fee, there was, you know, it was for the advisor, and they were quite costly. There was a period of time where it seems like a couple of years back paraplanners were incredibly expensive, and you sort of felt like you were paying, and you know, relative to other roles, that you’re paying an increasing or very significant fee for for those services. I think the change has been that now it’s across the board, you can’t even get a client service individual at you know, anything less than I would say 75,000. And I would say if you can find someone who’s got any experience for 75,000, at a CSM level, you’re doing incredibly well, you know, you’re probably looking more at something like that 85 ish, kind of mark for a pack of good, good CSM nowadays, including super, you know, even upwards of that in some instances. So I think the the sentiment is, it’s hard to find talent. It’s hard to and when you do find talent, it’s expensive. Yeah, I think that, yeah, that game has changed quite significantly, in terms of, you know, employers don’t necessarily hold all the cards anymore, if that makes sense. And

James Wrigley
do you have any sense that you’re in Melbourne? As a mybe? Do you have any sense? If that’s any different anywhere else around the country? Like if these, you know, the salaries that for various levels of Client Services associated whatever it might be? If they’re any different anywhere else, or is it old, seemingly expensive?

Christine Bau
I would suggest that seemingly expensive to be honest, if you’re in it a capital city, the salaries don’t tend they vary a little bit. But by and large, they don’t vary that significantly. And, you know, the issue is exactly the same at the end of the day, that businesses that have really good reputations, culturally, are the ones that find it the easiest to recruit And if you don’t have that reputation in market, then, you know, you’re, you’re probably going to find it challenging. To some degree, I’ve got a couple of businesses that I work with. And one in particular, we had to recruit three clients ever since. And I got told that I was like, you serious, it’s gonna be hard enough to find one, let alone three. But this business’s reputation in market was just so strong, I actually did find three. And we didn’t compromise on the quality either to get three of them. We didn’t pay overs, and we didn’t pay unders or that those individuals either, and we were quite reasonable, but appropriate for the salary in the market that they were in. But yeah, again, I think, to come back to your original question, I don’t think it’s much different in other states, I think across the country, it’s hard. I do think if you’ve got a good reputation as a good, you know, supporter of staff that obviously serves you well, but it’s, by and large, it’s just hard.

James Wrigley
So it starts off really well published that there’s there’s a whole lot less financial advisors in in Australia than what they once was education standards, you know, adviser examiner, all the rest of it. There’s a whole range of reasons why that that’s well published. But do you think that it’s so hard to get people at other levels within a financial planning business as well? Do you think there’s just less people around in general? Like, I haven’t gone looking for it. But is there anything published on like, other lists, client service people? Are there less people coming out of university going into financial planning? Do you have any idea about that?

Christine Bau
Well, I think I mean, part of the challenge is that to, to go into financial planning nowadays, there are only literally, you know, half a dozen places that you can go to to get a financial planning qualification, without going and doing a grad dip. You know, some states, there’s actually not even a clear university that’s offering the, the course so to speak. So if you think about Melbourne, for example, there’s essentially three universities that are providing a course, in relation. So Swinburne, Deakin, and RMIT. Also all have financial planning courses that are approved courses. Other than that, if you do something else, you you’re looking at getting, you know, go do the grad dip through a provider, or you could get another qualification and then go do the grad dip, etc. So I think that in itself, obviously reduces it. I think that there’s just to go back to your question, though, there’s a perception that people in the end, there’s it had, I put it expectation that you’re sort of gonna go down that pathway of advisory, I think what we’re seeing is a lot fewer people that are coming particularly into those support roles, just for the sake of being in a support position. Everyone has this aspiration to ultimately go into advice. And somewhere in there, it seems as though and once upon a time, there are lots of people that you just pick up, and they’ve got nothing but pure admin experience. And that’s okay. And we’ll put them in and they’ll stay there for an incredibly long time. And it seems like that that group of people has dissipated in terms of this, just this perception that unless you’re going to become an advisor, you really don’t go into that space. Yeah, as easily anymore.

James Wrigley
Yeah. Because we used to never think back from years ago, the SW educator, so it was, there’s various peoples that are various people rather than have been part of the business that as long as I’ve known that have been in a client services type roles or associated visor type roles, and you try your best to support them to be the best that they can in that particular role, because they didn’t want to become an advisor, and that’s fine. But yeah, maybe there is just less of those people around that. Yeah, people are getting into financial advice, because they want to be a financial advisor. Not because they want to work in paraplanning, full time mother want to work in some other facet of the industry full time.

