A 30 minute watch.

Mark Polson is chief of the lang cat, a consultancy that works with advisers and providers alike to help build their propositions, and define and refine their strategy and communications. In this wide-ranging interview with Lee Robertson, Mark chats through lang cat’s recent live event, its work with advisers and asset managers, and his view on the Woodford saga.

The distillation of compliance for clients is an important area of focus for the lang cat. Mark makes the point that the onslaught of new rules-based regulation is hard for advisers to “navigate, plus do the day job”, and that while most firms are broadly compliant, it’s a bit like “passing your driving test versus knowing how to drive – your hands need to be at 10 to 2”.

He uses the demographic make-up of adviser books as an example. Heft with late-boomer clients on the brink of retirement with plenty of liquid assets, the landscape of products, he says, is not suitable for this segment.

As new products are developed and rolled-out to meet needs, regulators will need convincing – through proper evidence and documentation – that advisers have a thorough product understanding and are making suitable recommendations to their clients.

Woodford inevitably crops-up. While accepting issues with the fund manager’s enthusiasm of illiquid positions, Mark takes aim at the distributors, pointing out that they should have realised “the sexy stuff might not be right for Mr & Mrs Miggins”. Their responsibility, he says, lies with the fact “the buy-list becomes a proxy” for due diligence when it comes to self-directed investors buying funds on D2C platforms.

Rounding-off with his work for asset managers, Mark makes the point that regulation like MiFID II is “tough”, and forcing them “down the mountain” to describe the value they create for end-clients and the propriety of their products.

Mark also appears in our quick-fire question round if you fancy a shorter watch.