High levels of attrition among new brokers have pushed one industry professional to help those just entering the field establish themselves.
Aaron Christie-David, managing director at Atelier Wealth, said the fact that 50% of new industry brokers fail in their first 18 months was quite alarming.
Discussions with those just starting out as mortgage brokers revealed a number of common themes around why this attrition rate is so high, he told
Australian Broker:
- A feeling of loneliness as a new broker
- A lack of knowledge around credit policy
- Differences between perceptions versus reality
While he understood that in a 100% commission-based model, there would be natural turnover, there still needed to be something done to lower this rate, he said.
One main reason for this high attrition rate was the ease in which someone could become a broker.
“I’ve approached the
MFAA to ask what we’re doing to address people wanting to become a broker. If all it takes is doing a day as a Cert-IV or doing a diploma, that in my eyes is far too easy.”
With brokers planning their clients’ financial future, the wrong loan structure or the wrong advice could have serious ramifications, he said. This means the bar has to be raised when educating those new to industry.
After being mentored by some of the top performing brokers in the industry, Christie-David felt he wanted to do the same and play this forward.
“We should leave the industry in a better place than what we found it. We should be able to help the next generation of brokers who are coming in to succeed.”
This 50% attrition rate did not reflect well on the industry as a whole, he added, as it eroded trust in the community.
“The community doesn’t trust us as much because brokers may not stick around. If we have more successful brokers, this increases our footprint which in turn leads to better trust and credibility.”
To do this, Christie-David is now creating his new mentoring initiative, which could be a simple meeting around coffee or drinks where experienced brokers discuss growing pain challenges with those new to the industry.
“I’m not trying to start a full day conference for new brokers. I don’t think that’s what they need or want. What they want is a small community to go over the challenges they’ve got with someone who’s walked that path before.”
These meetings would ideally be held once a quarter, he said, to give new brokers time to implement any suggestions they were provided with during these meet-and-greet sessions.
The focus for this new community would be aspects such as upskilling or business development since groups like Finance and Coffee already cover scenarios and case studies with members.
Christie-David said anyone who has ideas about how to establish this sort of group or who are already running their own mentor program should get in touch.
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