When we meet, James Horniman is on the verge of securing a publishing deal for the crime thriller novel he wrote nearly six years ago.
The book, inspired by a three-week stint of jury service for a murder trial at the Old Bailey in 2011, is described to me by Horniman as “high-octane”, involving drug trafficking through China and Istanbul, and the property purchasing of Chinese companies to make what is really a drugs ring look like a proper investment business.
Horniman’s time at the Old Bailey was so vivid that it stirred him enough to put pen to paper and vent about certain things that bugged him, including justice, rejection, greed and selfishness: all themes in his book.
Speaking about his jury experience, he says: “I felt like a schoolboy; you get a little cup of water, a pencil, some paper and all the facts. There is the glamour and performances of the barristers and the judge, a dock the size of a boxing ring and a young woman sitting in there, and you think, ‘What on earth have you done?’.
“I went home and said to my wife, ‘I am going to write about this’ because [in our industry] we are all regulated and we have compliance, but I had never seen the raw seriousness of the whole justice system before.”
While life at James Hambro and Partners (JH&P) is not quite so dark, or illegal, as the world depicted in his fictional tome, Horniman believes there is a culture in certain parts of the wider industry of “growth for growth’s sake” when it comes to assets under management and scale; often at the client’s expense.
Branching out
JH&P is in the relatively early stages of branching out into servicing a new client area: the IFA market. The firm began to think about this in early 2016, and Horniman was charged with leading the offensive. It acquired its first client in October 2016 when it won the mandate to look after Surrey- based IFA firm Regency.
The Adviser Solutions proposition now has £200m under management across nine adviser clients. This comprises a model portfolio service of four risk-rated funds, as well as an ethical and income portfolio. It sits on platforms including Fidelity, Aviva, Standard Life and James Hay.
With a heritage steeped in offering private client discretionary services, Horniman says learning what the IFA community wants has been “a real journey”, conceding that “a few mistakes have been made along the way”.
“The characteristics of going after the IFA community are different to the private client industry, where good manners and a cup of tea go a long way sometimes,” he says.
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