Coaching financial advisers: a programme built on real meetings

In most advice firms, coaching runs on memory. A supervisor sits in on the occasional meeting, forms an impression, and gives feedback a week later. The adviser remembers the meeting differently. Nobody can say whether things improved since the last session, because nothing was measured the first time.

Coaching financial advisers works far better when it starts from what actually happened in the room. Most firms already record client meetings. This guide shows how to turn those recordings into a structured coaching programme: what to measure, how to run sessions, and how it links to your training and competence obligations.

Why coaching financial advisers matters to the firm

Coaching is not only about developing people. It is part of how a firm meets its regulatory obligations. Under the FCA's Training and Competence sourcebook, firms must "review on a regular and frequent basis employees' competence" (TC 2.1.12R), and must not assess an employee as competent until they have "demonstrated the necessary competence" (TC 2.1.1R) (TC 2.1).

Retail investment advisers must also complete "a minimum of 35 hours of appropriate continuing professional development in each 12 month period" (TC 2.1.15R), and the FCA's guidance says they should complete "no less than 21 hours of structured continuing professional development" activities (TC 2.1.16G). Structured coaching sessions with clear objectives and recorded outcomes can form part of a sensible development plan, though how CPD is recognised depends on your accredited body's rules.

And the meeting is where the client experience is decided. The Consumer Duty's consumer understanding outcome (PS22/9) depends heavily on how advisers explain things and check understanding in the room.

The problem with sit-in coaching

• It is subjective. Two supervisors watching the same meeting notice different things.
• It does not scale. A supervisor can only sit in on a handful of meetings.
• It changes the meeting. Advisers behave differently when watched.
• It leaves no baseline. Without measurement, you cannot show improvement.

Recorded meetings fix all four. The supervisor reviews what happened, the adviser can hear it for themselves, and the same measures can be compared over time.

What to measure in a client meeting

Keep the measures few and clear. A good set covers how the conversation was shaped, what was evidenced, and how it felt to the client.

For questioning in particular, our guide to open questions in client meetings sets out the techniques and four simple counts to start with.

A quarterly coaching cycle

1. Set the baseline

Review three to five recent meetings for each adviser, using the same measures every time. Record the results. This is the starting point everyone can see.

2. Agree one or two focus areas

Do not try to fix everything. Pick the one or two changes that would make the biggest difference: fewer stacked questions, more time on capacity for loss, shorter explanations. Write them down with the adviser.

3. Run a coaching session on real moments

Use the exact words from the transcript. "Here is the point where the client mentioned her husband's health, and here is what happened next" is far more useful than "you could explore vulnerability more". Let the adviser listen first and say what they notice before the supervisor adds anything.

4. Practise and re-measure

Over the following weeks, review a sample of new meetings against the same measures. Look for movement in the focus areas, not perfection.

5. Record the outcome

Keep a dated note of each session: the evidence reviewed, the focus areas agreed, and what changed. This record supports the regular competence reviews TC 2.1.12R requires.

The supervisor's role

Good coaching supervisors share a few habits:

• They ask the adviser what they think before giving a view.
• They tie every point to a specific moment, quoted.
• They praise what works as clearly as they flag what does not.
• They keep coaching separate from formal competence assessment, so advisers feel safe to be honest.
• They follow up, so the plan is not forgotten.

That separation matters. Coaching describes and develops. Assessment measures against a standard and decides. Both are needed, and they work best when advisers know which one is happening. Our guide to training and competence for financial advisers covers the assessment side.

Making it practical: time and tools

The obstacle is time. By our estimate, reviewing one client meeting properly by hand takes about an hour. At six meetings per adviser a month, that is six hours of supervisor time per adviser before any coaching starts. Most firms cannot spare it, so transcripts sit unread.

Asclto takes on the review. It pulls recorded meetings from Fireflies and produces a scored report for each: talk share, open against closed questions, client questions and the longest adviser monologue, all counted from the transcript and checked word for word against it. It reads tone of voice from the audio, scores nine dimensions covering questioning, listening, clarity and control of the meeting, and gives a meeting score and an adviser score out of ten. Key moments are pulled out with the exact words, an FCA checklist shows what the meeting did and did not evidence, and a written coaching plan gives the supervisor something to act on. A score trend shows development over time, and each report exports to PDF as an internal coaching record, never shared with the client.

For formal assessment against a dated standard, Freeboard scores adviser competency against defined skill profiles and a versioned scoring ruleset, built to support a structured T&C scheme. The supervisor still runs the conversation and makes the judgement.

A coaching programme checklist

• Meetings recorded, with client consent handled in line with your policy.
• A short, fixed set of measures used for every review.
• A baseline for every adviser.
• One or two agreed focus areas per adviser per quarter.
• Sessions based on quoted moments from real meetings.
• Dated records of each session and its outcome.
• Coaching kept separate from formal competence assessment.
• Trends reviewed by the T&C supervisor at a set interval, such as quarterly (a firm choice, not a rule).

Frequently asked questions

How often should financial advisers be coached?

In our view a quarterly cycle works well for many firms: baseline, focus areas, session, re-measure. The rules do not set a coaching frequency, but TC 2.1.12R requires competence to be reviewed "on a regular and frequent basis", so set a rhythm you can sustain and record.

Should coaching and competence assessment be the same process?

They are better kept separate. Coaching develops the adviser and needs honesty; assessment measures against a standard and decides. Both draw on the same meetings.

Can recorded meetings be used for coaching?

Yes, and they are the best source, because they show what actually happened. Make sure your recording and consent arrangements cover internal review and training use.

See how Asclto turns each recorded meeting into a coaching report, or book a twenty-minute demo on Microsoft Teams with Adam Booth, run live on a demo firm with nothing to prepare.