Achievement Awards Announced at the 2013 Insiders Forum Conference and Leadership Forum
Dallas, Texas - The first annual Insider's Forum conference attracted more than its share of industry leaders. But two of its more prominent attendees received special recognition for their contributions to the financial planning/investment advisory profession.
Tim Kochis, of Kochis Global, was given the inaugural Insider's Forum Leadership Award, recognizing more than 40 years of outstanding service to the profession in a leadership role. He received the award from Bob Veres and Jean Sinclair, co-producers of the Insider's Forum conference, who cited his continuing commitment to moving the profession forward during its still formative stages. "I've often said that Tim Kochis has the best resume in the financial services profession," said Veres. "In my 30-year writing career, it seemed like every time I turned around, I was writing about the next interesting stage of his career, which more often than not would lead to a new evolutionary stage of the profession." He is a past recipient of the Charles Schwab IMPACT Award (2006) and the FPA’s P. Kemp Fain Award (2010).
Mr. Kochis, former CEO and Chairman of Aspiriant, and founder of Kochis Fitz (one of Aspiriant's predecessor firms), pioneered financial planning in the banking industry as Director of Financial Planning for Bank of America (1981-1985), and later helped bring financial planning into the accounting profession as National Director of Personal Financial Planning for Deloitte & Touche (1985-1991). In addition, he was a co-founder of the Personal Financial Planning Program at University of California-Berkeley, one of the first accredited financial planning programs in the United States, where he taught for eighteen years, and whose Business School Extension has created an annual award for teaching excellence in his name.
Mr. Kochis currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Financial Planning Standards Board, the international certification authority for the CFP credential, having previously served on its Board at its founding in 2004 and as its Chair in 2005. Prior to that, he served as chair of the International CFP® (Certified Financial Planner) Council, as President of the Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards, and as Chair of the Board of Examiners of the CFP Board. In 2004, he Chaired the Foundation for Financial Planning.
Mr. Kochis co-authored the book , Wealth Management, (now in its second edition, 2006) and authored Managing Concentrated Stock Wealth: An Adviser's Guide to Building Customized Solutions (June 2005). www.wiley.com. He is currently serving on the Boards of the University of San Francisco, the Asian Art Museum, The Asia Foundation, and the YMCA of San Francisco.
At the annual Leadership Forum dinner event, Richard ("Richie") Lee was given the Inside Information Iconoclast Award, recognizing his ability and willingness to consistently think outside the box and move the profession in creative new directions. "I'm not sure anybody has been willing to endure the business risk of moving away from the herd as consistently as Richie Lee," said Bob Veres, who convened the annual Leadership Forum as a way to help the profession think through its next set of challenges. "Over and over again, he was the first to point out the next direction in the financial services world, whether it was with compensation models and reduced conflicts of interest, or moving the attention from a client's assets back to the client him/herself, to his unique investment style."
Mr. Lee is the CEO of Lee Financial Corporation, which he founded in 1975 as one of the first fee-only financial advisory firms in the country, giving up commission revenue long before the AUM revenue model became popular in the profession. He was a co-founder of the National Association of Personal Financial Advisors, helping the profession evolve a business model that stood in contrast to the product-driven industry structure prevalent in the 1980s.
More recently, Mr. Lee has advocated the need for a multidisciplinary approach to solving clients' problems. This broader context involved integrating financial and business planning as a well as a goal-based structure focused on an array of specific client objectives. In addition, Mr. Lee helped pioneer a new level of investment diversification using what are now commonly referred to as "alternative investments". Today, Lee Financial remains a leader in diversifying clients' portfolios with alternative investments.
Mr. Lee is an active member of the CFA Institute, the Financial Planning Association
(FPA) and is a charter member of the National Association of Personal Financial
Advisors.
About the Insider's Forum: Bob Veres' Insider's Forum ( www.insidersforum.com ) is an annual conference that brings together the leaders of the financial planning/financial services profession and strives to create the most in-depth, sophisticated educational program in the profession in the areas of practice management and investment planning. Each year, it attracts a multi-cultural array of sophisticated advisors from the CFP, CPA/PFS, NAPFA and FPA communities. This year's event, at the Hilton Anatole hotel in Dallas, September 17-19, featured three tracks, one devoted to CEOs at advisory firms, another track with sessions geared toward CIO investment professionals, and a third operations track for COOs and key operations personnel. More than 275 advisors were in attendance, along with approximately 75 non-advisor speakers and sponsoring firm representatives who were invited to participate in the conference's unique by-invitation-only exhibit hall environment.
For more information, contact:
Bob Veres
