[quote=bil]Anyone know if Edward Jones requires a college degree in order to be offered a “Financial Advisor” position?  Have an interview lined up for next week and would like to know if I should bother or if they are ok with limited college experience.

  Thanks![/quote]   Minimum 2 years of graduate school required...unless you can prove you have significant learning disabilities.

someonewouldntexpect:

No. Sturdy knees and a long tongue help.

Do a lot of studying up, are you ready to become a door to door salesman?

  I think it's more a lack of gag reflex than long tongue, but it's all good.

You can read right on their web site where it says a degree is not required.  

  http://careers.edwardjones.com/us/fa/ExperiencedFinancialAdvisors/TheOpportunity/FAQs/index.html#faq12   So - Read Pursuit of Happyness or watch the movie and let us know how the interview goes.

OK, this is just getting stupid.  Not sure who decided a few months ago to start spoofing “new Jones FA’s” and “looking to join Jones” and “just graduated from high school and got a job with Jones” lines, but it’s become way to obvious.

  For those of you that are still buying it, have a blast.

[quote=Takingnames]You can read right on their web site where it says a degree is not required.  

  http://careers.edwardjones.com/us/fa/ExperiencedFinancialAdvisors/TheOpportunity/FAQs/index.html#faq12   So - Read Pursuit of Happyness or watch the movie and let us know how the interview goes. [/quote]   Good...glad to hear.  I've been on like 15 interviews the past month and have nary a bite.  Right now I'm looking for just about anything.  What is the average salary for someone as a new hire?  What do you have to accomplish and by when for your 1st raise?  And how big are the raises?    

[quote=bil][quote=Takingnames]You can read right on their web site where it says a degree is not required.  

  http://careers.edwardjones.com/us/fa/ExperiencedFinancialAdvisors/TheOpportunity/FAQs/index.html#faq12   So - Read Pursuit of Happyness or watch the movie and let us know how the interview goes. [/quote]   Good...glad to hear.  I've been on like 15 interviews the past month and have nary a bite.  Right now I'm looking for just about anything.  What is the average salary for someone as a new hire?  What do you have to accomplish and by when for your 1st raise?  And how big are the raises?    [/quote]

Broadly speaking, some places offer no salary, some a nominal salary (30k) , others reasonably good salary(60k) - Depends on experience, training, etc.  One guy on the boards recently posted he got a 90k salary, but came over as part of a team - so probably someone is guaranteeing that out of production. Highest actual salary I know anyone having is 75k while in their first year. However - that only lasted 6 months. After 6 months, that started to reduce depending on how many assets and how much production. The less assets and production the more the salary is cut. Sounds draconian, but it's a great way to have carrot and stick so that you will do your job -which is to find clients and sell products and services.     Each firm has different expectations of what you will bring in and what you will produce. Some will expect as much as 8- 10 million and 100k production year one, others are ok with 4 or 5 million and 50k production. Jones reportedly has the lower expectations, but I can't vouch for that. Ask one of the Jones people to explain it to you or post for a recruiter to contact you. Most recruiters can't help you because you don't have a book of business and no one in this market wants someone with no clients. That's the reality. There are a lot of advisors out there right now managing 20, 40 and even 40 million dollar books who are being laid off. You are competing for a job with nothing under management when companies are increasing profits by squeezing out the lower producers.   Most firms won't tolerate a penny under 2 million in the first year and that is a path to failure. (2 million is say.... 12 $200,000.00 accounts that you first find, then have agree to come on board with you and then you do production from it). The base starting salary is just to get you some time to build a pipeline to sell to - and then the salary goes away....it disappears.... and you are on commission  or payout on production.     Raises don't fall into the equation.   In most firms - you prospect, bring in client assets, sell them into something - either a transactional product or fee based and that is production. You get paid a % of production. Wire houses - normally pay between 20 and 40% of production depending on your level of production, some independents and others go to 90 - 92% but you are paying overhead. You create your income by what you do.    

[quote=Takingnames]In most firms - you prospect, bring in client assets, sell them into something - either a transactional product or fee based and that is production. You get paid a % of production.

Wire houses - normally pay between 20 and 40% of production depending on your level of production, some independents and others go to 90 - 92% but you are paying overhead. You create your income by what you do.[/quote]   Some places require you to get your own clients?  Which companies provide you with clients already?  I'm looking for somewhere I could come in, earn something like a $70,000-$80,000 salary, manage clients, and maintain the portfolios within their accounts. 

Are you a CFP?  Only CFPs can get that kind of a gig.

 

Oh boy.  Zoinks, Bil. No. No no no no no, grasshopper.

   Ominous is not even half kidding either.  He joked that you must be a CFP, because CFP are notorious for not closing business, but managing concepts and no one gets paid if they can't close business. Further - the CFP  requires a 4 year degree ("Candidates for certification must have a bachelor's degree (or higher), or its equivalent, in any discipline, from an accredited college or university in order to obtain CFP® certification". - taken from the CFP web site) and an additional set of classes and tough exams and then you also have to be licensed in most environments. That involves significant time and costs. Firms sponsering you to take the Series 7 and train you on their systems and processes are dropping 150k - 200k just to get you trained and it can take 2 years for them to break even on that investment because of the regulatory requirements and complexity of the business. No one hands you anything. People even sign agreements to pay back all or part of the training costs in the event things don't work out when they start in some firms.   You want to interview for a job with EJ with no degree to become an FA and you want accounts and a salary? Jeepers. Any of the Jones folks on this board can tell you that isn't the way it's set up at Jones. This business doesn't run that way. Even the bank platforms aren't going to be paying you a salary to sit around and manage portfolios and clients. They need profits and that happens by reducing costs and driving revenues.     You're talking to trained killers here who can track, kill, strip, cure and eat what they hunt and flip a leveraged ETF on a dime while chiming a covered call on one phone and pitching a muni bond  a minute later, as needed, to a client as they watch the beautiful diamond we call the market spin and reveal opportunities for making money in the market.   You want to know where you should go to find a fat herd where you can sit and stay fat and happy earning a cozy salary without a degree? That's giving up before you even start. You might as well stop looking.   You're up against people with multiple degrees, and post graduate degrees and certifications with years in this business, some with extensive business experience (development, M&A, law, executive management, senior sales, R&D, pharmaceutical) or strong military backgrounds who give up everything they have already done  to start from scratch and build a book of business that produces a million dollars a year in revenue or more. Further - each one of them is looking at their book  of business and asking themselves in this post apocalyptic environment saying "what do I have to do to help my clients and help myself in this environment" Even then, some of these advisors, good producers, skilled, educated and tough as nails are facing layoffs in the environment where the firms are valuing efficiency and profitability with less liability in their businesses.   Think long and hard about whether you are cut out for this. Get informed about the realities and let us know how you make out on the interviews.  A degree isn't required but an entreprenuerial spirit and the will to work harder than you ever imagined is.