In Conversation with Yash Mishra

Tell us a little about your passion and personal drive.

My passion lies in making a difference to people’s lives. Professionally, this means giving high-quality advice to an individual on the different aspects of financial planning, that will provide a framework for tackling the ‘real’ issues and allow them to achieve their longer term goals.

Could you elaborate on what you mean by ‘real’ issues?

Sometimes, what people ‘need’ and ‘want’ can be two, very diff erent things and most often, people do not understand that crucial diff erence between their ‘wants’ and ‘needs’. Therefore, the ability to listen, to guide these individuals through the factors, and pinpointing their actual needs through active dialogue is essential.

For example, a client may start off by stating their need for high returns, and at the same time, they explicitly declare that they are highly risk-averse. This expectation is in contradiction to the risk reward equation. So what do they really want? And what do they really need? In essence, this is what you need to understand as a financial services practitioner.

A skilled advisor would hence need to be able to engage the clients in a meaningful conversation about their current lifestyle and aspirations. Through this conversation, the advisor should listen and facilitate the client towards identifying what they really need on their own. This means allowing the client to form his or her own conclusions regarding their own actual needs. This will create a sense of ownership on the part of the client and allows them to make their own financial planning decisions with clear objectives in mind.

In your travels throughout Asia, what have you observed?

My travels throughout the region tells me that no matter where one is residing – whether it’s in Taiwan, Hong Kong or Singapore – the inherent wish to provide the best for one’s children and to have a comfortable retirement lifestyle is a universal idea. These are the ‘wants’. On the other hand, their ‘needs’ are individually subjective.

Culturally, there are major differences between one country and another. In some societies, a majority of its people perceive a long term plan as one that encompasses months, while others view it on a much longer basis. In Singapore, the government’s proactive stance on retirement planning education seems to have spawned a complacent tendency to expect the government to map out a path for one’s retirement. However, of late, there is a growing awareness that this reliance on the government alone may not be enough. In fact, awareness levels here are looking to be more encouraging than in countries such as Hong Kong and Taiwan, where basic awareness is truly lacking.

Singapore is also exhibiting a trend of the ‘sandwiched’ generation where the working adults have to provide for their retired parents and their growing children at the same time. This puts an extra strain on the family finances and the need for careful risk management cannot be understated.

As a financial planner, we need to be sensitive to the cultural and societal differences of our clients. Active listening and meticulous planning is necessary as each client is unique and their solutions have to be tailor-made.

You are a champion for financial education, an active member of the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) as well as the Financial Women’s Association – what drives you to contribute to these communities?

I deal with a lot of women in my profession. Increasingly, I am observing that:

1. more women are taking the reins for their family’s financial planning needs;
   
2. there are more single women; and
   
3. with the local divorce rate on the ascent, women who are single again realise that they would need to take charge of their own finances once more.

The patterns mentioned above are namely societal trends. Statistical trends have also found that women tend to live longer than men. As such, their retirement years would stretch longer and this would require a bigger financial nest to be built to last them throughout these golden years. With these trends, it has therefore become more urgent for women to be properly informed and educated about financial planning. To this end, I have contributed and shared my experiences as well as knowledge through events hosted by these organisations. I believe my participation in these organisations is an active and constructive way for me to give back to the society and allow others to benefit at the same time.