Sheffield financial wins prestigious award

19th November 2018

Financial planner Jillian Thomas has been honoured with a Lifetime Achievement Award.

Jillian, who is managing director of Future Life Wealth Management, won the award at the Derbyshire Times Business Awards, in recognition of her hard work for her business - and her local community. Jillian said: -While this is an individual award, this could not be achieved without my team and everyone else who has helped me during my career. -I was overwhelmed by the response at the awards ceremony, with the whole room standing up to applaud. But that applause should be for everyone I have worked with and not just for me. The winning entry told how Jillian has risen through a very male-dominated industry to become one of the top financial planners in the country, less than ten years after setting up Future Life Wealth Management. She was inspired to make the leap into running a company after being involved in the Boxing Day Tsunami of 2004 made her reassess her 'future life'. The company, based at Renishaw, near Sheffield, has been listed in the Top 100 by New Model Adviser every year since 2013. Jillian's reputation means she is regularly called upon as an expert to comment on financial matters for the BBC. In 2017 she represented finance in the Parliamentary Review, a prestigious report which includes a foreword by Prime Minister Theresa May, and is sent to more than 250,000 leading business executives and policymakers. The award entry also highlighted how she gives back to the community with initiatives ranging from helping people with early-stage dementia deal with their finances to encouraging wildlife around the office. She is also a former governor of Chesterfield College and a past president of Sheffield Chamber of Commerce. The awards were held at Chesterfield College, with former Apprentice and Celebrity Big Brother entrant Jessica Cunningham acting as the MC. Derbyshire Times editor Phil Bramley said: -The awards night was a great celebration of some of the out-standing business we have in our local community. -It was especially moving to see the standing ovation which Jillian Thomas received as she collected her Lifetime Achievement award and as she spoke powerfully about how being caught up in the Boxing Day Tsunami while on holiday in Thailand changed her life forever. Future Life Wealth Management offers a bespoke financial planning service to generators of wealth, typically business owners, executives and professionals, and also to receivers of wealth, such as inheritors, divorcees, widows and retirees.