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Best of the Best: Leadership Award Finalist Kathleen Kelly

Editor’s Note: This is the first of three profiles of the three finalists for the 2014 NAPA 401(k) Leadership Award.

Now in its seventh year, the NAPA 401(k) Advisor Leadership Award continues to recognize leadership, innovation and contributions to the retirement plan industry with the sales, marketing and establishment of 401(k) plans.

There are three finalists for this year's Leadership Award: Alliance Benefit Group Financial Services, represented by Bradley K. Arends, J.D.; Compass Financial Partners, represented by Kathleen A. Kelly, CRPS®, AIFA®; and Maresh Yoshida 401(k) Group, represented by Henry Yoshida, CFP®, CIMA®. One of the three will receive the 2014 401(k) Advisor Leadership Award during the 2014 NAPA 401(k) SUMMIT, March 24 in New Orleans.

Finalist Kathleen Kelly is a Founding and Managing Partner of Compass Financial Partners, LLC, in Greensboro, NC. She is a 17-year veteran of the financial services industry, specializing in the areas of retirement plan consulting and investment advisory services for qualified retirement plans and executive benefit planning. A semi-finalist for last year’s Leadership Award, Kelly has also been named to the Principal Financial Professional Advisor Council, the Prudential Advisor Council, the MassMutual Retirement Partners Council, the Transamerica Retirement Solutions RIA Advisory Board, the J.P. Morgan Advisor Council and the Retirement Advisor Council.

Kelly and her team are no strangers to the spotlight. Since 2002, they have been featured and awarded in more than 15 nationally recognized honors, including 401kWire’s 2011 300 Most Influential Advisors in Defined Contribution and PLANADVISER’s 2013 Top 100 Retirement Plan Advisers.
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In 2013 Kelly and her team launched “Worksite Financial Solutions,” a revolutionary new way to provide individualized financial advice to participants. The program allows Compass to have unique conversations with plan sponsors that differentiate their practice and showcase the way they can work with participants holistically to improve retirement readiness. Today, Compass is implementing WFS throughout their book of business and launching participant programs that focus on maximizing participant outcomes.
No stranger to civic and philanthropic activities, Kelly served on the Wake Forest Alumni Council and the Greensboro College Board of Visitors, and was a member of Leadership Greensboro, Class of 2002. She was selected as one of the Triads “40 Leaders Under 40 ” and was awarded a “Women in Business” Award by the Triad Business Journal. Her community involvement has included work with the Friends You Can Count On (breast cancer research), Operation Smile, founding membership in the Steering Committee for Women’s Programming with the Greensboro Chamber of Commerce, and her current position on the Board of Directors of the Peaks to Piedmont Girl Scout Council. Kelly also recently completed her 1-year term as the 2011 American Heart Association Guilford Heart Ball Chair, having achieved both fundraising and attendance numbers representing new records.

Worksite Financial Solutions is offered through LPL Financial; Kathleen Kelly is a Registered Representative and Investment Advisor Representative with LPL Financial

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