What do you do after Personal Banking?
If you like what you are doing as a Personal Banker, the next career move could be a Priority Banker. If you want to learn more and is interested about loans, equities, bonds, FX or insurance, you can be a product specialist such as an Investment Advisor, Treasury Advisor, Insurance Specialist or Loan Specialist.
Or maybe you want to explore other areas such as management, service support or into Private Banking. How about out of banking?
There are so many options to choose from. It is no wonder many Personal Bankers left the banking industry, unaware of their career options.
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Here, we look at 5 career options for Personal Bankers:
No. 1 Become a Priority Banker
The most popular, direct and related career option is to be a Priority Banker.
Other than a base salary increase (with a possible decline in commission during the initial period), you will be managing a portfolio of clients numbering about 50 to 300. This will be dependent on the bank’s profile. Banks that are new or growing will need you to spend more time on acquiring new clients while banks with a larger client base may provide you with existing clients.
You will be providing dedicated advisory to the portfolio of clients, who have at least $200,000 in the bank.
About Priority Banking
Priority Banking provides banking, financial & wealth management services to affluent clients. Affluent clients are generally defined as having at least $200,000 or $350,000 assets under management (AUM) in the bank. Wealth Managers are mostly based in priority banking centers or selected branches. Priority Bankers offer banking, financial & wealth management advisory to a portfolio of selected clients.
Is there any other options in Retail Banking?
No. 2 Become a Product Specialist
Yes. After gathering considerable amount of experience in banking and wealth management, you can choose to become a product specialist.
You will team with up with Bankers and work with clients to provide wealth management solutions. Roles such as Investment Advisor, Treasury Advisor, Insurance Specialist or Loan Specialist are popular career options. These are front-office roles where you get to meet clients and work with people from all walks of life.
If you prefer to understand how products are created and marketed, you can be a product specialist in the middle office. This will be a career function away from client-facing role. You can choose to specialise in deposits, loans, unit trust, insurance, structured products and treasury. Since only a few people need to be involved in this area of development, there is less demand for the number of product specialists,, making it harder to get the preferred roles.
No. 3 Other Career Options in Banking
Since a Personal Banker is trained in multi-facets of banking, the career options in banking are diverse. A Personal Banker can move into leadership roles such as Sales Manager or Branch Manager. Opportunities to stay close to Wealth Management in service roles includes Customer Service Manager and Service Relationship Manager where they support Banking & Wealth Management services to their team and customers.
Other options include moving into Private Banking as Assistant Private Bankers, Investment Support, Operations, Administration and Compliance are also possible career moves.
- List of Regional Private Banks in Singapore
- List of International Private Banks in Singapore
- List of Boutique Private Banks in Singapore
Other than retail banking functions, Personal Bankers can also move into Credit Cards, Payment & Transactions, Operations, Human Resource, Marketing.
There are also non-retail banking functions such as Corporate Banking, Institutional Banking, Treasury and Capital Markets.
No. 4 Financial Industry
Wealth Management career is not just limited to banking. Major service providers of Wealth Management includes Fund Management, Asset Management, Insurance Companies, Custodians, Information Service Providers, Technology & Software Co., Tax, Trust and Legal Services.
No. 5 Non-Bank Advisory
Non-Bank Advisory is another great career option for Wealth Managers in Asia. Traditionally, only Independent Financial Advisory Firms and Family Offices provide Wealth Management services. Insurance Companies and Stockbroking Firms recognise the new trends and have modified their business propositions to include holistic Wealth Management solutions.
A List of Non-Bank Advisory Firms:
- Independent Financial Advisory Firms
- Family Offices
- Insurance Co.
- Stock Broking Firms
No. 6 Continue as a Personal Banker
You can continue as a Personal Banker. Being able to meet thousands of new people & clients every year is a blessing to those who love interaction, customer service or front-line jobs. You will be able to continue providing financial and wealth management solutions to more people, and to those who are less equipped to deal with their personal finances.
Though this option is less available as Wealth Management in Asia is still in early development. The career in banks are structured for growth in assets and sales due to high wealth growth rate in Asia.
This may affect Personal Bankers to sustain their career in situation of:
- Economic downturn
- Financial Market Rout
- Product Failures
- Bad sales or revenue period
- Marriage, Birth
- Illness
- Personal Problems
- Bad sales or revenue period
But in Europe and United States where Wealth Management development mature, Personal Banker & Financial Advisor can be a lifelong career in banking.
Example of Financial Advisors Career in Retail Banking in United States and Europe:
- Wells Fargo Financial Advisors
- Chase Financial Advisors
- Morgan Stanley Financial Advisors
- Bank of America Financial Advisor
- UBS Client Advisor
- Credit Suisse Client Advisor
In Summary:
Personal Bankers can move into a vast variety of roles. Their financial literacy, banking know-how, network, ability to interact with diverse group of people, explain abstract and sometimes boring products, provide them with career opportunities in many industries and help them to build up life-long skills.
The Career Options:
- Priority Banker
- Product Specialist
- Other Career Options in Banking
- Financial Industry
- Non-Bank Advisory
- Continue as a Personal Banker
Recommended Articles
- 8 Reasons why customers don’t understand the value of Wealth Managers
- 8 Reasons why building a Portfolio is Tough in Asia
- 7 Secrets how the Old Rich Achieve Success with Wealth Managers
All Personal Banker Articles
- What is a Personal Banker?
- How do you become a Personal Banker?
- Why more than 50% of Personal Banker quit in 9 months?
- How do you survive as a Personal Banker?
- 14 Questions Personal Bankers get Daily
- How do you succeed as a Personal Banker? Part 1
- How do you Succeed as a Personal Banker? Part 2
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