With 30 years’ experience of working in financial services, Steve’s passion is to lead teams to achieve great things. Steve truly believes that when galvanised behind a common purpose and when empowered with possibility, teams can achieve greatness.
By creating a vibrant culture and a great place to work, colleagues will naturally deliver a superior client experience.
Gordon joined the financial services industry 39 years ago and has worked in a range of industry roles, originally within technical areas before moving to be a Financial Planner in the mid-1990s.
Gordon worked closely with solicitors and accountants over that period and understands that much of financial planning is built around tax planning in one form or another. As Head of Advice, Gordon’s role mostly involves running the Advising team as well as other duties within Mercer Private Wealth. Gordon is a Chartered Financial Planner and continues to advise some long standing clients.
Away from work, Gordon enjoys spending time with family and friends, walking and cycling. He is a bit of a lapsed golfer and his current ambition is to start playing again more regularly, if he can find the time!
Darryn has over 27 years’ experience working in financial services, with roles ranging from compliance, operational support, research to investment and fund management. Darryn has been the Chief Investment Officer for Mercer Private Wealth, for over 10 years and is also the Chairman of the Mercer Tactical Asset Allocation Group and the Mercer Private Wealth Investment Policy Group. Darryn is also a Chartered member of the Chartered Institute for Securities and Investment.
Key areas of expertise:
Away from work, Darryn enjoys spending time with his children, playing and watching sport, walking his chocolate Labrador and is an avid and extensive reader of books.
Having worked in financial services for the past 25 years, Max transitioned from accounting and finance functions (where he became a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Certified Accountants) to operational leadership 10 years ago. Since making that move, Max has lead a number of operational integrations and transformations. He enjoys ensuring that a business is equipped to deliver a first class client experience, both efficient and secure.
In Max’s spare time, he is kept busy with his three young children and attempts to keep his French Horn playing in shape.
Paul’s current role is a Senior Regional Leader for London at Mercer.
Paul has 28 years’ experience working in a range of financial services roles; starting as an adviser for a Bank assurer, moving on to an insurance company and then working as an IFA. In 2008, Paul started his first role in management being responsible for a team of financial planners and from there he has led a variety of teams in financial planning and employee benefits.
Paul’s background gives him an insight into the issues that financial planners deal with on a day-to-day basis, and he has a desire to lead the team to ensure they provide a high level of customer service. Paul is passionate about the use of technology to complement the services that Mercer provides on a face-to-face basis.
Away from work, Paul enjoys walking the surrounding countryside with his family and enjoys playing and watching a range of sports. Through his own admission – it’s less of the playing these days though, so his ideal weekend is watching his son play rugby or cricket.
Paul has 27 years’ experience working in financial services. His current role is a Senior Regional Leader for the Midlands, North of England and Scotland at Mercer, where he provides supervision, training and development, as well as coaching interactions for a team of 10 Chartered Financial Planners across the UK. Paul is a member of the Personal Finance Society and a Fellow of the Chartered Insurance Institute, he has advised clients for many years before moving into a senior management role.
Key areas of expertise:
Outside of work, Paul enjoys playing tennis and cycling and regularly participates in organised events to raise funds for his preferred charity Cancer Research. Paul also captains and coaches junior Cricket for his local team during the summer months.
Russell has worked in the financial advice sector since 2001, with his current role as a Senior Regional Leader for the South and South West of England.
Having started out his career in a small IFA business, Russell built up continuous service for over 15 years, although he has been involved in various ownership changes during that time, with the latest development change being Mercer via the acquisition of JLT in 2019.
Russell’s career began by advising clients specialising in tax, investment and pensions. He became a Chartered Financial Planner in 2008, before moving on to manage a team of Financial Planners. Whilst he has kept a small number of clients in order to “keep his hand in”, his main role now is to use his skills and experience to help develop his colleagues to give the best possible advice.
Russell takes an active role in shaping the future direction of the business as part of his involvement in Mercer’s internal advice and operations executive committees.
Alex has 14 years’ experience working in financial services, within a variety of roles, managing teams, advising on group pension schemes and as a Financial Planner working with personal wealth.
Alex likes being able to put his qualifications to good use and help clients to reach their objectives.
Key areas of expertise:
Away from work, Alex has recently stopped playing football and taken up golf. Alex and his wife enjoy eating out with friends, socialising and having plenty of fun with their 2-year-old daughter!
Alex has over 30 years’ experience working in financial services and has been with Mercer since June 2018. During his time as a Financial Planner, he has gained a wealth of experience and knowledge as well as attaining professional qualifications. He is qualified to advise on all aspects of financial planning.
Key areas of expertise:
Outside of work, Alex enjoys spending time with family and likes most sports, especially football, cricket and rugby.
