Prudential Advisors represent everything wrong with the financial services industry today. If you’re looking to get started in wealth management or financial planning this place should be your last resort. The job function of advisors at this firm is just to sell as many Pru life insurance policies as possible, which is why they require advisors to obtain the series 6 instead of the series 7. The entire business model creates conflicts of interest as you are incentivized to sell products rather than give sound advice. I spent my first year of employment there and did not see one single advisor write a financial plan, all of the revenue was generated by insurance/annuities and since the job is 100% commission the only way agents get paid is selling products. Their investment advisory platform was not competitive at all which made getting wealthy clients impossible. The result is that the most significant portion of recurring revenue comes from agents writing car insurance so essentially the company is giving the title of financial advisor to insurance salesmen.
The initial training isn’t too terrible, but once you become full-time (which happens after selling 5 policies) you’re essentially on your own. Pru likes to boast about their on going training however what they call training is bringing in a few wholesalers to tell the agents that their new products are the best in the marketplace. You never really learn the financial planning process.
Employee turnover is discouraging as well. The industry as a whole has an issue with this but Pru takes it above and beyond. I asked for them to pay for my series 65, 7, and first course of the CFP and management responded by saying that since those licenses/designations aren’t required they would only offer reimbursement. So you essentially are paying out of pocket for a job that is paying you nothing. The firm also has no education requirement for their advisors other than the initial licensing, which is partly why they cannot attract and retain talent.
Lastly the lead program is a travesty. One of the major selling points of the job was the fact that Pru would provide their advisors with leads. The leads that were given out were either 90 year old clients who don’t want to be bothered, or clients who want to cancel the policy but haven’t been able to get ahold of an agent for years (because the salesperson quit within a month of selling the policy). Building your book is completely on you and since most of the new reps who come in through the CDP program are new grads with a ton of student debt it’s virtually impossible to get started. As a result you will be forced to hound friends and family by offering them expensive products to try and start your business.
