How I Became A Multi-Award Winning Financial Adviser (And What We REALLY Do!)

Hi everyone, I'm Jay Dalwal and welcome to my channel Jay the IFA. This is my first video and no one is more scared or excited about this than I am. It's taken me over a decade to build my technical knowledge, confidence and credibility to make this happen today. I'm a chartered independent financial adviser based in Birmingham which means that everything I do is regulated by the firm that I work for. So Chase Deve as well as the financial conduct authority and today I want to take you on a journey. It's my journey to becoming a multi-awwardwinning financial adviser in the UK. So let's start with the basics. What is a financial advisor and what do they actually do? Fundamentally, a financial adviser helps individuals to make better decisions with their money. Decisions that shape their future, their family's future, and their sense of security. I help my clients to regularly review the five key areas of financial planning. You've got mortgages, protection, investments, all the way through to retirement planning and estate planning as well. Let me know in the comments below if there's a question you'd like answered or a topic that you want me to dive deeper into. The whole purpose of this channel is all about financial education and it will help me to shape my future content so that it's engaging and also relevant. Now, a lot of people think that my job is just about pensions reinvestment, especially because I started my career all the way back in 2015 as a pensions technician, but to be honest, that's only a really small part of the picture. So, here's what a financial advisor really does, summarized into five key areas. Before we talk about money, products, or investment returns, a good quality financial advisor will talk to you about your life. Because the truth is great financial planning has very little to do with the numbers at the beginning and it's got everything to do with understanding the person in front of us. The right course of action for one client may be completely wrong for another and it's my job to figure that out. Once I understand who you are and what matters most to you, the next step is building a financial plan that's actually realistic for your life. The aim is really simple. It's to turn uncertainty into clarity to help you see not just where you are today, but also where you're heading in the future and what needs to happen along the way for you to get there. One of the most powerful tools we use to do this is cash flow planning analysis. This allows us to project your financial future visually. So, showing how your income, your spending, your assets, and goals all interact over time. It helps to answer questions like, "Will I have enough money to retire when I want to?" "Can I afford to reduce my working hours?" "Is it possible to retire earlier than state pension age, which for most of you watching will be age 67 or 68?" Now, cash flow planning takes all of the guesswork out of decision-m. It gives you a clear picture of your future based on numbers, assumptions, and scenarios so you can make more confident and informed choices. And quite honestly, I personally love it. I've been able to have conversations where I've told my clients that they can retire much earlier than they ever thought was possible or conversations where we planned that saving additional monthly amounts into ISIS or pensions can shave years off their retirement aid. It's honestly fantastic. There's a lot of noise out there. Markets rising and falling, constant changes to tax rules, shifting interest rates, new legislation, products, and headlines every single day. Most people don't need more information. They need clarity. They need someone to cut through all of that noise and say, "Here's what actually matters to you, and this is what you need to do." That's a huge part of what a good financial advisor does. We translate lots of complexity into something really simple and understandable and actionable. To give you the perfect example, so I'm a specialist when it comes to defined benefit pension schemes, particularly the NHS pension, as a lot of my clients are medical professionals. To say that this area alone is incredibly complex is an understatement. There have been multiple changes over the last decade. So changes to different sections of the scheme, transitional protections, the Mloud remedy, changes to retirement ages, and even changes to how benefits are calculated and how you can access them at retirement. The list honestly goes on and on. Now, trying to navigate that all on your own whilst working full-time and managing your life is almost impossible. Even in a full YouTube video, I wouldn't have enough time to explain every single detail. And that's just how technical it is. So, a part of my job is to take all of that complexity, all of those rules, all of those moving parts, and break them down into clear, personalized guidance that makes sense for my clients. Sometimes the most valuable advice isn't about what to do, it's about what not to do. I've helped people avoid things like panic selling when markets drop, locking in losses that could have recovered, taking too much risk because a friend, colleague, or even a Tik Tok video mentioned a great investment, taking too little risk, which can be just as harmful, especially when planning for long-term goals like retirement. Missing valuable tax allowances that could have saved thousands over a lifetime. not protecting their income or family, leaving them financially vulnerable if the unexpected happens. Now, these aren't small things. They're decisions that can shape someone's entire financial future. Financial planning isn't just a one-off event. It's a relationship. Life changes, goals evolve, markets move, tax rules shift, careers take new directions, families grow, and with every change, your financial