Andrew has over 30 years’ experience working in financial services, with roles ranging from a Pension Consultant where he’d advise companies on their group pension arrangements, to his current role as a Financial Planner with Mercer. During this time, Andrew developed his skills and technical knowledge as well as attaining the required professional qualifications, including being qualified as a Pension Transfer Specialist.
Key areas of expertise:
Away from work, Andrew enjoys spending time with family, including walking the dogs, playing golf and skiing.
Ben has extensive experience working across different areas of financial services with both major financial institutions as well as boutique firms. His roles transitioned from an Investment Analyst; researching and developing bespoke investment portfolios for clients, to his current role as a Chartered Financial Planner for Mercer. During this time, Ben developed his skills and technical knowledge as well as attaining professional qualifications across financial planning and investment management.
Key areas of expertise:
Ben lives in Devon’s South Hams with his wife, two beautiful daughters and a small fluffy dog called Maggie. Whilst he is well and truly outnumbered, he wouldn’t change a thing… most of the time!
Carl is a Chartered Wealth Manager, Chartered Financial Planner, Certified Financial Planner and Fellow of The Personal Finance Society, with over 30 years’ experience in financial services.
Carl is a member of The Personal Finance Society (PFS) and The Chartered Institute for Securities and Investment (CISI). As a member of these professional bodies, Carl is required to undertake continuous professional development. This demonstrates an ongoing commitment to professionalism and the highest standards of knowledge, skills, competence and behaviour.
Carl’s role is to support clients to manage, enhance and protect their wealth. He works across all client areas.
Key areas of expertise:
Outside work, Carl enjoys relaxing with family and watching football.
Chris has practised as a Financial Planner since the mid-1980s, advising a range of individuals, corporate clients and trusts. Many of those clients have received holistic advice from Chris for more than 20 years.
Key areas of expertise:
Claire considers herself to be a people person; she loves meeting new clients and finding out what they really want in life and helping them achieve their goals. Claire is a holistic adviser who is able to consider all areas of financial planning to meet people’s specific needs.
Claire has more than 18 years’ experience working in financial services, in roles ranging from Pensions Administration through to Financial Planner. During that time, she has gained a wealth of experience and technical knowledge as well as attaining professional qualifications. Claire is a member of the Personal Finance Society (PFS) and Diploma qualified.
Key areas of expertise:
Outside of work, Claire enjoys spending time with family, taking long walks with her dog, running and socialising with friends.
Craig has spent the last 17 years working as a Financial Planner, providing a wide range of advice to meet client needs. Nearly four years ago, Craig was awarded Chartered Financial Planner status, which demonstrates his commitment to providing clients with the best possible financial advice to suit their situation.
Craig enjoys using his experience and skills to understand a client’s specific needs and objectives, then working with them to ensure their objectives are met.
Key areas of expertise:
Outside of work, Craig enjoys spending time with his young family and following a variety of different sports, in particular rugby.
Emma’s passion is meeting new clients and building long term business relationships with them. Emma prides herself with having an exceptional skill for understanding client needs and objectives whatever their stage in life and guiding them through the required advice for their needs and circumstances.
Emma has more than 20 years’ experience working in financial services, and has been a fully qualified Financial Planner for the last 16 years.
Key areas of expertise:
Outside of work, Emma is a happily married mother of two. As a family, they are passionate about sports and being outdoors in their spare time.
Emma has worked in the financial services industry for over 30 years, starting as an administrator with a large national IFA firm. Having successfully achieved various industry qualifications along the way, including Pension Specialist, Emma is currently a Charted Financial Planner, studying towards achieving a Fellowship. Throughout her career, Emma has advised both individuals and corporate clients.
Key areas of expertise:
When not studying, Emma enjoys vegan cooking with family, tap dancing and improving her long distance running to achieve that ultimate goal of running her first marathon.
James has more than 18 years’ experience working in financial services, in roles ranging from an Administrator, a Paraplanner and now a Financial Planner. During that time, James has gained a wealth of experience and knowledge as well as attaining professional qualifications. James is qualified to advise individuals on all aspects of financial planning.
Key areas of expertise:
Outside of work, James enjoys playing golf and spending time with family and friends.
James has 23 years’ experience working in financial services, with roles ranging from a Pension Consultant where he advised companies on their group pension arrangements and helping employees around retirement decisions, to his current role as a Financial Planner with Mercer. During this time, James developed his skills and technical knowledge as well as attaining professional qualifications.
Key areas of expertise:
Away from work, James enjoys spending time with family, travelling to explore new places, walking, cooking, playing golf and watching most sports. He can also speak French relatively well having lived in Normandy for a year.
