David J. Murphy

You know what seem like distant memories? Summer, gardening, and landscaping. It is now Fall heading into Winter.

I am married to an expert gardener. We have a home on a lake in East Tennessee. My wife is someone who plans, arranges, selects, and nurtures plants of intrinsic beauty and compatibility. She plants in sets of three, adequately spaced, and balances each bed so that two sides of the garden separated by a driveway, sidewalk or lawn look identical.

Meanwhile, I let what grows naturally take hold. Truth. I have several areas of our property (not visible from the road) over which my powers to superintend are unchallenged. In these spaces I watch to see what indigenous plants grow and flourish. Plants with thorns, bristles, or noxious oils (poison ivy) are ruthlessly removed. Everything else is welcome. I am open to surprises.

By late Summer, my “garden” area is covered in tall plants bearing either white, yellow, or purple flowers. Here is a sampling of what grows:

• Giant Ironweed, Vernonia gigantea, as tall as nine feet with prolific purple blooms that attract a variety of pollinators.
• Showy Goldenrod, Solidago speciosa, a lovely addition adding bright yellow to the autumn landscape.
• Small-headed Sunflower, Helianthus microcephalus, an attractive woodland yellow sunflower with smooth green or burgundy tinged stems.
• White Crownbeard, Verbesina virginica, is a late season nectar plant which has hundreds of white blossoms on each plant in heads terminating from several branches arising at the upper leaf axils. They grow as tall as seven feet.

I like these plants because they are impressive in size, color and they attract butterflies, wasps, skippers, and bees. And besides, they are free!

Surprising Everyone in Winter
The first Winter my wife and I spent here we discovered an amazing phenomenon. Frost Flowers.

Long after I have cut down the tall barren stems, when only several inches of the once-glorious stalks remain, the White Crownbeard plant is not done delighting. This wonderful specimen is also known as “Frostweed.”

Frostweed earns its name from the wonderous ice sculptures on its stems upon the first frost, or even subsequent deep frosts. This natural majesty graced us by splitting its stems and producing amazing, delicate ice sculptures. Frost Flowers are airy, fragile constructions that pour out of the plants’ stems like ice meringues.

(None of my wife’s plants can do this. Just saying…)

Question: What does this have to do with independent life insurance distribution? Keep reading.

Winter of Life
Old age and winter of life are semantically related. People will sometimes replace the phrase “Old age” with the “Winter of life.”

I am privileged to know many independent financial professionals who in any other occupation would be retired by now. I am referring to men and women in their seventies and eighties who are still meeting with clients, even prospecting (casually). As you might expect, their clientele is similarly aged.

This article is written for anyone currently in their later years and still in the business. (It is also for anyone who is currently younger but who is anticipating working as an independent financial professional beyond normal retirement age.)

According to J.D. Power, “The average age of financial advisors is about 55, and approximately one-fifth of advisors are 65 or older.”¹

Kiplinger claims that “There are more CFP^® professionals over the age of 70 than under the age of 30.”²

Are you among these people who are 65 years old or older? Are you still holding onto your licenses, attending CE training, participating in association meetings, and maintaining regular appointments with clients? Beyond these, how are you using your time?

How Not to Prioritize
I came across an article giving suggestions for people for how to pass the time in Winter.³ Check out these suggestions:

• Try A New Hot Drink Recipe
• Spike Hot Chocolate
• Spike Coffee
• Clean Out Your Wardrobe
• (And my favorite) Clear Your Browser’s Bookmarks

Seriously?

My Suggestion: Surprise Everyone in the Winter of Your Life
These questions are for you.

1) Your wisdom and knowledge are your treasure for having lived this long. Who in your community needs to draw from this wealth?

a. Undoubtedly, a significant immigrant and refugee population lives in your geographic vicinity. Would you be willing to partner with organizations serving these people by offering financial education for free?

b. Young people entering adulthood have little preparation for financial decisions. Would you consider offering yourself as a financial instructor at a local high school or community college?

