Q. How long have you been a broker and why did you get into the industry?

I started broking in 2001 and then did five years in the industry. I jumped out and had a stint in the legal industry for 10 years and returned to broking around 2015. As for why I became a broker? I really enjoyed banking. I was in banking with Bank of Queensland and enjoyed helping people, but I realised that it was limited in terms of what we could offer at just one lender. So, when the idea of broking was further developed, I saw that it could be a way that we could say yes to more people and just help people move forward with their lives. That was the motivation to get into a derivation of lending and into a broader market.

Q. How long did it take you to reach a billion dollars in settled loans?

It’s been across two tranches of time, 2001–05 was probably the first part. At the time, we built a team of about 12 brokers across Queensland and we were dug into the back of a law firm, which was a great lead generation source for us. And it’s been about eight years in the making of this business. So, it’s probably safe to say it took the best part of 13 years to get to that point across two different businesses.

Q. Were there any specific methods you used to reach this milestone?

We just continued to put our head down and employ really good people. That’s been one of the cornerstones of what we’ve done, to get people that really understand client service, that are efficient and that get along [together]. We’ve probably staffed a little over so that we continue to give first-class service to our referrers and our clients. We just kept doing what we were doing, which is servicing our clients. We simply just kept moving towards our goals, which were to get $20 million a month settled and then $25 million a month settled, and so on. We were focusing a little bit more on the micro than the macro (of settling a billion dollars!). It was about: ‘what are we going to do this month, and this financial year and then this calendar year?’. So we hit just a little over $225 million settled last year, which was a wonderful surprise and it was a lot of hard work to get there. But we’re aiming up at bigger and better things. We’re trying to get the $30 million a month this year and in the face of some changes, we’re going to have to work really hard to do that.

Q. How has Finsure helped you succeed as a billion-dollar broker?

We use and we’ve been heavily involved in helping develop the Finsure Infynity platform. It’s been wonderful to just drive it in the way we want to use it. Not many businesses have as many as we have on our team, so we need to make sure that we all know what we’re up to. We’ve worked with Simon [Bednar] and the development team just to bring what we want and what we need to manage our business into that, it’s been really helpful that we didn’t just go and get something off the shelf or rely on something that Finsure already had; they invited us in. That was a critical plank for us and we’re still helping develop that and we love it because we can see some of the cool things that we’ve asked for in the platform now, which makes our life much easier.

Q. What do you attribute your success to as a broker?

I think I’d have to say my ability to pick people. I’ve been fortunate and there’s a lot of people that we’ve employed that are not with us now for various reasons, but I’m really happy with the people we’ve got. That would be my big strength, the people management side of it or knowing how to pick people who have complementary skill sets and can do the things I can’t do very well or don’t particularly like doing.

How Finsure supports high-performing brokers

Q: Matt mentioned he had worked collaboratively with Finsure on tailoring Finsure’s software. Why do you work with brokers to tweak the offering in this way?

Having people like Matt and his business and his peers available is really helpful for us. We’ve built a workfl ow management tool using artifi cial intelligence and Matt was critical in actually ensuring that what we did and how we provided that service actually worked in the real world. I think there’s sometimes a very big disconnect between what we think is important and potentially what is actually important. So, we take the approach that we’re here to really support our brokers rather than lead and provide services that the brokers have to take up. And because of that ethos and the way we think, it’s all about collaboratively providing services that benefi t businesses like Matt’s and even the smaller ones that are on that journey. We put together steering committees and we put together opportunities for brokers in any walk of life to be part of that journey; to provide insights; to be part of the team that tests and confi rms that what we have in mind actually works.

Q: Are there any common traits in billion-dollar brokers?

I think there’s a few traits that are common across these types of individuals and, ultimately, their businesses. The first one is just a real tenacity to get up in the morning and really make a difference. They’re very structured in the way they approach their business; they set milestones [and] they follow through on those milestones. Some brokers get up in the morning and just hope for the best. But unfortunately, the phone doesn’t ring unless you make it ring. The other thing is they hire very good staff. You can walk into one of those businesses and they’ve got solid people behind them. And the other thing is that these businesses aren’t afraid to reach out for assistance when they need us … they’re more than inclined to put their hand up and ask for help.

Simon Bednar

CEO

Finsure

You can find out more about Matt Punter and how he runs his brokerage in The Adviser’s Elite Broker podcast, below: