Using Self Awareness to Empathize with Clients

    Financial counselors should be self-aware of their personal beliefs, attitudes, and values because they can affect how they interact with clients (Durband et al., 2019).  It will affect various factors such as training, personality, situational, and financial socialization factors. Therefore, financial counselors should know how their personal financial experiences might affect their perspectives and emotions when working with clients. In addition, families, peers, media, etc., can negatively or positively influence an individual’s financial values, attitudes, skills, and behaviors. Cooper Bumpus's knowledge of such influences gives them a perspective of how to assist clients. 

    Sometimes insurance companies can be petty when clients are experiencing challenging situations. Copper Bumpus Insurance Agency staff members empathize with their customers by putting themselves in their client's shoes. According to Durband et al., empathy is an effective communication skill financial counselors should have with clients (2019). Empathy is when you try to understand that client's perception to see why they have made certain financial decisions. Staff members at Cooper Bumpus mentioned that if it were them in a similar situation, they would want all the help they could get. Staff members are self-aware of their personal values and beliefs and connect them with their clients. They proceed with allowing the clients to express and communicate their feelings and choices. They insist on finding clients the best rates and policies with other insurance companies to help clients stuck in crappy situations. The important goal is to establish trust with the clients.

References 

Durband, D. B., Law, R. H., & Mazzolini, A. K. (2019).The importance of self-awareness for financial Counselors and Clients. In: Durband D., Law R., Mazzolini A. (eds) Financial Counseling. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-72586-4_5