The Team

Richard has a Master in Business Administration (MBA) and a bachelor degree in Civil Law (LL.B.) from University of Sherbrooke as well as a bachelor degree in Common Law (Juris Doctor) from Queen’s University in Kingston. He is a Certified International Wealth Manager (CIWM), a Fellow of the Canadian Securities Institute (FCSI), a Canadian Investment Manager (CIM), a Certified Financial Planner Professional (CFP) from the Financial Planner Standard Council and a Financial Planner from the “Institut Québécois de Planification Financière” (F.Pl.).

Before joining RBC Family Office Services in 2015, Richard worked in the securities industry with Canadian and American brokerage firms and with the Montreal Exchange, where he worked as a Trader, Banker, Financial Advisor, Private Advisor and Financial Planner. He also spent three years in a Montreal based law firm specialized in business law.

Richard’s role is to work with and support your advisor in preparing and presenting comprehensive Compass Financial Plans for clients.

Shawna is a Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA), and holds a Master of Taxation (MTax) degree from the University of Waterloo as well as her Bachelor’s degree in Commerce from McGill University. She is also a Financial Planner (F. Pl.), duly registered under the Institut Québécois de Planification Financière (IQPF).

Prior to joining RBC, Shawna was a taxation manager at a Montreal based accountant firm, providing sophisticated tax and wealth management planning to high net worth individuals and corporate clients.

Shawna's area of expertise includes personal, corporate and estate tax planning, wealth preservation and financial planning. As a Financial Planning Specialist at RBC Family Office Services, Shawna works jointly with your advisor to prepare and present your comprehensive Compass Financial Plan.

Prior to joining RBC Wealth Management, Joseph Di Niro began his career as a Notary in private practice at a notarial firm in Montreal. During this period, Joseph developed an expertise in Will and estate planning and also acquired specialized knowledge in estate settlements and non-contentious matters. To further his knowledge in the field of taxation, Joseph later joined a multinational accounting organization, where he specialized in tax planning for individual and corporate clients.

Member of the Board of Notaries of the Province of Quebec (Chambre des Notaires du Québec) since 2010, Joseph obtained his Notarial Law Degree(D.D.N.) from Université de Montréal in 2009, after having obtained his Bachelor of Law LL.B.) from the Université de Québec à Montréal (UQAM) in 2007. Joseph is currently pursuing a Master’s Degree in Taxation from the University of Sherbrooke.

As an Estate Planning Specialist, Daniel Duchesne gives advisors and their clients something they weren’t expecting. A different discussion about life insurance – one in which they are completely comfortable.

As Daniel puts it, “So many clients say: ‘Why has no one had this discussion with me before?’ The image they had of life insurance is transformed. They say, ‘Wow – I didn’t know insurance could do that.’”

Daniel has an innate ability to put those around him at ease – by simplifying complex matters. His goal is to have two happy clients, the advisor and their client.

Everything he and his team do is for one single reason – to help clients preserve and enhance personal and corporate wealth. They are always asking themselves: “If the client was our parent, would we recommend the same thing?”

The Care Factor – fine-tuned answers.

Benjamin Otto is motivated to serve others. “My dad is a pastor. Growing up, I often went with him visiting congregational members in their homes, hospitals and nursing homes. I saw him working extremely hard for others and the positive impact it had on them.”

This sensitivity to people’s needs and expectations is at the core of Ben’s philosophy. Ben and his team call it The Care Factor. It means that for every client, they work with meticulous devotion to provide fine-tuned answers and remove the stress of the unknown. Ben draws on his creative thinking, passion, and 22 years of expertise, to offer fresh perspectives and develop innovative solutions for complex high net worth cases.

Ben and his team are committed to being their client’s most trustworthy resource.

Paule specializes in tax and estate planning for ultra-high-net-worth families.

Her guidance supports clients in their relationships with their external professional advisors, with whom she frequently interacts.

Paule has a Bachelor’s degree in Commerce from l’École des Hautes Études Commerciales (HEC) and a Master’s degree in Tax Law from the Montreal University. She has completed the Securities Dealers Course from the Canadian Securities Institute.

As a Chartered Professional Accountant, Paule has more than 30 years of experience in tax and estate planning consulting, in CA firms as well as in life insurance and securities dealer companies. Paule is a frequent lecturer at annual conferences and technical seminars of l’Association de planification fiscale et financière and other professional associations and an active writer of reference papers on tax and estate planning topics.

Paule is a member of the executive committee of STEP Montreal and is regularly involved in various committees of the Association de planification fiscale et successorale. Paule is a member of the Ordre des comptables professionnels agréés du Québec, the l’Association de planification fiscale et successorale, the Canadian Tax Foundation, the International Fiscal Association and the Society of Trust and Estate Practitioners.