Skills
Financial Advisor Skills & Tools
The technical skills, people skills and tools employers look for in financial advisors, and how to build and show them.
What skills do financial advisors need?
Financial Advisors need technical skills such as financial planning, investments, and retirement planning, plus people skills like trust-building and listening. They also use tools such as Financial planning software and Portfolio management systems.
Technical (hard) skills
- Financial planning
- Investments
- Retirement planning
- Tax basics
- Insurance
- Estate basics
People (soft) skills
- Trust-building
- Listening
- Communication
- Patience
Tools, equipment and technology
- Financial planning software
- Portfolio management systems
- CRM
- Custodian platforms
- Risk tolerance tools
- Video meeting tools
Skills in action: common tasks
These step-by-step guides show how financial advisors put their skills to work:
- How to run a first client discovery meeting
- How to build a retirement income plan
- How to talk a client through a market drop
How to show these skills on a resume
- Lead your skills section with the technical skills from the job posting, for example, “Financial planning” and “Investments.”
- Prove soft skills with results: instead of listing “trust-building,” describe a situation where you used it.
- List credentials such as CFP near the top, with the issuing organization and date.
- Use the employer’s vocabulary. Our financial advisor glossary covers the terms hiring managers expect.
How to build these skills
Formal training, supervised practice and certification are the most direct routes. Our Financial Advisor training introduces each of these skills with plain-language lessons, procedures and a final knowledge check: a strong foundation before hands-on training or your first day.