Josh has almost 20 years’ experience working in the financial services industry and 15 years as a Financial Planner. Prior to joining Mercer in 2014, Josh worked for a large retail bank and insurance company before moving into private banking. Now he provides advice to both private individuals and companies. He really enjoys meeting new clients and spending the time to understand them and what is important to them.
Key areas of expertise:
Outside of work, most of Josh’s time is spent with his wife, his children and the family dog. Being a massive rugby fan, Josh enjoys watching matches and has started to coach at his local mini rugby team, who his son plays for.
Ken has more than 28 years’ experience working in financial services, in roles ranging from corporate employee benefits, including managing workplace pension schemes, to providing financial advice to individuals. During that time, Ken gained a wealth of experience and knowledge as well as attaining professional qualifications.
Ken is qualified to advise clients on all aspects of financial planning however does have a number of areas in which he specialises.
Key areas of expertise:
Outside of work, Ken enjoys spending time with his family, long walks and keeping fit.
Kimberley has 15 years’ experience working in financial services, within a number of roles, with the last 11 years as a Financial Planner. During this time, Kimberley developed her skills and technical knowledge as well as attaining professional qualifications. She holds Chartered status and is a Fellow of the Personal Finance Society.
Key areas of expertise:
Lucy has 7 years’ experience working in financial services, joining Mercer at the start of 2018. During her time as a Financial Planner, Lucy gained a wealth of experience and knowledge as well as attaining professional qualifications to achieve Chartered Associateship through the London Institute of Banking and Finance. Lucy finds that attention to planning helps avoid many problems that can arise in the future.
Key areas of expertise:
Outside of work, Lucy enjoys motor sports, along with captaining and playing for a local netball team.
Mike has 13 years’ experience working in financial services, with roles ranging from Pensions Consultant where he’d advised companies on their pension arrangements, to his current role as a Financial Planner with Mercer Private Wealth. During this time, Mike developed his skills and technical knowledge as well as attaining professional qualifications.
Key areas of expertise:
Away from work, Mike enjoys running and playing tennis, and is also a keen amateur chef and loves to travel.
Martin has now been in the financial services industry for over 34 years, learning his trade with some of the top UK insurance companies. In 2000, Martin joined a top 10 Global accountancy firm to provide bespoke financial advice to their clients, both individual and Corporate. This provided Martin with a really good grounding in tax planning.
Key areas of expertise:
Outside of work, Martin likes to keep fit by walking the dog, circuit training and cycling. He also enjoys sailing, cruiser racing from his local club, taking holidays in hot sunny climes and skiing.
Michael has been in the financial services industry for over 30 years. In that time, Michael has been a holistic financial planner across a range of financial planning needs, including Pensions, Investment, Risk management and Inheritance Tax planning.
Key areas of expertise:
Michael has close to 25 years’ experience in working within financial services. During that time, Michael has gained a wealth of experience and knowledge, as well as attaining professional qualifications. Michael works across all client areas.
Key areas of expertise:
Outside of work, Michael enjoys playing and watching many sports. His sporting highlights are running the London Marathon in 2015 having raised money for Cancer Research UK and in his role as football manager for his son’s team, becoming League Champions in 2016.
Nathan enjoys meeting new clients and building long term business relationships with them. Nathan takes the time to listen and understand client needs and objectives, whatever their stage in life. He guides them through the required advice to improve their circumstances now and support them in the future.
Nathan has more than 20 years’ experience working in financial services, and he has been a fully qualified Financial Planner for 15 years, advising clients during times of challenging market conditions and buoyant economic cycles, and this experience has enhanced the advice he provides clients. As a Mercer Financial Planner, Nathan is able to pull on a bank of expertise within the company that truly adds value to the service he provides both his private and corporate clients.
Nathan is also Diploma qualified and a member of The Personal Finance Society and Chartered Insurance Institute.
Neville holds a degree in Economics and Economic History from the University of Warwick (2002) and he is a Fellow of the Personal Finance Society. He is also a Chartered Financial Planner and Chartered Wealth Manager CFPTM
Prior to joining Mercer in 2010, Neville worked for Tilney (formerly Towry Law) and for MLP, a leading German private wealth management company, providing wealth management and pension advice to Senior Executives and NHS consultants.
Neville is a West Ham fan and spends most weekends playing Uber to two energetic boys. He also likes to pretend he can play golf!
Regina has over 30 years' experience in the financial services industry, with 20 years’ continuous service with Mercer, following different acquisitions (Drawdown Bureau to Alexander Forbes to JLT and Mercer in 2019). Regina is a Fellow of the Personal Finance Society and a Chartered Financial Planner, with a wide experience on advising individuals on all aspects of their personal financial planning.
She has been involved in corporate projects to support employee benefit programmes and supports her clients and colleagues through mentoring, as a Pension Transfer Specialist.
