CFP Board - The Financial Planning Competency Handbook

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Copyright 2013 by Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards, Inc. All rights reserved.

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.
Published simultaneously in Canada.

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The financial planning competency handbook / The CFP Board.
pages cm. (Wiley finance series)
Includes index.
ISBN 978-1-118-56086-0 (cloth); 978-1-118-67758-2 (ebk);
978-1-118-67785-8 (ebk); 978-1-118-67763-6 (ebk)
1. Financial planners. 2. Investment advisors. 3. Finance, Personal. 4. Financial planning industry. I. Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards.
HG179.5.F5663 2013
332.024dc23

2013006530

Acknowledgments

A work of this magnitude could not come to fruition without the commitment of a large number of dedicated, accomplished individuals. First, I want to thank the 22 contributors and reviewers who shared their scholarship and practice experience for this book. I am grateful for their generosity and collaboration throughout this immense project. I suspect that as you read each chapter, you will witness the dedication of these individuals to both this book as well as the profession as a whole. I want to thank them for allowing me to pester them incessantly regarding deadlines, revisions, and content. They are a respected group of teachers, researchers, and practitioners, and I am lucky to have had the pleasure to work with them throughout this important project.

Thank you to Laura Walsh and all of my friends at John Wiley & Sons for their help throughout this process. I went to the New York area with an idea for something totally new, and the people at Wiley listened, nurtured, and supported the construction of this work from beginning to end.

I would like to thank the board of directors at CFP Board for their unwavering commitment to this project. I also would like to thank the CFP Board Education and Examinations staff for their years of hard work in helping develop the certification requirements that help serve as the basis for this book. I am grateful to the Professional Standards, Marketing, and Public Relations departments for their generosity in supporting several key components of this project. Also, thank you to Meghan McConaughey and Mychal Cohen for their assistance in providing some vital support to this immense, yearlong endeavor.

I am grateful to Kevin Keller, CEO of CFP Board, and Michele Warholic, CFP Board Managing DirectorExamination, Education, and Talent, for their support and encouragement throughout each stage of the development of this book. CFP Board is a place that cultivates both innovation and creativity for an important, common purpose, and I hope The Financial Planning Handbook is representative of that special environment.

In the end, I take responsibility for this seminal work that I hope will contribute to a profession that not only continues to grow in size and stature, but is one that all of us, whether in our first day or in our 30th year, can be very proud.

Charles R. Chaffin, EdD

About the Book

CFP Board is pleased to develop this seminal work that outlines the knowledge, actions, and contexts associated with financial planning. This book represents the advancement in the profession by practitioners, educators, and researchers in moving toward a universal body of knowledge for the discipline as a whole. This publication is not meant to replace any existing textbook or provide any specific examination preparation, but rather to further the theoretical knowledge base of our growing discipline.

This book serves the entire financial planning profession, including students, faculty, researchers, and practitioners in financial planning and related professions. The book was designed to treat theory and practice not as binary functions, but as one entity, where content was defined but also applied, both within the learning environment and in practice. Part One outlines the 78 topics required to meet the CFP Board Education requirement. Each topic is defined specifically with regard to financial planning and presented in the form of student-centered Learning Objectives . These objectives indicate what the student should be able to do relative to a given concept. The In Class section illustrates ways to facilitate higher-order cognitive thinking relative to each topic in both the traditional classroom as well as the online learning environment. Professional Practice Capabilities outline what practitioners should be able to do relative to three distinct career stages. Vignettes in each chapter, In Practice , illustrate how each particular concept is applied and/or exists in practice. Part Two outlines the domains that are part of the CFP Board Examination requirement. This section defines each of the domains and presents the associated Techniques for completing the domains as well as how they occur In Practice . There are questions specific to each of the chapters in Part One that assess the readers content knowledge relative to each of the topic areas. Students can benefit from these questions to test their understanding of these vital areas, as well as CFP professionals who can also choose to obtain the full 28 CE credit hours by taking and passing the test. Visit www.wiley.com/go/wileycfpboard for more details.