A FINANCIAL advisor says he hires for personality rather than whether they are a good salesperson, saying “if they’re boring, no chance”.
Ben Perks has an unusual test when deciding whether a financial adviser is the right fit for his business. Qualifications and experience matter, but he also wants to know whether he would actually enjoy sitting down and having a conversation with them.
In fact, when the Managing Director of Stourbridge-based Orchard Financial Advisers was asked whether he would employ an adviser who was excellent technically but extremely boring, his response was immediate: “No chance.”
It is part of a deliberate attempt by Perks to build a different type of financial advice business – one where personality, humour and enthusiasm sit alongside professionalism, and where advisers build relationships with clients rather than simply processing as much business as possible.
That philosophy can be traced back to Perks’ own career. He studied tourism management at university, although quickly realised it was not the industry for him, before finding his way into financial services through a job processing mortgage applications.
He later worked in student lending, spent time in insolvency following the credit crunch in 2008 and eventually returned to mortgages, working for a small family-run financial firm.
The turning point came when that business was acquired by a much larger organisation. Perks found the corporate environment increasingly frustrating and, when Covid arrived, began thinking seriously about creating a company of his own.
He said: “I really wanted to set up my own thing and create a place where advisers enjoy working. That was the vision.
“I’d experienced working in a much bigger corporate environment and I wanted to cut out the micromanaging and a lot of the corporate stuff that can make the job unenjoyable.
“I wanted somewhere that backs and supports advisers and encourages them to thrive, because I think that ultimately feeds through to better outcomes for clients.”
Orchard began operating under Perks’ current vision in 2021 and has since grown to 13 advisers alongside support staff. The business has also recently expanded into investments and pensions through Orchard Wealth Management, giving it a broader range of financial services.
Orchard describes its approach as injecting “fun and enthusiasm” into financial advice and lists being honest, enthusiastic, approachable, reliable and trustworthy among its central values.
Fun
For Perks, however, making finance more enjoyable does not mean taking it less seriously.
He said: “Financial advice is serious stuff. We take the job very seriously and the outcomes have to be right, but I don’t think that means you’ve got to be boring about it.
“There are two ways of delivering information. We’ve all been in meetings where somebody is reading a document almost word for word and three minutes in you’ve completely switched off.
“We try to be conversational. We use humour and break the ice. You almost become a mate of your clients while you’re holding their hand through the process.
“It’s about being approachable and professional without taking yourself too seriously.”
That approach has a direct impact on recruitment.
Perks is less impressed by an adviser telling him how much business they write than he is by somebody he believes clients will trust and enjoy dealing with.
He said: “You’ve got to have an adviser with a bit of charisma and a bit of humour.
“I’ve had plenty of coffees with advisers where they start the conversation talking about sales, facts and figures, and I’m immediately turned off.
“If somebody starts telling me about themselves and we can have a proper conversation, I’m much more interested. I want people who are personable.
“In my experience, those are often the people who care more about the client. Your turnover from that adviser might sometimes be less, but the trust is higher. You sacrifice some performance for trust and I think you end up with a better adviser.”
Perks also believes personality has become more important as traditional financial advice competes for consumers’ attention with social media.
Orchard has deliberately embraced a lighter approach online. One of Perks’ more memorable posts imagined Prince Harry needing mortgage advice after falling out with his family, while younger members of the team persuaded the company to join a TikTok trend involving staff “trotting” across the office.
The latter proved considerably more successful than one of Perks’ earnest explanations of an interest-rate decision.
Meme
He said: “I remember doing a serious post explaining what was happening with the Bank of England and I think it got one like, which was probably from my mum.
“Then some of the younger advisers did this stupid meme where everyone was trotting across the office for a Bridgerton trend. It got shared and liked thousands of times.
“I thought, there is no rhyme or reason to this. So we made the decision to cut down on the really serious posts and show more of what we’re doing in the community, things we’ve appeared in the news talking about and some of the funny trends.”
Perks believes the financial advice profession also has to think about how it appeals to a younger generation.
At 41, he jokes that he remains one of the “young guys” in an ageing industry. He has also visited schools to talk to pupils about money, credit and borrowing, something he believes is missing from mainstream education.
During one assembly on credit management, rather than starting with financial terminology, he showed pupils the expensive clothes, bags and other products they wanted and explained what could happen if they borrowed to buy everything immediately and then failed to keep up with the repayments.
He said: “The kids are really engaged because they’re not hearing enough of this elsewhere. I’ve had so many mortgage meetings where people have said, ‘Why weren’t we told this at school?’
“For me, financial education is as important as sex education. If you get these decisions wrong when you’re young, they can follow you around for years.”
Ultimately, the same philosophy runs through Perks’ approach to schools, social media, clients and the people he employs: finance may involve serious decisions, but the people explaining them do not have to sound like a textbook.
And when he is sitting across the table from the next prospective Orchard adviser, a sparkling sales record alone is unlikely to seal the deal.
For Perks, being someone clients will actually want to talk to counts for considerably more.
