One Platform Proves the Most Efficient for Robust Wealth Management

Foundation Wealth is a true fiduciary with transparency and accountability

The adage “lead, follow or get out of the way” applies to giving professionals the latitude to do what they do best, and is the key distinguishing feature for James Pelmore, Leanne Brothers and Mark Ting.

They chose to lead and founded a wealth management firm where independent advisors, portfolio managers and their clients benefit from the objectivity of independence and efficiencies of a unified technology platform. The firm’s goal was to be, among other things, a true fiduciary, delivering to clients an experience with transparency, objectivity and accountability. Importantly, the responsibility of being an independent and objective fiduciary results in better advice and decisions for clients.

When Pelmore set out to create Foundation Wealth four years ago, his first task was to find or create what he describes as “one unified, integrated platform,” so that advisors could “see data in real time, have workflows and processes that are efficient in the operation of business, create a robust digital experience for clients and involve third parties such as lawyers and other professionals in those workflows.”

One year later, as investment to create their technology platform intensified, Foundation partnered with Purpose Advisor Solutions (PAS) led by CEO Jeff Gans, to develop a new kind of Wealth Management platform. Partnering with PAS, who has Som Seif’s Purpose Financial as a lead investor, resulted in a turnkey digital management and operations solution from which they were able to launch and manage Foundation Wealth Partners’ business.

Foundation Wealth Partners is a partnership-based portfolio management firm focused on meeting the needs of affluent individuals, their families, family offices, corporations, private pensions and trusts.

Pelmore, who has spent more than 30 years managing investment portfolios to ensure individuals and families achieve their financial planning goals, says he was inspired to resolve the impediments financial advisors experience with archaic technology platforms, restrictive portfolio management policies, regulatory rules preventing incorporation and concerns about advisor business equity.

Pelmore is equally determined to attract partners who share his views about the industry.  He describes colleagues at investment dealers as “being frustrated by aged technology, coerced on portfolio management and not in control of their business. They want to be better, do more for their clients and have confidence in the equity and direction of their business.  Foundation Wealth Partners appeals to them for all of these reasons.”

Another important aspect that distinguishes Foundation Wealth from the competition is their Family Enterprise Advisor designation: the partners received accreditation from the Institute of Family Enterprise Advisors at UBC’s Sauder School of Business. This program has been credited with helping advisors across many professional disciplines deepen their relationships with their family enterprise clients and give them a broadened perspective of the issues business families face—including generational transition.

With these elements in place, Foundation Wealth Partners is positioned to effectively deal with the complexity of family relationships in a family-owned enterprise, where business, financial and legal decisions are aided by good governance and communications.

They are also ready for the impending changes in technology facing the industry; leveraging a digital platform to improve the client experience from simplified onboarding and account opening, to more robust reporting and access to account information.

From retirement, estate and business succession planning, to institutional consulting or complex case legacy planning, Foundation Wealth Partners provides clients with a wealth of management experience in a delivery model that leads their industry and will likely be replicated by competitors in coming years.

“Foundation is ideally positioned now to add the very best investment professionals to join as partners and provide them with everything they’ve been missing to better advise their clients in making effective financial decisions,” says Gans.

“This is the year we become a disruptor in the high-end advisory sector.”

Originally published in BC Business.