Why Wealth Advisors Keep Leaving Insurance on the Table — and What It Costs Their Clients

A conversation with Jaclyn Nemethy, Senior Director of Strategic Relationships at PPI, cuts to the heart of one of the most persistent gaps in Canadian wealth planning.

The problem is not ignorance. Most wealth advisors understand, at least in the abstract, that insurance belongs in a comprehensive financial plan. The problem is execution — the gap between knowing insurance should be part of the conversation and actually making it happen. In a recent episode of AdvisorTalks¹, Jaclyn Nemethy, Senior Director of Strategic Relationships at PPI, laid out exactly why that gap persists, and what it takes to close it.

Nemethy works exclusively with wealth-focused advisors helping them build, or rebuild, their insurance capability. Her observations are not theoretical. They come from years of frontline conversations with advisors who are, in her words, "running on fumes" — capable professionals who genuinely intend to bring insurance into their practice but never quite get there.

Client Expectations Have Moved

The starting point, as Nemethy frames it, is a shift in what clients are actually asking for. "Client expectations are evolving," she says. "Clients are more informed and expect comprehensive planning, not just investment advice or management. They really want clarity on, 'Am I gonna be okay? Will I be okay in retirement? And what's gonna happen with my wealth when I'm gone?'"

Those are not investment management questions. They are planning questions, and they require insurance as part of the answer. The wealth advisor who cannot address estate transfer, legacy, and protection leaves a hole in the plan — and increasingly, sophisticated clients notice.

The Advisor Who Dabbles Goes Nowhere

Geoff Evans, Vice-President of Marketing and Communications at PPI, notes from his own experience training advisors that insurance was always the harder sell. Clients sign paperwork and assets move — investments feel clean. Insurance is slower, more complex, and requires the client to sit with uncomfortable questions across multiple meetings.

Nemethy's diagnosis of why advisors fail to integrate insurance is precise: they do not pick a lane. "What I find is advisors really don't properly pick a lane when they talk about how they're going to integrate insurance into their practice," she says. "They kind of dabble everywhere and then end up not doing much of anything because they just don't have a clear plan."

The framework she puts to every advisor she works with is direct: Do you have capacity to do this yourself? Does someone on your team? If neither, the answer is partnership.

The Aging Advisor Problem

There is a generational dimension to this challenge that Nemethy articulates with particular clarity. Many advisors in practice today did solid insurance work early in their careers, when younger clients needed risk protection — life insurance, disability, income coverage. That work receded as clients accumulated wealth and the advisory focus shifted to portfolio management. Now those same clients are in their 60s, facing estate planning questions and wealth transfer decisions that are, at their core, insurance conversations.

"Advisors that really did great insurance work 20 years ago have to shift back into the mindset of: 'okay, now we can leverage this planning tool of insurance and integrate it into the go forward plan along with your wealth strategy,'" Nemethy observes. The discomfort is real — they have to relearn how to ride a bike they put down a long time ago. The cost of not doing so falls on clients.

Partnership Without Losing the Relationship

For advisors without the capacity or appetite to rebuild insurance expertise themselves, partnership with a specialist is the logical route. Evans pressed on the obvious fear: an outside expert enters a carefully nurtured client relationship and, somehow, the client gravitates toward them. Nemethy addresses this directly.

The safeguard is specificity. "You should have a written agreement outlining roles and responsibilities with respect to the client," she says. "What servicing looks like in terms of partnering with that advisor... You're the wealth advisor. You're in the driver's seat. That is your client relationship. They're parachuting in as a specialist."

The agreement should define everything: communication protocols, servicing responsibilities, commissions. And if the relationship breaks down, the wealth advisor can execute an Agent of Record transfer and redirect commissions with a single form. The structural protection exists. Most advisors simply have not used it.

The One Process Change That Starts Everything

For advisors who want to move from intention to action, Nemethy's practical prescription is disarmingly simple. Add "insurance review" to the annual review agenda. No quotes required, no analysis prepared in advance.

"Put 'insurance review' on the agenda," she says. "Then you can tell the client, 'We've expanded our team and we are actually now partnered with an amazing advisor within the insurance space. We haven't done a review for a number of years now for your insurance, so I think we need to do a deep dive there.'" The specialist handles the rest. The advisor's job is to signal that the conversation is now part of the practice.

That is the tweak. The rest follows from it.

5 Key Takeaways

1. Comprehensive planning is the new baseline. Clients are asking whether they will be okay in retirement and what happens to their wealth when they are gone. Advisors who cannot address those questions through an integrated plan that includes insurance are answering only part of what clients need.
2. Dabbling is not a strategy. Advisors who attempt to add insurance without committing to a clear model — doing it themselves, building internal capacity, or partnering externally — consistently produce zero results. The lane must be chosen before the work begins.
3. The capacity question is non-negotiable. An advisor who does not have time for insurance will not do insurance well, regardless of intentions. Honest self-assessment about capacity is the prerequisite to any meaningful integration.
4. Partnership is a structural decision, not a relationship risk. A written agreement defining roles, communication protocols, and servicing responsibilities puts the wealth advisor firmly in control of the client relationship. The specialist is a parachute-in resource, not a threat.
5. Process change is the ignition point. Adding "insurance review" to the standing client agenda is the single most accessible first step. It signals to clients that insurance is now a pillar of the practice, creates a natural entry point for a specialist, and costs the advisor almost nothing in preparation time.

Footnote:

1 Nemethy, Jaclyn, and Geoff Evans. "Integrating Insurance Into a Wealth Practice." AdvisorTalk, PPI, 31 Mar. 2026, www.advisortalk.ca/2026/03/31/integrating-insurance-into-a-wealth-practice/.