Meet with PWL Capital: https://pages.pwlcapital.com/en-ca/contact-us?utm_source=content&utm_medium=youtube&utm_campaign=rationalreminder_yt Avoid Online Scams https://pwlcapital.com/stay-safe-online/ Ben Felix or any PWL employee will never reach out to you on social media platforms or WhatsApp to give financial advice. These are scammers trying to commit fraud. Financial planning is built on assumptions — about markets, inflation, longevity, human behaviour, and even the questions clients bring into the room. In this episode, Ben and Braden welcome a diverse panel that originally came together at the FP Canada Conference to explore how those assumptions influence planning outcomes in practice. Joining them are Adam Chapman, a retirement-focused planner who helps clients turn their money into memories; Joe Nunes, an actuary with decades of pension and longevity experience; and Aaron Theilade, Director of Continuing Education at FP Canada. Together, the panel unpacks how to make assumptions credible, how to stress-test them, how to navigate client bias, and how planners can blend math with humanity to create better client outcomes. Timestamps: 0:00:00 Intro 0:07:00 What makes financial planning assumptions so important to the practice of financial planning 0:08:55 Where Joe starts with planning assumptions from an actuarial perspective 0:10:52 How Braden approaches making planning assumptions with an engineering mindset 0:15:05 How Adam navigates client conversations when clients challenge the assumptions you use in a financial plan 0:19:15 How we should determine an appropriate asset allocation - which will drive the expected return assumption - for the financial plan 0:23:20 Some of the limitations of planning software and software-based modelling 0:24:47 How the limitations of planning software show up in Adam's practice 0:28:35 How a planner should navigate this, since behavioral considerations lay outside of the scope of planning software 0:32:45 How the assumptions should change based on the question that you are trying to answer 0:34:50 The software limitations Aaron has encountered, and the kinds of workarounds he has seen 0:39:11 How Adam handles client biases in assumptions 0:43:54 How Braden handles uncertainty about future planning assumptions when thinking about a projection being made today 0:48:58 Joe's actuarial perspective on moderating client biases around planning assumptions 0:53:25 How Aaron has handled client biases 0:58:04 How Joe thinks advisors should approach the fact that the map is not the territory 1:00:07 Everyone describes how frequently they think financial planning assumptions should be updated 1:08:43 Everyone gives one tip related to assumptions and financial planning projections to planners 1:20:12 Everyone defines success in their lives Links From Today’s Episode: Rational Reminder on iTunes — https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/the-rational-reminder-podcast/id1426530582. Rational Reminder on Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/rationalreminder/ Rational Reminder on YouTube — https://www.youtube.com/channel/ Benjamin Felix — https://pwlcapital.com/our-team/ Benjamin on X — https://x.com/benjaminwfelix Benjamin on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/benjaminwfelix/