Rowan has more than 27 years’ experience working in financial services, in roles ranging from Head of Wealth Management to Regional Director but has always gravitated back to his love of working with clients as a full time Financial Planner. During that time, he has gained a wealth of experience and knowledge as well as attaining professional qualifications.
Key areas of expertise:
Simon has a number of years’ experience working as a Financial Planner and he provides a wide range of advice solutions to help clients achieve their goals and objectives. Simon likes to take the time to understand clients’ financial planning objectives in order to build comprehensive tailored solutions.
Key areas of expertise:
Outside of work, Simon spends his weekends coaching in grassroots football, having attained his coaching qualifications. He also treasures spending time travelling with my family.
Steven has more than 25 years’ experience working in financial services, having gathered a wide ranging experience through a variety of challenging and enjoyable roles across a number of professional environments including accountancy, wealth management, corporate banking and employee benefits. During that time, Steven developed his skills and technical knowledge as well as attaining professional qualifications.
Key areas of expertise:
Outside of work, Steven enjoys sport, playing tennis on a regular basis and developing his mountain biking and skiing abilities. He also actively supports a range of charities including Round Table and Help for Heroes.
Stuart joined Mercer’s personal financial planning team in 2001. He is a consultant with responsibilities for advising new and existing clients on all aspects of their personal financial planning including pensions, investments and protection. Stuart also specialises in business protection solutions such as key person cover, shareholder protection and executive income protection.
Following his BA Honours Degree in Business Studies, Stuart became a Fellow of the Personal Finance Society and a Chartered Financial Planner. He holds specialist qualifications in pensions, tax and trusts and holistic financial planning.
Outside of work, Stuart captains his local squash team in the Middlesex League, plays occasional golf (when time permits) and he’s kept busy with his two children.
Stuart has 14 years’ experience working in financial services, with roles ranging from Pension Consultant where he’d advise companies on their group pension arrangements, to his current role as a Financial Planner with Mercer. During this time, Stuart developed his skills and technical knowledge as well as attaining professional qualifications.
Key areas of expertise:
Away from work, Stuart enjoys spending time with his young family, hill climbing in the Scottish highlands with his dog (all weather permitting) and listening to audiobooks and podcasts.
Tim joined Mercer in 1998 having practiced for over 20 years with leading accountancy and pensions firms. Tim is a Chartered Financial Planner and Fellow of the Personal Finance Society.
Key areas of expertise:
Tim had also previously been the Financial Adviser of the year of the Society of Financial Advisers (SOFA) - now called the Personal Finance Society - in one of a series of high-profile awards introduced by SOFA to promote excellence in personal financial planning.
David has over 13 years’ experience working in financial services, having previously worked within a specialist investment business and a global banking organisation. Currently David’s role of Investment Manager at Mercer is to manage the wealth of Private Individuals via their Centralised Investment Proposition. Not only has David obtained valuable experience working over a number of economic cycles, he has also qualified as a Chartered Wealth Manager.
Key areas of expertise:
Other interests outside of work include football, rugby and cycling. Away from sports, David enjoys spending time traveling, cooking and walking his dog.
Edward has 16 years’ experience working within financial services, graduating through the ranks to Investment Manager, which is a role he has been in for 13 years. Over this period, Edward developed his skills and technical knowledge attaining professional qualifications. He is a Chartered Fellow at the Chartered Institute for Investments and Securities (CISI).
Key areas of expertise are:
Away from work, his family keeps him busy with trips to either the local beaches or visits to Dartmoor. In the occasional moments, he follows football (Torquay United) and current affairs while enjoys reading about history and politics.
Hilary Winn has over 20 years’ experience working in investment management, running investment portfolios for private clients, pension funds, trusts and charities on both a discretionary and non-discretionary basis.
Hilary also has extensive experience in asset allocation and portfolio construction. She is a Chartered Fellow of the Chartered Institute for Securities & Investment (CISI).
Key areas of expertise:
Away from work, Hilary enjoys spending time with family, sailing and reading.
Lewis joined Mercer in April 2020, having worked in financial services for the past 7 years. The majority of Lewis’ experience is within the Private Client Investment Management industry, working initially as an Investment Analyst before progressing into an Investment Manager. His role involves managing bespoke investment portfolios, which are multi asset in nature, to suit the specific requirements of individuals, charities and trusts (among others). He works closely with in-house Financial Planners to offer a comprehensive and tailored investment service to our clients. Lewis has accumulated various industry recognised qualifications, most notably the CISI Diploma in Wealth Management.
Key areas of expertise:
Outside of the workplace, Lewis enjoys exploring the Hampshire countryside with his wife, and is also a regular runner, occasional skier, and a fair weather golfer. In his less active pursuits, he is an avid reader and the family cook.
Africa
