CFP Board encourages people from all backgrounds to value financial planning. CFP Board wants everyone to know he or she can obtain competent and ethical personal financial planning from individuals entitled to use CFP Board's marks.

To achieve these goals, CFP Board will undertake several programs in 2006. CFP Board's Board of Governors met September 22 and 23 in Denver and agreed upon an overall framework for furthering its purposes through specific programs. These programs provide an opportunity for all of CFP Board's constituencies to work together. Here is a summary of some of the initiatives discussed or under development.

The Board of Governors will form a task force to conduct a comprehensive review of education requirements. Education is one of the four "Es"-the others being examination, experience and ethics-forming the foundation of CFP Board's core operations. The Board of Governors reviews these elements in regular rotation to assure relevance within the current financial services environment.

The Education Task Force will include representatives of CFP Board's various constituencies as well as experts from other relevant backgrounds. The task force, which will be chaired by Robert Glovsky, CFP®, will consider the implications of evolving educational patterns and demographics. It will be charged with analyzing whether CFP Board's support of its registered programs is optimal and offer suggestions for improvement.

CFP Board will send more communications to stakeholders in 2006. These will include increased communications from the Chair of CFP Board's Board of Governors and offer more information on the activity of the Board of Governors and subsidiary boards. CFP Board's website will become more interactive and ever-changing so that communication is fresh and current.

The Board of Governors is pleased to announce that they will host CFP Board's First Annual Conference Meeting August 1-5, 2006. This multi-day meeting incorporates within it the Programs Directors Conference, the Firm Meeting, and meetings by the subsidiary boards. It will be held in Santa Monica. By sponsoring this meeting the Board of Governors will be able to interact with all of these vital constituencies.

CFP Board will roll out in 2006 and 2007 several new external initiatives. These include, in addition to the annual meeting:

• an initiative to work with employers to include financial planning as a standard employee benefit
• a coordinated effort with significant public constituencies to make people more familiar with the value of financial planning
• a coordinated effort to tap governmental networks and programs to further awareness of the benefits of financial planning and working with a CFP® professional
• coordinating undertakings with groups that reach under- served populations, such as through a program where CFP Board "invests" in supporting these groups.

CFP Board expects to complete by 2006 its administrative reforms that are allowing it to manage its core operations more efficiently. CFP Board will convert its IT operations to a totally new operating platform in 2006. This will enable it to serve certificants and the public with greater speed and reliability and at lower cost than in the past. At the same time, CFP Board will finalize a conversion to other new software systems that will allow for greater efficiency in other core operations as well, from payroll to professional review.

CFP Board will conclude its review of professional review processes and procedures and its review of CFP Board's Financial Planning Practice Standards and Code of Ethics and Professional Responsibility in the first quarter of 2006. It is expected that later in the year, slightly revised versions of these documents will be distributed for public comment.

More information will be forthcoming in future issues of CFP Board Report.