The Intermediary – July 2026 - Flipbook - Page 88
In Profile.
Q&A
Jessica O’Connor speaks with Emma Hollingworth,
chief distribution officer at LSL Financial Services,
about the future of advice
A
s firms navigate everything
from Consumer Duty to artificial
intelligence (AI), success
increasingly depends on more
than just product choice.
For Emma Hollingworth, chief distribution
officer at LSL Financial Services, this is a shift that
has been taking shape for some time. Having spent
more than 25 years in the industry, she believes
that the future will be defined not by replacing
advisers, but by giving them the tools to deliver
better advice.
In light of this, The Intermediary sat down with
Hollingworth to discuss the future of the adviser
market and why she believes advice itself has
become the industry’s most valuable product.
Advice first
Hollingworth’s career has been built around one
consistent theme: advice. After leaving school
midway through her A-levels, Hollingworth began
in an administrative role at a local independent
financial advice (IFA) firm, before completing her
CeMAP, and launching her career in advice.
She explains: “All of my career has been in and
around advisers and the value they bring. I’m very
wedded to the adviser market.”
Today, Hollingworth oversees four businesses
within LSL’s financial services division: Primis
Mortgage Network, TMA Mortgage Club, Linear
and protection sourcing platform Novium.
Despite the breadth of the role, however, she
deliberately keeps her focus simple: “I only ever
think about four stakeholders. The advisers, my
colleagues, customers and the regulator.”
She adds: “A business that fixates on only
one of those four is problematic; I think you’ve
got to deliver for all of them. Over the last two
years, we’ve taken a broader perspective on how
we want to run our business and serve those
stakeholder groups better than ever.”
The future model
While the core skills of a good adviser
have remained consistent over the years,
the environment in which firms operate is
constantly changing.
Hollingworth says: “I don’t think the adviser
skill set has changed at all. But I do think there’s
86
The Intermediary | July 2026
a mindset shift here, in that advice is the product,
not the product itself. I think if advisers can make
that mindset shift […] then the skill set of the
adviser remains really important and doesn’t
change a great deal.”
In addition, Hollingworth believes some of
the biggest changes are taking place around the
advice process. As firms contend with increasing
regulatory expectations, partnering with
organisations that can provide broader support is
becoming increasingly attractive.
She explains: “The market’s made up of mostly
small firms. If you’re the principal of a small
firm, you’re the CEO, the COO, the CMO – you’re
everything. That makes it hard for a small firm to
keep up. So, I do think what we’ll see is greater
partnering with firms that can keep up with
market developments, so that, in turn, small firms
can continue to be at the forefront of the market.”
One of the clearest market trends, she adds, is
consolidation. Recent Financial Conduct Authority
(FCA) data shows fewer firms and principals
operating across the market, and increasing
regulatory demands are making scale more
important than ever.
Hollingworth says: “I believe there’ll only be five
networks in five years. It’s very difficult, if you are
a small network, to keep up with the demands of
the regulator and customers and advisers.”
The next generation
While evolving business models may shape the
future of the intermediary market, Hollingworth
believes one of the industry’s greatest long-term
challenges is attracting new talent.
Rather than individual firms attempting to solve
the problem alone, Hollingworth believes the
industry needs a far more collaborative approach
to promoting financial advice as a career.
She says: “The industry has got to come together
to find the advisers of the future. I don’t know
what gets in the way, but, as an industry, we have
got the opportunity to show what a fantastic
career you can have in our market. That’s the
route I took, and it is one of the best decisions I’ve
ever made.”
However, attracting that talent is, in her view,
largely a question of perception: “As an industry,
we are not as good at selling ourselves as we could
