While a career in financial services comes with long hours, advisers need to do a better job of practising what they preach on mental health.
Ahead of World Mental Health Day (10 October), Kristian Breeze, director of healthcare at Ascend Broking Group (pictured), tells Health & Protection the hardest lesson he has learned over his career is that being busy and being resilient are not the same thing.
Badge of honour
“In financial services, long hours and pressure can almost become badges of honour. I don’t think that is particularly healthy,” Breeze says.
“Exercise, proper downtime and talking openly have made the biggest difference for me. What I’ve learned is that good mental health requires maintenance. You shouldn’t wait for something to break before paying attention to it.”
Strange duality
Breeze points to an irony and a strange duality in the industry.
“Advisers spend their working lives encouraging people to protect their health, income and families against risks they cannot predict,” he continues. “Yet we can be remarkably poor at protecting ourselves. If we genuinely believe in prevention and early intervention for our clients, we should be prepared to practise what we preach.”
