Guardian Wealth Management and the two-horse race with Holborn Assets

Pension Life blog - Guardian Wealth Management and the two-horse race with Holborn Assets - Guardian Wealth Management and the two-horse race with Holborn Assets

This is the start of Guardian Wealth Management week – following the end of Holborn Assets week.  Apart from bleats from Holborn Assets salesmen that I was compromising their chances of destroying more victims’ pensions, nobody has come forward and proposed realistic compensation offers for the existing victims.

So, I thought it would be good to set up a “race” between Guardian Wealth Management and Holborn Assets – with two new, fresh, thoroughbred complaints.  And see which firm passes the post first.

But, first, let us have a look at the Guardian Wealth Management culture behind the scenes from the horse’s mouth: the self-employed salesmen who peddle Guardian’s products.  These are published on www.glassdoor.com – and give an interesting insight into the inner workings of a financial services firm.  Here are some of the comments:

“opportunistic”

 Doesn’t Recommend – worked at Guardian Wealth Management full-time

Pros – Quick way to earn cash

Cons – Not always ethical with advice or product advice

This tells us a lot – GWM is an unethical selling machine (from this unhappy salesman’s experience)

Another unhappy guy relates even more details about the failings of the company:

“I do not recommend working here”

Doesn’t Recommend.  Current Employee – Business Development Manager
 
 Cons – poor training; poor communication; high staff turnover; lack of support; poor salary; constant changes to the business that are not needed; self-employed

Advice to Management: Look after your staff and actually value people over money. Your sales training needs a lot of work and you need to support new recruits rather than just weighing heavily on a manager that really just hogs all the leads.

This review tells us that the people who work for Guardian Wealth Management are nothing more than self-employed salesmen who work for commission on top of a pitiful basic “wage”.

“Working at Guardian”

 Recommends – Current Employee

Pros – Great earning potential.

Cons – Can be high pressure, need to remain motivated and driven to achieve.

Just what we thought: pressure to sell, sell, sell!  Doesn’t seem to be anything other than a bag of carrots to drive these salesmen to realise the “great earning potential” – rather than to provide good and appropriate financial advice.

“Business Development Manager”

Recommends – BDM in London
 
Pros – I currently work as a BDM for Guardian in their London office. I’ve been here just 5 months and have learned a huge amount. The guys here are extremely helpful and friendly. It’s hard work but the culture really is an advocate of the harder you work, the higher the rewards with no ceiling in place it’s up to you how successful you want to be.
So, this business development manager has got sucked into the intense sales-driven culture of Guardian Wealth Management – and all he can see is rewards for himself, rather than quality advice for clients.
Against this backdrop of high-pressure stable manners – and the constant pressure to win, win, win, the poor dumb schmucks at Guardian Wealth Management have no idea (yet) that if they fail to meet their sales targets, they’ll just be chucked on the muck heap.  It is all about quantity, rather than quality.
The constant drive to flog more products – irrespective of whether they are right for the clients – just turns what should be a firm that strives for excellence into a sales sweatshop.  They are also heavily into cold calling – I should know, as they cold called me a year or so ago and claimed to have offices in Spain.
This last Guardian Wealth Manager salesman has highlighted the fact that there is no “ceiling” to success.  But what he has missed out is the fact that there is no floor to the depths the salesmen will go to scam victims for profit.

This week is Guardian Wealth Management week – and I will be kicking it off with a race to see which firm of scammers – Holborn Assets or Guardian Wealth Management – will be first past the post to compensate their victims.  One from Israel and one from Australia.  The stakes are high; the going is firm; the prize is glittering (a glowing compliment on the Pension Life blog).  Take your seats for an exciting race.

 

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