Northampton Business School partners with Legal and General Financial Solutions

​​Northampton Business School (NBS) at the University of Northampton is pleased to announce the launch of a significant partnership with Legal & General (L&G) Financial Solutions, which forms part of the UK and International Development division of Legal & General.

L&G Financial Solutions’ vision is to deliver a professional, ethical and highly valued financial solutions advice service to its customers. To help achieve this goal, L&G Financial Solutions wishes to work with NBS to offer L&G staff a blended corporate learning programme that will enable them to achieve a top-up degree in Banking and Financial Planning.

The University of Northampton is only one of the few universities to offer such a degree programme. Workplace mentors will be provided for those who take the opportunity to participate in the programme.

L&G Financial Solutions also wishes to help train the next generation of financial planners to address the skills shortage as a result of the recent radical changes in the financial services industry. Five bursaries worth £2,000 each will be offered to students at NBS who will be starting their degree in Banking and Financial Planning from September 2013. This scheme is unique because the successful applicants will also have an opportunity to undertake paid work experience in the summer months of Year One and Two, helping them with their employment prospects on completion of their degree.

Dr Lien Luu, Programme Leader for Banking and Financial Planning and Dr Mairi Watson, Head of Corporate & Postgraduate Programmes at Northampton Business School are working closely with the L&G Financial Solutions team. They commented: “We are thrilled to be working in partnership with L&G to provide this programme for its professionally qualified advisers and we are pleased to announce the bursaries they will be providing for our students. We will be working together to develop the relationship further and look forward to a long and productive collaboration.”

Dr Mike Smith, Managing Director of Legal & General Financial Solutions said: “The bursary and top-up degree schemes we are announcing today are core components in building a viable and sustainable advice-based business that has at its very core a customer-centric culture. It is part of our social responsibility to encourage new talent to join our industry. And in striving to achieve excellence, it is incumbent on us to support our colleagues to go well beyond the minimum industry standards of professionalism and qualifications as they plan their future careers. Northampton Business School is playing a leading role in the future success of L&G Financial Solutions and all that we strive to achieve.”