By: Adrian Khiat Financial Planning is not a rocket science or something very complicated. Many people thought they know everything about their finance but when the pieces are not properly glued together, they somehow will still be confused. Our responsibility as Financial Planners are to help glue all these pieces together by encouraging them to go through the process of Financial Planning. Once the blue-print are drawn and foundation laid out, they will have a structured plan towards their financial goals. They will no longer think that Financial Planning is only about how much they spend on insurance monthly and Financial Planners as someone who are just trying to sell them an insurance plan. Financial Planning can be a tedious process for both the client and the planner and hence resulting in many "Financial Planners" choosing not to plan for their clients. 20% of their time is probably introducing a quick concepts and 80% of the time are on how to close the deal. (All in 1 day!!!) The interesting part is that they are able to derive a recommended insurance coverage without understanding their existing insurance, net worth and cashflow. They are able to derive the amount to save solely based on client's declared budget without understanding their short, mid and long term goals and how the budget are derived. Today, I like to share the standard 6-steps Financial Planning approach. Though I may not be able to express better than a textbook written by professors or academics, I'll try my best to explain in my own words which I feel its easier to understand. Read more...