2) You no longer need to actively prospect. You have amassed a significant client base. They are connected to all kinds of people. Who is it in their families, neighborhoods, religious organizations, or community groups that they can introduce you to?

3) Younger independent financial professionals are relying more and more on technology. They can run circles around you in the use of digital tools. On the other hand, they do not know what you know. Would you be willing to mentor someone in the elements of client-building that they cannot learn on-line? Here are a few areas:

a. You learned to serve the clients rather than push products. You may sell insurance, but you first teach people about the value of insurance, what it does, why it enjoys tax advantages, and how it can protect loved ones. You know how to link the benefits to the individual situation. Show a younger professional how to do this.

b. Teach another person how to show gratitude to the clients they are privileged to work with. Examples:

• Send hand-written notes
• Remember birthdays with a phone call
• Celebrate their financial accomplishments
• Visit them in the hospital
• Attend funerals of lost loved ones

c. You have learned that the best tools in your repertoire are not answers, but questions. Mentor a younger advisor in the art of knowing which questions result in the client making the best decisions–ones they are proud to make. Examples:

• Do you have a belief system that drives how you handle money? If so, what specific ideals or priorities do you have?
• How do values such as frugality, generosity, fairness, corporate responsibility, hard work, innovation, compassion, respect, diversity, faith, integrity, and love influence your financial decisions?
• What makes you most anxious about the financial preparedness of your children, grandchildren, and others?
• How do you know that what you believe to be true really are proven financial principles?
• Who has had the greatest influence on your approach to financial matters?

4) You may have grandchildren or even great-grandchildren. Write them a story about a lonely dollar that finds how to make friends by working hard, being kind, demonstrating discipline, avoiding bad decisions and suddenly discovering the land of Compound Interest!

Wouldn’t you enjoy surprising everyone you know during the Winter of Your Life?

Summary
The White Crownbeard plants in my yard are beautiful in full bloom at the peak of their lives. Yet, more prized than their blossoms are the wonder they provide in the time of Winter. There really is nothing more surprising than to discover Frost Flowers formed from sap.

The Psalmist⁴ long ago wrote to inspire people in their Winter of Life:

“The righteous flourish like the palm tree and grow like a cedar in Lebanon…
They still bear fruit in old age;
they are ever full of sap and green.”

The oldest bristlecone pine is more than 4,800 years old! The wood is very dense and resinous. (Read that as sappy!) The wood’s extreme durability helps the tree resist invasion by insects, fungi, and other potential pests. Turns out, sap is an essential defense and necessary for full life!

Are your energy and will “sapped?” Or, are you still “full of sap?”

Only one way to prove it. Bear fruit!

References:

1. https://www.jdpower.com/business/press-releases/2019-us-financial-advisor-satisfaction-study.
2. https://www.kiplinger.com/article/retirement/t023-c032-s014-what-happens-when-your-financial-advisor-retires.html.
3. https://www.bustle.com/articles/135530-21-winter-activities-for-adults-to-keep-you-occupied-during-this-drab-and-dreary-season.
4. Psalm 92:12-14 (English Standard Version).

There is no small debate currently being waged in the United States regarding our shared cultural history. Statues are coming down, place names are being changed and historic symbols are being eliminated. This pattern repeats itself throughout history. Everything is known as something until it is called something else by people living later.

There are, however, some people, places and things that stand the test of time simply because they remain the starting point from which everything is still viewed. World religions have founders. Scientific laws, discoveries, inventions, words, and innovations have their originators.

Bottom line: for everything there is a starting point.

Point of Beginning
A monument stands outside of East Liverpool, in Columbiana County, Ohio, near the three-way intersection of Ohio, Pennsylvania, and the northern tip of West Virginia. This monument is protected and included in both the U.S. National Register of Historic Places and as an U.S. National Historic Landmark.

The Point of Beginning is a surveyor’s mark and the starting point of the surveys of almost all other lands to the West, reaching all the way to the Pacific Ocean.

