Mapping a New Programme with Massey

With the new legislative regime for Financial Services in effect from mid-March 2021, all financial services practitioners in New Zealand must conform to the new Code of Professional Conduct for Financial Advice Services.  The code requires that those giving financial advice must meet the outcomes of the New Zealand Certificate in Financial Services (NZCFS), Level 5, version 2.  This qualification was developed by Skills in consultation with the financial services industry.

The code allows for alternative qualifications to be used to demonstrate competence if they have been independently verified as meeting the outcomes of the New Zealand Certificate in Financial Services, Level 5, version 2.

As a financial services training provider, Massey University, in partnership with Kaplan International (the largest financial services training provider in Australia), reached out to Skills to map a new programme that would align with this update.

The Skills team kicked off the project by working with Massey to map what they were teaching students against the new Skills certificate requirements. “We had brilliant guidance from the team at Skills” says Jeff Stangl, Executive Director at Massey. From there, Massey enlisted the support of subject matter experts (SME’s) from New Zealand and Australia, who brought across useful material from the Australian curriculum for their new programme, Certificate in Business Studies (Financial Services Pathway), Level 5. After working through changes and revisions with support from the SME’s, the team completed the new programme to meet the outcomes of the NZCFS in December 2020.

“[The Skills Team] were great communicators, gave us a clear path that needed to be followed with steps along the way, and the project was completed within budget and on time. We look forward to working with Skills again in the future.”

Massey’s new programme officially launched on the 13th of April.