NAPFA Elects Locker as National Chair

Locker brings years of regional and national board leadership to NAPFA’s top volunteer position, and will assume the chairmanship immediately. She succeeds Susan John, who stayed on when Ron Rhoades, who had been chair-elect, stepped down voluntarily last month because of a compliance error. (See “Compliance Registration Error Causes NAPFA Chair-Elect to Resign.”)

Locker founded Locker Financial Services LLC in Little Falls, New Jersey, in 1992. She became a Certified Financial Planner in 1994 and joined NAPFA in 1998. Her practice was established to work with middle-income individuals, especially women and non-traditional families. During her more than 20 years in the field, she’s seen a growing demand for financial services that focus on the aging and elderly population. To better understand and serve these clients, she became a Registered Financial Gerontologist (RFG) as well as a Certified Senior Advisor. She established a new division of her business, ElderLife, to work with aging adults.

Locker is the immediate past-chair of NAPFA’s Northeast/Mid-Atlantic Board and has served on NAPFA’s National Board for the past two years. In her new role, she is committed to seeing NAPFA achieve its goal of becoming “the recognized and unquestioned leader in supporting the professional growth and business development of extraordinary financial advisers.”

Locker’s objectives will be to lead the board in its effort to sharply define and promote the NAPFA brand; provide NAPFA members with educational opportunities; and ensure that the organization’s fiduciary perspective is represented nationally.

Calling this a critical time for the organization and the industry, Locker said that the current debate regarding oversight and regulation gives NAPFA members an opportunity to bring their commitment to the fiduciary standard to the forefront. “Our members already pledge to employ full disclosure, transparency and accountability in every interaction with every client,” Locker said. “We can’t let uncertainty about regulatory issues cause us to lose that all-important focus. We need to forget about ‘business as usual’ and begin to think in terms of business as it should be to meet the needs of the public who have their eyes open and their expectations set high.”