Debra Wooding

I love getting to know people and really actually getting them right. Really, really understanding what matters to them and for us as Investment Advisers and Portfolio Managers, we need to understand our clients in order to build the proper solution for them. What it really entails is what makes them happy, what keeps them up at night, what they're worried about, right. And then putting those pieces together to build a great portfolio. Solve their problems for the future.

They all want something and that's either income in retirement. It could be to fund their children's education. It could be to take their hard earned money from selling a business and investing that to create future income. Could be building a legacy. Many different things.

Our boardroom table is a kitchen table and it's a kitchen table because most of the big decisions, and I could probably say all of the big decisions in our family are made at the kitchen table. And we didn't want our boardroom, our client meeting room to feel stuffy or, you know, corporate, so to speak. We wanted it to be a place where people were comfortable to sit down and have a conversation about what matters and make good decisions. So that's probably one way that we bring those family values to our clients.

Community is really important to me. I'm currently a Vice President of the Compassion House Foundation, which is a wonderful sanctuary for women with breast cancer.

I feel it's my responsibility to give back.

I'm Debra Wooding. I'm an Investment Advisor, Vice President of CIBC Wood Gundy.

Tom Wooding

How money works and how it can do things for people, you know, it is something that I'm always curious about.

I come from a family that were successful and are successful and they're very good at making money. They aren't so good at necessarily keeping it. And really in the end, had no idea how to make money work and the craft of having money work for you rather than you working for money. And so that's a big part of the reason I got in this business was to understand that.

I'm always learning in the financial services industry. Always chunking away or, you know, looking at different courses I can take. Everyday Deb has to pull me away from reading financial articles. Let's go home. You know, and I don't want to go. I just love reading and understanding and then being able to translate the things that I'm learning into helping my clients.

You know, I think that the core of it is understanding people and their needs, probably understanding them better than they understand them themselves. And then bringing financial experiences and the nuance and the craft, really, of managing money to bear to solve the concerns that they probably didn't even know they had. And help them meet their long term goals and short term goals. And ultimately help their families meet their goals.

We have all kinds of clients who tell us, you know, so glad we found you. It's made an incredible difference to us. You know, our retirement is better than we ever thought it was going to be is a comment that we hear a lot. So, you know, I think a family environment helping, whether it's families or individuals, is super powerful.

I'm Tom Wooding. I am a First Vice President, Portfolio Manager and Investment Advisor with The Wooding Group at CIBC Wood Gundy.

Lindsay MacPhie

Family business is super challenging and that I really enjoy. Our industry is always changing. I like change. I thrive in that kind of an environment. But most of all, I get to deal with people everyday that I really enjoy.

When I was eight years old, I used to come downtown with my mom on weekends. And, you know, I would say assist, but I'm not actually sure what I did at that time other than getting in her way. But I was just I was raised in the business, you know, and I saw how hard both of my parents worked.

At that time I didn't realize what an impact that would make on my life in the future, but that's made a huge impact just being raised and around it.

I've actually been every single role in our team. So in that, I think I built really strong foundations and I wouldn't have had that any other way. But I'll tell you, Tom and Deb, wouldn't have had that other way. It wasn't come work for The Wooding Group and here's you know, you're the associate. It was come work for The Wooding Group, start at, you know, the very bottom and let's see what you can do.

We kind of say that Deb and Tom are working on the business, you know with the clients. And that's a part of what I do too. But I also work in the business to make sure that the clients' experience is a repeatable one. I'm also the financial planner for our group, which is a designation that Tom and Deb don't have. So that's kind of a bit more of my expertise.

The question people ask is, am I going to live my money? Right? I mean, that's what a lot of people worry about, most people worry about, and our job is to set them free from that worry. So when we talk about the responsibility of managing someone's wealth, it's a huge responsibility and one that we don't take lightly in our team. But it also has huge rewards when you see them, you know, meet their goals and have peace of mind about the finances.

I am Lindsay MacPhie, Associate Investment Advisor and Business Leader of The Wooding Group at CIBC Wood Gundy.

Peter MacPhie

Simplicity is an art form. When I did my masters at the U of A, one the biggest piece of feedback I got at the end of it from my classmates was my ability to take complex matters and distill them down to their simplest elements. I think that's important when dealing with complicated matters like financial affairs. To get it down to its core element and ask yourself the right questions and keep the answers to them as simple as possible.

I come from Montreal. We lived in a two story, four bedroom house, three kids, very much I live today. Some of the lessons, the financial lessons I learned specifically from my mom was the concept of financial freedom. Effectively the ability to walk away from a situation at any given moment and be comfortable. That has transitioned through my approach to the way I run my finances personally, to my conservative nature and how we approach our investments and our outcome.

My family is everything. It starts and ends with them. And the gifts that I have of my wife and my children are our cherished.

I teach a cycling class. I'm a strong believer in working with coaches. I think coaches give you structure, give you feedback, keep you on course.

Very similar to how we approach finance when we sit down clients, we want to get to know them really, really well. Part of that is getting to know what their personal goals are. When I identify all of those, because everyone has a different target for one, that when they may happen, everyone has a different feeling for what that might look like. And we want to constantly focus in on on making sure that we achieve the goal.

At The Wooding group, we really care and I see it every day. We are driven to do what's right and the best interests of our clients, no matter what it means for us. Everyone has the same persistence of doing what's right for our clients, always.

My name is Pete MacPhie. I'm an Investment Advisor at The Wooding Group, part of CIBC Wood Gundy.