In Thomas Jefferson’s day approximately five million people lived on the East Coast within 50 miles of the Atlantic, hemmed in by a confusing series of ridges and peaks known as the Appalachians. From his home at Monticello, Jefferson could see the easternmost portion of these ranges known as the Blue Ridge hills. He was fascinated by whatever lay beyond. Furthermore, he believed in an idea that was antithetical to the Native Americans who had lived for hundreds of years beyond those geographical impediments. Jefferson’s radical notion was simply this—land ownership. He knew that as America expanded in population the people would have to spread westward. He knew they needed places to settle.

Thomas Jefferson believed men should have the right to buy, sell or borrow against land that they owned. He also knew that the government needed funds to properly govern. (The Congress was prohibited from raising revenue by direct taxation, but land sales could provide an important revenue stream.) As a seated member of the Continental Congress he sponsored a bill in 1785 known as the “Land Ordinance.” “The Land Ordinance established the basis for the Public Land Survey System.”¹

The Public Land Survey System (aka “Rectangular Survey System”) was established to survey land ceded to the United States by the Treaty of Paris in 1783. This territory included what is now the states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin.

The Land Ordinance “laid down the requirements for a survey, the creation of a grid of meridians and baselines from which to create these parcels.”² Of course, to begin the process, there had to be a starting point. The responsibility for choosing the starting point fell on Thomas Hutchins.

In 1781 Thomas Hutchins became the First (and only) Geographer of the United States. He was a military engineer, cartographer, geographer, and surveyor. He was also the architect of a system still in use today. The system Hutchins created is based on townships, each one measuring six square miles. These are stacked North and South in “ranges.” Each township is then divided into 36 numbered sections equaling one square mile (640 acres).

Hutchins somewhat randomly chose the Point of Beginning. It is situated at baseline Latitude 40° 38’33” and Longitude 80° 31’10.” The Latitude chosen is referred to today as the “Geographer’s Line.” The line extends all the way to the Pacific.

Point: One man chose the starting point and the system for surveying the whole country (before most of the territory to be included was even part of the Union).

Question: What does this have to do with independent life insurance distribution? Keep reading.

Financial Planning Is All About Getting Started
A Financial Plan is a map for how to move forward. Before engaging the Plan it must be known where things stand. The starting point is the current holdings and sources of funds and how they add up. In other words, the starting point is a Financial Inventory that includes total income, tax rates, credit score, expenses, debt load, account balances, assets, real estate and total net worth.

The starting point serves as the “you are here” mark on the Financial Plan Map. The next step in a financial plan is to identify the destination. Consider these examples of Financial Destinations:

• Debt Free
• College Funds
• Seasonal home
• Retirement at a certain age
• Charitable legacy

Financial Planning Is about Baselines
A financial plan must be based on reality to be successful. A financial plan therefore must include a baseline, the all-encompassing examination of actual spending, saving, and giving. Habits dictate the future. Bad habits lead to a less-than-optimal future. Good habits can accelerate the arrival of goals and dreams. To not understand current behavior is to fail to achieve future results.

Financial Planning Is about a System or Process
While keeping a jar on the kitchen counter to collect spare change may accumulate some funds for future use, this is not a system. The process of financial planning is applying known elements that have proven to be successful. These elements include:

• Annual review of the financial plan
• Establishment of an Emergency Fund
• Systematic savings and investments
• Diversification matched to risk tolerance
• Dollar Cost Averaging
• Discipline
• Tax minimization
• Protection against downside risks
• Regular rebalancing
• Insurance to prepare for the unexpected

Starting Points Require a Starter
Sadly, a significant proportion of the American population is operating without a sound financial plan. It is not for lack of goals, dreams and sometimes even resources. They lack a catalyst. Their lives have not intersected with the life of an independent financial professional.

This article began with the Point of Beginning in East Liverpool, OH. That is not the only thing East Liverpool is famous for. It is also where Ben Feldman spent most of his adult life. (If you asked, “Ben who?” then you need to read up on this hero.)

“As early as 1979, Feldman had sold more life insurance than anyone in history.”³ It is estimated that he sold $1.5 billion in total life insurance face value for New York Life from 1942 to his death in 1993.

