AFSE Directors

Cara Edwards – President
Cara is the founding director of Pinnacle Financial Services Academy, a new and innovative financial services RTO. Pinnacle has gone from strength to strength with Cara recently joining forces with John Prowse - former CIO of Tribeca Limited - to move the business forwards. The development of the RTO is the culmination of Cara's substantial financial services experience in compliance, para-planning, training, advising, technical, practice management and software development for financial planners.

Cara has also worked for a number of training organisations in a variety of capacities from designing and delivering corporate induction programs, reviewing existing training materials against national training requirements and updating content for currency, writing of materials, presentations and development of assessments.

Cara is a long-standing member of the Financial Planning Association (FPA). Her involvement in various education committees and industry consulatation with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) and the FPA for Regulatory Guidance 146 demonstrates Cara's dedication and passion for the financial planning industry and ensures she remains current and close to the financial services professionals and trends in the market.

Mike Salter – Vice President
Mike has been a member of the AFSE and supported the organisation through sponsorship since 2004. He is a senior account executive with Wilson Learning Australia and responsible for business development, account management, performance consultation and facilitation within the Australia and New Zealand operation. Prior to joining Wilson Learning, Mike worked in management and marketing roles including the role of senior account manager for a boutique financial recruitment organisation and varied executive leadership roles within the hospitality and travel industry.

Mike’s technical focus areas are:

• Business creation and relationship management
• Needs analysis and solution development
  
• Interpersonal effectiveness
• Service, sales and leadership performance
• Innovator and business strategy facilitation

Mike has undertaken studies in business and organisational development at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) and hospitality management at the Queensland Institute of Technology (QIT) Gatton. The majority of Mike’s responsibility is in working with large client organisations including IBM, Suncorp, and BlueScope Steel. Mike’s role encompasses in-depth consulting, curriculum design, facilitation, and relationship management across a broad range of industries and organisations.

Mike’s industry experience lies in the financial services industry, recruitment, manufacturing, IT, consulting and business Services and hospitality and tourism. He obtained a Bachelor of Business (University of Technology Sydney 2004) and an Associate Diploma Hospitality Management (Queensland Institute of technology).

Leigh Wilby
Leigh has had over 12 years experience across training and development, sales and marketing and operations in the financial services industry where she has held management positions at AMP, Centric Wealth, Berkley Group, Godfrey Pembroke and MMI.

In her current as the Professional Development Manager at AMP Horizons Financial Planning Academy, she is responsible for the organisation, development and management of the Horizons Academy curriculum and planner development programs, including: content design and structure, internal and external vendor management, development of sustainable learning programs and learning accreditation for over 90 trainee financial planners per year. Prior to this, Leigh was the manager for training and development at Centric Wealth Ltd.

Leigh holds a Diploma of Financial Services (Financial Planning), Diploma in Public Relations, Certificate IV in Training and Assessment and she is currently completing a Bachelor of Adult and Vocational Education. She is a member of the Association of Financial Services Educators and the Australian Institute of Training and Development.

Arndria Seymour
Arndria is Head of Training Design and Delivery, Business Products and Development at the Commonwealth Bank of Australia. She has extensive experience in Human Resources, in particular training and organisational development with tertiary qualifications in Marketing (Bachelor of Commerce) and Organisational Development (Master of Commerce).

Arndria has held many senior learning and development/organisational development roles with demonstrated success in aligning Learning Management technology and solutions with operational and strategic learning requirements. Significant proven experience across enterprise-wide learning management systems, service delivery, quality assurance and project management areas. Conceptual and first-hand experience in the operation, cultural change, project management and implementation of strategic learning and development programs within large global organisations.

Arndria is best known is the finance sector, where she has worked in banking, financial services, financial planning, life insurance, general insurance and workers compensation over the past 28 years. In her former role at Allianz she developed the Greenfield learning and development, organisational design site across Allianz Australia, becoming an industry recognised leader in the implementation of eLearning initiatives for over 3300 employees and 9000 intermediaries.

Arndria has worked in the Munich head office and established the global framework for consulting, various local implementations and the overall global management of the Allianz (Saba) learning management system. Management included platform configuration, content design, generic content purchase and platform management.

Arndria has strong people management and interpersonal skills combined with exceptional negotiation and financial management skills necessary for management and key performance reporting to Boards and organisational executive teams, ensuring benefit realisations plans are achieved.