Christine Bau
Yeah. And I think we’ve just got to get better at you know, publicizing, I’m not sure that everyone getting potentially lots of the the listeners always set out to be financial advisors, but maybe not everyone even appreciates that that’s an opportunity that they can pursue. And when you think about regrettably, or unfortunately, I should say it the publicity that financial advice had in the last couple of years, it that potentially may have tainted some people’s perception of do actually want to go down that avenue. So, you know, I think that there’s an awkward chindi at an industry level to help sort of build that up, but I do, and I think you need to, that needs to potentially be tackled in everything from high school onwards so that you’re getting more people considering the idea of going into that industry or whether it’s, you know, as a financial advisor, or even as a support person. This is an opportunity to really rebuild their the reputation, but also just help people understand what financial planning is, and the opportunities that exist in it. Because the reality is, you know, there’s some amazing opportunities there. There’s certainly no shortage of work for anyone interested with with skill capability. Yeah, yeah.

James Wrigley
And so the the professional year, that’s, I don’t know, how do you might know, off the top of your head, how long are we into having this thing called the professional UI? We’ve got some people here at first one, just coming out the other end of that, and I suspect they probably started writing right in the beginning. But do you have any idea how long we were into the provisional year actually include a

Christine Bau
good couple of years now. So here we are. It’s 2023. And it actually started quite a while back, like people could start back in 2019. Believe it or not, I actually gave a presentation in FPA conference on this back in 2019, pre COVID. The challenge is that in that first 18 months, I think there was something across the country like 30, people don’t quote me on that figure, but it was quite low. Very low numbers of people participating in the py year in that first year or two, everyone and understandably, was very much focused around the idea of just getting their existing advisors, authorized in the sense of getting them through the exams and doing the extra unit so that they could retain that AR status. So I think there was quite a lot of emphasis and focus in that space versus py is tomorrow’s problem. So it’s been there for a little bit. The reality is an hour with hitting, those numbers have very significantly increased in terms of virtually every firm I talked to and work with has at least one person undertaking professional. Yeah. And I think, you know, we’re starting to see certainly some of my clients. There’s some interesting ramifications coming with py in the sense of expectations, and clarifying expectations, I think,

James Wrigley
Adam, in what love have expectations of this person that’s done the provincial year at the end, like what’s expected, and what’s expected on going through the, the, I

Christine Bau
think it’s more that piece around. And the conversations I’m having, at least is, is around people going through py. And then because they are qualified as an advisor now, expecting that there’ll be given this lovely little book occurrence. And they can become a fully fledged because they are a fully fledged advisor on paper that, you know, now that they can practice as an advisor. So they will be given the opportunity to practice in its entirety. And so it’s a really interesting set of discussions that I’m having at the moment, because in some situations, that’s completely viable. In other situations, you know, you’ve got people that have done a university degree, and then they’ve joined a business and the business has put them through their P y, but they’re still only, you know, 2425. Do you give a 2425 year old Holbrook clients that an idea have capacity to give that to them? And are they going to be able to really support that book of clients? In the sense of do they had the skills to have the difficult conversations, not so much that the technical ability, but that ability to foster rapport and a trusted relationship and potentially be able to have challenging conversations with a client? I think that’s there some of the challenges that I’m working through with some of my clients because you’ve got this group of people that are qualified, but that doesn’t automatically make them a great advisor. So it makes sense. Yeah,

James Wrigley
I understand exactly.

Christine Bau
I don’t know if your ex because I know First Financial has been putting some people through py year if that’s a shared experience, from your perspective, that

James Wrigley
it absolutely is we’ve got this and it can do quite well. The numbers are maybe six Some people or seven might even be more that are in various stages of going through professional year like this one or two of them that will finish any day now and, and Julian, who works directly alongside me started his back at the beginning of Feb. So we’ve got some right at the very start some right at the very end and, and some partway through. But yeah, it’s a it’s a way we’re trying to deal with that internally now to say, Okay, well, now you fast forward 12 or 18 months, this half a dozen people that that are qualified to be financial advisors? Do we have a need for half a dozen financial advisors? It’s no, you know, if you if you go down this route of trying to give him clot trying to hand over clients to, to these to these new advisors. Now, there’s not not enough of them to go around, actually working with other things. So you know, everyone’s having to what we’re doing internally here is whoever that that person that’s going through the professional year works directly with, they’re having to come up with business plans to say, Okay, well, James, and Julian, who works directly with me is like, Oh, what about what are our plans for Julian, when he finishes? Is he going to be a fully fledged adviser? Or is he going to be half associate half advisor? What support are we trying to provide to them in terms of taking and giving them clients maybe to start off and to continue to practice until and to learn and to grow? Versus what support are within offering to them, so that they can kind of go out and build their own networks and try and find their own clients? Yeah, so I ran a session internally with the people in my team a few weeks back on this kind of one of the main questions that we’d sit down, like, who actually knows you exist, is great, you know, you’re a, you’re an advisor here, but for someone to want to come and sit in front of you, and speak to you and, and become a client of you in the firm that you work for that to know you exist in the first place. So write down on the piece of paper who knows you exist? And then how do we find more people that will know you exists? Yeah, I can appreciate the challenge that, that everyone’s going through?

