Credentials Matter!
Credentials....I can't live with them, I can't live without them! If I had a nickel for every time someone has told me or asked me the following, I would be a very rich man!
- What do all those letters behind your name mean?
- How many years were you in school?
- You have more letters behind your name than in your name!
- I know what a CPA is, but what is a PFS or an LL.M?
- I went to a financial seminar and this other guy had just as many letters behind his name as you.
I could go on but I think I would rather make a very simple point...credentials matter. If someone tells you otherwise, that person has none or did not bother to take the time to get them. Additionally, not all credentials are created equal. When you get a chance to look at the degree of difficulty it is to attain a few of them, you might start realizing that many of the letters behind someone's name may not be anything more than space filler. The website listed below is a great tool to investigate what many of these credentials mean and the difficulty it is to attain. As an example, a J.D. is a legal degree that is attained by going 3 years to law school. Once such a person passes their State Bar, they now can refer to themselves as an Attorney at Law. A C.P.A. or Certified Public Accountant can only be certified at the State level after completing a rigororous course of study and passing a lengthy two day exam (at least in the State of Florida). Some States require an experience requirement while others require extra course of study beyond the undergraduate level. Again, so many times I have run across financial advisors that say "who cares" about educational credentials and my only retort is "my clients care!"
Take a look at the following website for more information on credentials: http://www.financialcertified.com/financial-designations.html
|
|