Deals & People March 5, 2015

NFP Retirement Adds Five Consultants

NFP Retirement hired five new consultants to its retirement plan and investment consulting teams in Texas and California.
Reported by

The additions include retirement plan consultants Solomon Stewart, Daniel Kallus, and Vince Learned, who each assist plan sponsors in designing and operating retirement plans. Geoff Keeling, another new hire, is responsible for providing investment consultation and serves on NFP Retirement’s investment committee.

NFP Retirement also announced its acquisition of The 401(k) Concierge, a retirement plan consulting firm. Managed by Allison Kaylor Flink and based in Austin, Texas, the firm will expand NFP Retirement’s reach in the Texas region.

Never miss a story — sign up for PLANADVISER newsletters to keep up on the latest retirement plan adviser news.

“We’re thrilled to welcome Solomon, Daniel, Vince, Geoff and Allison to our team,” says Nick Della Vedova, president of NFP Retirement. “With this new talent, we now have 10 in-house analysts with the chartered financial analyst (CFA) designation, deepening our existing investment expertise and ability to deliver positive outcomes for clients.” 

In his new role, Stewart conducts investment due diligence reviews and educates fiduciaries on best practices in plan design, fee benchmarking, and participant outcomes. He is based in Orange County, California. 

Kallus brings investment due diligence consulting to plan sponsor clients, especially in the area of retirement plan investment lineups. He is based in the NFP Retirement Houston office in Texas.

Bringing 15 years of industry experience, Learned works with clients to help ensure plan design and investment due diligence best practices among fiduciaries. He is based in Orange County, California, and holds Series 7 and 66 licenses.

Also serving in the Orange County office, Keeling assists in driving investment due diligence for clients. He has over 15 years of retirement industry experience with a focus on asset management and investment due diligence for plan sponsors.

Kaylor Flink specializes in Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) issues and defined contribution plan services. She assists clients of varying sizes, tailoring plan design that meets the needs of plan sponsors and participants. She also assists with investment due diligence, provider benchmarking, advanced plan design, and fiduciary compliance. She is based in the NFP Retirement Austin, Texas, office.

Diversions March 5, 2015

Personal Tech Still a Big Plus

Internet users still overwhelmingly think that personal technology makes the world better, according to Microsoft’s second annual survey of Internet users around the world.
Reported by

Large majorities of the online populations in all five developed countries surveyed (France, Germany, Japan, South Korea and the U.S.) and all seven developing countries surveyed (Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Russia, South Africa and Turkey) say that technology has vastly improved how they shop, work and learn.

Respondents continue to be most enthusiastic about technology’s effects on the economy and most concerned about privacy. The role of technology in transportation and literacy moved up, while technology’s ability to improve social bonds and enhance personal freedom and expression moved down. Concern about privacy jumped five points.

For more stories like this, sign up for the PLANADVISERdash daily newsletter.

How technology will affect people in the future is creating some division between developing and developed countries. Developing countries express deep and genuine enthusiasm about the benefits of technology, whereas developed countries, where technology is more ubiquitous, express greater concerns about emerging issues, including its impact on social bonds, the media and facilitation of consumer-driven services.

Among the results:

  • Respondents in all the countries agree that social media has had a positive impact on social activism, with some concerns emerging especially in developed countries like France, the U.S. and Germany. Developing countries remain enthusiastic about technology opening up political expression, but their enthusiasm was more tempered this year.
  • In all 12 countries, respondents say personal technology has had a positive impact on their ability to find more affordable products. Even two out of three (65%) of respondents in the least enthusiastic country, China, believe this.
  • In each of the countries, respondents think personal technology has improved innovation in business, including more than three-quarters of people in developing countries. In Indonesia, Brazil and India, more than 80% of Internet users think this.
  • Respondents in all countries say personal technology has had a positive impact on the ability to start new businesses, with Indonesia and Brazil leading the way.
  • Most respondents in nearly every country think technology has improved productivity, with on average more than seven in ten saying so in developing countries.

«