Christine Bau
And I think that’s a great question. Because I think, interestingly, that’s probably always been one of the challenges the businesses that I work with, there’s no shortage of people who want to be advisors. And you, there’s certainly no shit talent, shortage of, of clients, for a lot of businesses. So being able to hand over clients that new advisors can take on, to some extent, you can do that. Helping those individuals also become great business development advisors, and being able to generate their own leads and really foster their own networks is an probably been a challenge for virtually every single business I’ve worked with, since I even started this organized in my consulting firm. And pre that it’s probably one of the biggest challenges. Most organizations have said, you know, how do you help individuals to become great, you know, business development, right? It’s their generating as well as servicing and help it py, you doesn’t necessarily do that. It just helps you to be able to see strategy from beginning to end, so to speak. So helping them and giving them some project work that’s going to allow them to do that, I think is a great way to support their continued development, whilst making sure that they feel that I think growing because that’s, I think, part of the challenge, isn’t it always, I always say to my clients, HR, ultimately, and people management ultimately is about two things, showing the staff that you work with, that you care about them, and being able to support their growth and development. And I genuinely believe that, for the most part, not every scenario, but for the most part, if a manager can do that, if a business leader can show that they care and create that pathway that supports development and growth, that young people will stay with you. And this is where your money is important. Absolutely. But at the same time, that’s usually not the differentiator, people will stay with someone that feels has their back. Even if they’re not paid as much as they could get in market. If they feel like someone that they’re working with cares about them and is supportive of their development. Genuinely they stay. People will run really quickly from a high salary. If they don’t feel they’re getting those things. Yeah,

James Wrigley
that’s what I was gonna I was gonna ask you. Next slide. You’ve mentioned before about the kind of the cultural reputation you know, you’re talking about a client that you’re working with and you managed to find three client service managers. What are the what means that the good businesses are doing around culture and reputation in market like I sit here and had had his first financial have a reputation out in the market. Now, I assume we do. But how does that even come about? And what are the what are the good businesses doing to, to foster that? So which I imagine retains good, it not only retains good people, but you can attract good people? Is there anything in AMI experience anything you can share in that?

Christine Bau
Yeah, you know, and we’ll talk about the fact that culture is really hard to define in terms of its what’s unsaid, as much as it is what is said, in an organization. I think you certainly have a brand. And I know, I remember when I first spoke to businesses about some of these, you know, online forums and chat rooms that former employees post on and, and I remember, in some businesses being absolutely surprised that they existed, but really challenging. The idea that, well, let’s just were disgruntled employees go to, that might be the case. But that is part of what’s building your reputation and brand and market in terms of, quite literally, I know my little sister, for example, is 10 years younger than myself. Remember, when she went for a job a couple of years back, the first thing she did was to get onto one of those forums and see what the ratings were for this organization and what other people were saying about it, one of them,

James Wrigley
like Reddit or something like Whirlpool,

Christine Bau
yeah, like Whirlpool, and those sorts of things, you get onto them, and they’ll, they might be disgruntled, but they’ll also be typically some really positive feedback. And if, you know, there’s lots of just disgruntled feedback that does impact equally people know one another, you know, you and I both know, you know, financial planning is a relatively small world true. So people do talk to one another. So that’s, I suppose, what starts to build your brand. In terms of what, you know, what cultivates great culture, the reality is, it’s leadership, and it’s that leadership at the top, you know, all the businesses that I would suggest are incredibly strong, it’s because their managers care, but it’s because the leadership cares. And the leadership models the right behavior, you know, this particular organization, for example, the nd now, it is not going to be feasible in every organization, this MD had about 25 staff, he made a point of essentially, every two months, he would have breakfast, or lunch or coffee, with every employee in that business. So, you know, two, three times a week, he was actually doing something with a staff member, and they had half an hour to 45 minutes of his undivided attention, just to either shoot the Braves, or talk about whatever problem they had. Now, that’s not going to be viable in every organization. But it’s that care factor, it’s that ability to say, you know, changing from saying, this is an economic exchange, where I pay you to do a job for me to actually making it an emotional exchange, where it’s about, I actually, you know, yes, I do pay you. But I’m interested in understanding if what you’re doing engages you and if it’s not, how do I support you, you know, what do you want? In terms of how do you develop? How do you grow? How do we leverage strengths in this business, rather than just say, here’s a widget. Now you have to move it from here to here to here. And I’m paying you to do it. So you stop challenging? Which hysterical historically sorry, is possibly what we did do you know, I pay you do a job, Christine, just do it. That’s, you’re not going to get the greatest stuff these days. If that’s your mentality, you don’t have to give them everything they want. You absolutely have to listen. And you have to look to find ways that you can take on board some of what they’re saying and engage with them.

