I would advise the boss to give this financial planner strict parameters about what they can and cannot do. As a person with a compliance-related / liability-reducing job, this is your duty.
E.g. if the company facilitates this financial planner putting a bunch of people into mis-priced assets for the planner's benefit, the company might share some liability when a group of the employees wises up. Likewise, if the financial planner puts people into risky things, like crypto funds or junk bonds, employees might wonder why the boss was so enthusiastic about it. At a minimum, management
could will lose credibility if they're using their employees to let other people do sales pitches for shit products on company time.
Some lines in the sand might include:
-no pitching crypto assets
-no encouraging junk bonds
-no leveraged products
-no encouraging 401k loans
-full disclaimers about how stocks and bonds can go down or up
-emphasis on demonstrating how one's savings rate is a bigger determinant of wealth than their asset selection or timing (e.g. Bob, the world's worst market timer)
-no funds with >1.5% ERs.
@SilentC is correct. Running company retirement plans is expensive and risky. Somebody has to be compensated to do it.
The problem is that some financial advisors take their compensation in the form of steering people into risky and expensive funds, with kickbacks to the financial advisor. This shifts the cost burden from the company to the employees, while simultaneously reducing the returns experienced by employees.
