Fittingly, as the sun sets on daylight saving time for another year, and autumnal weather comes to Melbourne, I find myself penning my last column as FCVic Executive Officer. I have loved my time in the role and feel privileged to have worked for and represented financial counsellors in Victoria, but well over 5 years in a role like this is a substantial period beyond which burnout and overstaying loom as risks. I am moving into a new role as CEO of a disability advocacy organisation in central Victoria and will be keen to forge stronger links between the disability and consumer rights advocacy sectors in my new role. [If you think that is a fancy way of saying I want to stay in touch with the financial counselling sector, there may be some truth in that].
One of the side benefits of writing a column in these circumstances is it provides an opportunity to reflect on the financial counselling profession, the sector’s challenges and where I hope it can go. What follows is what I have learned starting pretty much from a zero baseline in 2017 (and yes, I understand well where those who are ignorant of financial counselling are coming from – that was me not so long ago).
The Financial Counselling Profession
Although I occasionally hear some people question financial counselling’s claim to be a profession because the qualification is ‘only a diploma’, it is important to realise that full accreditation as a financial counsellor requires 2 years of practice on top of the diploma. Financial counselling is very much a practice profession. This is linked to the high level of skills and sensitivity required in using an empowerment model to work with clients who are almost always stigmatised and vulnerable. However, these skills must be used alongside an agile and robust grasp of a lot of rapidly evolving technical, legal, and regulatory issues, plus advocacy and negotiating skills. The full combination of skills and aptitudes required of financial counsellors is unlike any other and fully worthy of recognition as a profession. Moreover, given the complex power sensitivities involved in working with vulnerable people as clients, professionalism with a strong set of ethics and practice norms is essential to protect clients from harm.
Financial counselling has developed significantly as a profession in Victoria over the last 15 years, as well as more widely around Australia. In Victoria we have established robust systems to audit and support members in meeting annual professional requirements for continuing professional development and professional supervision. This includes accrediting and maintaining CPD requirements for professional supervisors; developing a specific graduate program of CPD for new diploma graduates; adopting scope of practice documentation and starting to consider steps to formalise specialisations in gambling, family violence and small business financial counselling. We have also developed key membership structures designed to provide peer support on practice and advocacy issues.
I also need to acknowledge that Rural Financial Counsellors are a professional part of our sector and our membership, but with a different history and working with a different kind of practice profile and specialist expertise, reflecting as they should the needs of a specific client cohort connected to primary production. A good professionalism model needs to accommodate and recognise these types of differences and variations. Financial capability workers are also important and part of our membership but are set up or structured as a profession.
Challenges
Currently, reflecting its history, financial counselling is a small niche profession. Few people in the community, and few professionals in the kinds of work which should be connected to it, know it exists. Yet, at the same time, the last 30 years of economic reform and social and technological change have brought us to a point where financial counselling is relevant to well over 20% of the population, and that proportion is growing fast. Why is that? In broad terms we can point to high and growing levels of poverty, inequality, and financial disadvantage. Digging deeper for causes, we can point to the growth in predatory lending, exploitative contracts, scams and gambling; also, we can point to family violence, energy debt and to declines in mental health; lastly, we can point to many people having poor levels of understanding how to function safely around financial issues in a world full of traps and landmines designed to take money and capacity from the poorest.
There is a hopeless mismatch between a sector with fewer than 300 practitioners in Victoria as at March 2023, and that level of community need. There is also a long road in front of us to grow the sector at a sustainable rate and integrate it properly into all the service systems it is currently only on the edge of.
Even with low levels of awareness of financial counselling, at a practical level, right now many agencies are reporting wait lists of 3 months or are closing their books to new clients. This level of demand puts significant stressors onto this small community of practitioners; a key stressor is the way this situation denies them opportunities to do more than crisis case management, with no chance for preventive or early intervention work. There are many ways in which such a tiny sector can be at risk of falling over under the combined weight of unmet demand and being too small to care about.
Where to?
From my first interactions when I began as Executive Officer I was struck by the genuine affection and goodwill towards financial counsellors across an array of places that had some awareness of them. Our struggles – for recognition, awareness and to build capacity and develop professionalism – have been more against inertia than anything else. We also have a respected voice when it comes to advocacy for such a small sector.
These are not small things to build from; they are very significant. If we can build capacity and broaden and diversify the employment of financial counsellors across service sectors, we can begin to meet some of these challenges.
And lastly…
I want to acknowledge the support I have received in this role from past and present Board members, with particular thanks to the amazing Board Chairs I have worked with – Julie Barrow, Colin Harte, and Carly Baker (plus a special mention for David Balcombe who has provided enormous support as Treasurer over the last 3 years). I also want to acknowledge past staff members Anna Lienhop, Donna Letchford, Renee Ploegmakers, Lyn Dundon, Annette Lumsden, Helen Brady and Joy Mason, and current staff – our amazing team (in first name alphabetical order): Annette Devereaux, Bella Walker, Georgia Robenstone, James Degenhardt, Julia Monsbourgh, Julie Barrow (again), Julie Watson, Mel Keenan, Ron Rowley, Shweta Pathak, Sooz Boag, Suzy Goldsmith, Tanja Haeusler, Tracey Blythe, Vicki Burke.
If I start listing all the wonderful financial counsellors who have taught me so much, and give so much back to their peers and the profession, this piece already overlong, might get a bit too much, but thank you to all.
With best wishes,
Sandy