James Wrigley
Is there anything we can learn from businesses that maybe you haven’t done so well? And so you could just give them a great example of the type of business that is, but yeah, but is there anything that we can learn from the CNA, you look back and say that probably wasn’t a great way to handle it under the handle situation or something? I don’t know. Is there anything good from the bad side look and learn from?

Christine Bau
Look, I think, yeah, and I’m, I will acknowledge them. I’m the HR person so I’m going to look at everything from a quite a critical lens. If you don’t do it, well, it can. It can be bad Add outcome in the sense of we just lose that person, right through to a terrible outcome of they actually, you know, sue you, essentially, now I’ve got one matter at the moment, and I got involved in it quite late. In fact, it already started. And so I was engaged because someone had initially lodged a WorkCover claim for stress. And so that’s when they’ve called me in. The reality is, you know, that went through a process, it’s now in a, it’s we’re into year three, have a process around a WorkCover claim person has essentially now seeking permanent disability. So they’ve had time off, they’ve got all of this cash, and now they’re seeking something in and it’s gone to a lawyer, or it’s currently in front of lawyers. It is so time consuming, so stressful for the relevant parties. It is absolutely taking them away from their day job. So, you know, I think and even at the moment, I’m doing two investigations. I think the reality is, if it goes wrong, can end under estimate the impact of your or lack of care. And if it goes wrong, it can go terribly wrong, unfortunately. So yeah. And it’s, there’s increasing, I know, I’ve said these two before, there’s a fair reason, increasing number of avenues available to staff, you’ve got new six legislation, in terms of respect at work laws that have just come into play, is a positive duty that now is imposed on employers. And it’s not just about reacting when a claim gets made. But it’s being able to clearly demonstrate that from the outset, you’re doing absolutely everything you can to ensure the mental and physical well being and we start off. So there’s this increasing responsibility, and there’s an it’s $76.20, or something to that effect, to lodge a claim, if you want to, you know, challenge your employer. So it’s not expensive. If you don’t, if you go down a bit general protections, Avenue, the onus of proof is on the business, it’s not on the individual, I just have to make the claim. And you know, and you have to demonstrate that what I’m saying is wrong. So, to your point, if if you’re not creating a good culture, if you’re not being supportive and caring, someone may challenge you on their heads. And it can have incredible repercussions on your business, not just in terms of losing quit staff, but also, you know, what does that do to the perception of everyone else in the business to your brand in market, let alone financially timewise stress wise, on all of those senior leaders, and I have seen it happen on multiple occasions.

James Wrigley
That’s scary. That’s really scary. Yeah. I don’t know what to say to follow up that.

Christine Bau
Really not that dismal?

James Wrigley
No, we shouldn’t we should have had the finish on the brighter note rather than rather than the South.

Christine Bau
Positive is that that’s that’s not every business. In fact, the reality is, most businesses are not in that. But I think, you know, I was more taking in terms of you need to care because the the ramifications can be be significant. I think the reality is most businesses understand that people are incredibly important. I mean, that’s what financial planning is. They’re people businesses. Yeah. So getting great talent is, is really critical. And there’s absolutely some great talent coming through in organizations and some great opportunities for businesses. So that’s the you know, there’s real positives there. Absolutely.

James Wrigley
All right, we might, we might wrap it up there. Thank you. Thank you for your input for for anyone that wants to catch up with you or reach out to you. Where can people find you if they if they want to pick your brain? Where can people find you?

Christine Bau
Yeah, absolutely. So LinkedIn is probably one of the easiest and best options because that’s got all my details. So you know, Christine Bau, but LinkedIn is certainly the best way to be able to do that. Or you can always email me at Christine at people focus.com dot au

James Wrigley
We’ll put some some of those details in the show notes or Kieran who does the production will for me. Thanks for staying good to catch up with you.

Christine Bau
Pleasure. Thank you so much for having me on

James Wrigley
Thanks Christine