plan needs to adapt. That's where ongoing support becomes so important. A good adviser doesn't just hand you a plan and disappear. I'm there to review it regularly with my clients, to make adjustments when life throws something unexpected along the way, and to keep focus over the longer term picture, even when the short term may feel uncertain. Sometimes that means helping you stay disciplined when markets are volatile. Sometimes it means reminding you of your bigger goals that you're working towards. And a lot of the time it's simply being a sounding board. I'm someone who understands my client's situation, their values, their priorities, and I can give reassurance when it's needed most. Money isn't just numbers on a page. It's emotional. It's tied to our childhood experiences, our fears, our dreams, our relationships, and the version of the future that we hope to build. And because of that, financial decisions can feel overwhelming, confusing, or even paralyzing at times. We live in a world where information is everywhere. We've got Google, social media, news headlines, friends, colleagues, family members. What people really need is clarity, structure, and someone who can translate all of that complexity into confidence. A good advisor helps you cut through the noise. We help you understand what's relevant, what's not, and what genuinely moves you closer to your goals. We help you avoid the mistakes that can set you back. Stay focused when life gets busy and make decisions that align with your values and long-term plans. Now, let's clear something up that confuses a lot of people. The difference between independent, restricted, and tied advisers. These terms get thrown around a lot, and most people don't actually understand what they mean, but understanding them is essential when choosing who to trust with your financial future. So, first we'll start with independent financial adviserss. Independent advisers can recommend products from the whole of market. They aren't tied to any single provider or limited panel. Their responsibility is to search across all available options and find the most suitable solution for your needs wherever it comes from. This gives the client the broadest possible choice and the highest level of flexibility. We've then got restricted advisers. So restricted advisers can only recommend from a limited range that might be a panel of selected providers a specific type of product or in some cases products designed by their own firm. And then we've got tide advisers. They work for one provider and can only recommend that provider's products. This model is really common with banks or large financial institutions. Now I'm not going to sit here and debate which model is good or bad. What truly matters is transparency and suitability. That you as the client understand the scope of advice that you're receiving and that it aligns with your goals. And speaking from experience, I've worked in both restricted and independent environments. Today, I'm incredibly proud to have built my career as an independent financial advisor and even prouder to have found a firm that aligns with my values, one that I can genuinely see myself retiring with. My journey wasn't linear. I didn't grow up thinking I want to be a financial advisor. But I did grow up wanting to help people, wanting to make an impact, and wanting to build something meaningful, doing something that genuinely made a difference in people's lives. After graduating from studying BSE economics at the University of Leicester in 2013, I worked a few different types of jobs, mainly in hospitality, and then I stumbled on the chance to join Wesian as a pensions technician. In July 2015, I was invited as a guest on Sam Oaks's podcast last year, Financial Planner Life, to talk about my journey to becoming a financial adviser and the resilience and the challenges that I faced along the way. So, if you haven't checked that out already, I would highly recommend looking into it. And he's got a number of interviews with successful and inspiring financial planners. So, if you're interested in this video, there's a good chance that you're interested in his content. So, taking it back to 2015, I was young, curious, and determined to build a career that genuinely helps people, even if I didn't know where that path would lead. I spent those early years learning everything I could. I studied relentlessly evenings after work before going to easy gym which is around the corner weekends lunch breaks and after 14 months of self-funded study I achieved my CI diploma in financial planning in 2017 it opened the door for me being promoted to power planner in January 2018 where I finally got to see how advice was researched structured by writing reports and also delivered by the adviser from the start of my career the majority Majority of my time was spent on the phones to clients answering their queries as a pensions technician. So I knew I wanted to be client-f facing and weirdly I've really enjoyed talking about pensions and retirement. I'd already started shadowing existing financial advisers within the company and that just reconfirmed my decision. So on the 14th of January 2019, I joined Chase Deve as an independent financial adviser and that's where everything truly came together. Since then, I've continued to push myself professionally. In 2022, I achieved chartered financial planner status and that's something that I'm incredibly proud of because it represents the highest level of technical knowledge and also ethical commitment in the profession. In total, I've been named the winner of seven awards. Three of them were internal. So that's one from Wesian, two from Chase Deve, and four were externally received from 2023 onwards. The last few years have honestly been incredible from my professional career, and I'm truly living my dream. There are a couple of awards in particular that I want