Serving their communities and beyond

The Invest in Others Charitable Foundation and InvestmentNews have announced the finalists for the seventh annual Community Leadership Awards.

The awards, which will be presented Thursday, honor financial advisers who make a difference in their community and the world.

“It is intuitive for advisers to seek out and give tremendously toward helping others,” said Bill Dwyer, chairman of the board of Invest in Others. “And they’re not just donating money or volunteering time, they’re using their skill sets as professionals in a leadership role.”

Awards will be presented in four individual categories and one group category: Volunteer of the Year, Volunteer Team, Community Service, Global Community Impact and Mentoring Excellence.

200+ NOMINEES

The Invest in Others Charitable Foundation and InvestmentNews received more than 200 nominations for this year’s awards. The foundation will donate $20,000 to the charity designated by each category’s honoree. It will also donate $5,000 to each of the finalists’ charities.

“The foundation is relatively young, but it’s inspiring to start hearing back from advisers who are prior winners about how the award enhanced awareness of their charities, and how they’ve used the dollars to help their causes,” Mr. Dwyer said. “They’re really seeing the fruits of their labor come through and have impact over time.”

The awards ceremony will be held at Cipriani 42nd Street in New York. Proceeds from the awards dinner will go to the Boston-based Invest in Others Charitable Foundation, a registered 501(c)(3) charity that supports philanthropic and volunteer activities among advisers in the United States.

This year’s keynote speaker will be Maj. Dan Rooney, USAF (Ret.), founder of Folds of Honor, which provides scholarships and other assistance to the spouses and children of soldiers killed or disabled in the service of our country. The organization focuses on the needs of the more than 1 million Operation Iraqi Freedom, Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation New Dawn dependents who require assistance.

One aspect of the awards process this year that has most impressed Heather Randolph Carter, president of Invest in Others, is the diversity of the nominated advisers in terms of broker-dealers, geographic locations and the types of charities and missions served.

But one unifying characteristic shines through.

“The finalists are really indicative of the care they show as advisers for their clients,” Ms. Carter said. “It’s demonstrated in their business every day.”