Developing as a paraplanner: ‘How do I build a career plan?’

Caroline is a leading figure in the UK’s wealth management and financial advice community.

In a career spanning more than 20 years, Caroline's worked in-house as a paraplanner, senior paraplanner and head of technical for small and large firms until, in 2019, she founded outsourced paraplanning practice, Sparrow Paraplanning. In 2024, Caroline launched Sparrow Solutions which offers training, learning and development, and operational support to financial planning and outsource paraplanning businesses. Soon after, she co-founded The Co-Laboratory with Melissa Kidd - a service which offers planners, advisers and paraplanners help and training with the ‘human skills’-side of financial planning and advice.

Ellie is the Paraplanner Team Leader for the Aviva Financial Advice paraplanner team at Succession Wealth, where she manages a team of 14 paraplanners (soon to be 15). With over a decade of experience in the financial services industry, Ellie has worked her way through a variety of support roles before stepping into leadership over a year ago.

Since moving into the operation management space, Ellie has found a real passion for people—supporting them in their roles, helping them develop and grow, and creating a team culture that’s open, collaborative, and kind. Her leadership style is approachable and people-first, with a focus on listening, being honest, and making improvements that actually work in practice. She’s also been involved in the project management and strategic thinking side of management, working with other teams to build better processes and make day-to-day work smoother for everyone.

In 2020 I made a rather drastic career change from carpets to Financial Planning. I found my home in the technical side of Financial Planning, being a complete nerd at heart and am now Chartered through the CII.

My current role is Advice & Paraplanning Team Leader at Fintuity which allows me to get involved in a variety of tasks within the business and make the most of my technical knowledge.

Outside of my day job, I love helping out others with their own career and exam journeys.

From 2018 to 2021 I did admin at financial planning firm, focusing mainly on data entry and workflow management. A longer term career didn’t really appeal as I had no desire to be client facing, so I went to university to study media and communications.

After graduating, I did some shift work at Argos, but realised I wanted more of a “proper career”. I learned more about the paraplanning role, and found the combination of analysis and putting reports together surprisingly fun!

My future plans are to continue to learn and grow, building my qualifications and technical knowledge. Longer term, as part of a tiny company, I’m keen to see what opportunities arise.

Outside of work, I’m part of a 5-a-side football team. After losing our first game 24-0 we’re now top of the league, so I’m very used to working my way up!

As a learning professional based in Aegon UK’s People function, my role is to empower colleagues to thrive and grow their career with us. As part of this, I design and deliver programmes to develop our aspiring and existing managers and leaders to support their skill development in an ever-evolving landscape in our organisation and in the wider sector. I also lead on work around performance management that supports great performance and development conversations and processes. I’ve spent the majority of my career working at Aegon, doing a variety of roles across Operations and moving to the people function in the last three years