to highlight. So, we'll start with the most recent award is the women in financial advice role model of the year award for large firms. I'm not sure if you can see it there. This award was given to me um after three years as a finalist. So, I finally won and it felt incredible. The second award that I would like to highlight is the one that I got last October. It's the Greater Birmingham Chamber of Commerce Young Professional of the Year Award in Finance. And similarly, I was a finalist for two years in a row after being nominated. Um, I actually self-nominated myself for this award because of the networking opportunities that were available within it within Birmingham. And I honestly feel like it's projected my career quite a bit. So, yeah. And then the third award that I would like to highlight is this one. Um so this is professional advisor's young achiever of the year award. I was named the winner in 2023. Um not sure if you can see it there. Uh but it was the first award well professional award that I'd won externally. So, these awards mean a lot to me, and it's not because of the titles themselves, but because they reflect the impact that I've been able to make in such a short amount of time. I've only had 10 years in the financial services profession, and I've been an adviser for the last seven of those years. Some of the highlights that mean the most to me aren't awards, and they're not trophies. They're the opportunities that I've said yes to. opportunities that have scared me, but I embrace them to contribute to the profession to raise the standards and to help other aspiring financial advisers. Taking into consideration that the average age of a financial adviser in the UK is age 57 and that only 18% of financial advisers are women. Stepping into this profession as a female Asian advisor in my early 30s has come with its own challenges. But one of my favorite sayings is that change begins at the end of your comfort zone. And in many ways, my whole life has prepared me for this moment. I've always pushed myself. I've traveled the world solo. Currently, I've visited over 37 countries. I started weight training at the gym in 2014 when I was in my early 20ies, and it really wasn't popular for women to do so. I was raised as the eldest daughter in a first generation Indian household in the UK. So navigating expectations, judgment, and glass ceilings is something that I've known and dealt with my whole life. That upbringing taught me resilience, independence, and the ability to step into places where people don't always expect someone like me to be there. So I took that same mindset into my career. Instead of letting fear hold me back, I decided to step forward, to speak at events, to represent women and people of color in this profession. In 2023, I joined the PFS Power Panel, one of only 12 practitioners in the entire UK to be selected to help shape the future of our profession. I took the opportunity to speak at the PFS National Conference in 2025 on my topic of niching down after my national webinar was so wellreceived. Now, this was a dream of mine and it was one that I thought would have taken me much longer to accomplish than it actually has. Prior to this, I was asked by our first female CEO, Kathleen at Chase Deve, to deliver a presentation at the national conference. I first did this to 240 advisers in 2024 and then again to 380 staff in 2025. Now, this was a huge honor and a privilege and also extremely nerve-wracking. So, I'm really proud of myself for doing it. More recently, I was invited to Parliament in January 2026 to discuss the future of financial planning as part of my role as a mentor on the next generation program. But one of the things I'm most proud of is becoming a school governor in March 2025 at the secondary school that I once attended, King Edward V 6 Hanzouth Grammar School for Girls in Birmingham. going back into that environment, teaching financial education in schools as part of my volunteering work as a PFS education champion as well, helping young people understand money, confidence, and opportunity. It's been incredibly meaningful. But beyond the speaking, the panels, and the awards, I'm a deeply technical financial adviser. I manage over 50 million in assets under management for my clients and I've built a reputation for delivering highquality regulated and evidence-based advice. All of these moments have shaped who I am as an adviser. They taught me resilience. They taught me confidence. They taught me the importance of using your voice, not just for yourself, but for the people that you represent and the clients that you serve. When I look back at my journey from those early days studying after work to becoming chartered, speaking at local events and national stages, mentoring colleagues, winning awards, and giving back to the profession and community, it reminds me why I chose this profession in the first place. It's not about products and it's not about markets. It's not even about money really. It's about people and it's about trust. It's about helping someone feel more secure, more confident, and more in control of their future. And that's exactly what my channel is all about. I want to create a space where financial education feels clear, human, and accessible. There's no jargon, no judgment, just honest conversations that will help you to make better decisions for your life. So, if you've enjoyed this video or if there's a topic that you'd like me to explore in more detail, let me know in the comments. I want this channel to grow with you and to answer the questions that genuinely matter. So, thank you. Thank you so much for watching, for supporting this journey, and for being a part of this next chapter with me. And also, for those who've already shown me a lot of support before I've even posted, it honestly means a lot. I'll see you in the next video. Uploads are every Sunday at 11:00