How Ben Feldman Became a Starting Point in My LIfe
In 1986 I decided to get my designations: Chartered Life Underwriter and Chartered Financial Consultant. CLU and ChFC. A total of twelve exams.

The company I worked for was willing to reimburse me for the cost of every course I took and passed.

They cost roughly $300 each with books, etc.

I called the American College in Brynn Mawr, PA, and ordered the course materials and scheduled the exam dates. Oops. I accidentally ordered all twelve. Our credit card maximum credit was $2,500. I charged $3,500. I worked it out with my bank to take all twelve exams in nine months. I was at the office every morning by six AM. I passed all twelve exams in nine months.

The local Association of CLUs hosted a conferment ceremony and dinner. The person giving me my certificates would be the legendary Ben Feldman. I knew that this man was from East Liverpool, OH, a struggling factory town of less than 20,000 people. And yet, Fortune magazine featured him on the cover of a 1974 issue stating that he had written more business that year as an individual agent than half of the 2,400 life insurance companies had written in total. I was excited to meet him, and pridefully, I expected him to acknowledge my singular feat of passing all 12 exams in nine months.

That night I was disappointed. First, Ben Feldman the legend turned out to be about 5’6” tall, bald, stoop-shouldered and he spoke with a lisp. And, instead of congratulating me or flattering me, he simply shook my hand, gave me my certificates, and then said, “Send money on ahead for the old man you’re going to be.”

Afterward I bemoaned to my wife, Di, my disappointment. She said, “So what are you going to do?” I said, “About what?” She replied, “A man who is a legend in your business gave you individual advice. What are you going to do about it!” Well, we began putting $50 per month away in an account that now has $165,000 in it, thanks to Ben Feldman.

During his historic and heroic career, he changed the lives of clients and other financial professionals (like me). He gave advice to both groups that is useful today.

To Clients (Prospects):

• “You haven’t done anything wrong. You just haven’t done anything, and that’s what’s wrong.” The point being, today needs to be your Starting Point!
• “If you’ve got a problem make it a procedure and it won’t be a problem anymore.” Basically, know your Baseline and build a Process.
• To Financial Professionals:
• “If you don’t have any place to go, you won’t go any place.” Go see the people who need a Starter!
• “Your prospect doesn’t get excited first. You must get excited first.” This is your Baseline!
• “See the people.” For independent financial professionals, this needs to be the Starting Point!

Summary:
We all want to make a difference. Not many of us will discover something new and have it named after us. Not many will invent something everyone will find useful. Few of us will become legends. One thing we all can do is make an impact on the lives of others. To interact with others and to be helpful in directing them to their Starting Points is amazingly fulfilling.

Ben Feldman did that for me. Who are you going to impact in the balance of this crazy year?

References:

1. “Land Ordinance of 1785” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_Ordinance_of_1785.
2. The Men Who United the States, by Simon Winchester, HarperCollins, 2013.
3. Ben Feldman, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Feldman_(insurance_salesman).

The Loyola University Chicago Department of Philosophy offers a course entitled PHIL 280: Being Human: Philosophical Perspectives. In the course description we learn that the syllabus is “a treatment of the meaning of human nature. The course considers the human person as physical being, as knower, as responsible agent, as a person in relation to other persons, to society, to God, and to the end, or purpose, of human life.”¹

Let’s explore this a little further.
Humans are physical beings. We now know that 99 percent of a human body is made up of atoms of hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen and oxygen. What about those atoms?

“The size of an atom is governed by the average location of its electrons. Nuclei are around 100,000 times smaller than the atoms they’re housed in. If the nucleus were the size of a peanut, the atom would be about the size of a baseball stadium. If we lost all the dead space inside our atoms, we would each be able to fit into a particle of lead dust, and the entire human race would fit into the volume of a sugar cube.”²

I am pretty sure it would blow the minds of the “social distancing” police if all of humanity was packed into the space of a sugar cube!

Human beings are knowers, responsible agents. This is the very basis of any discussion of social justice. We expect people to know how to behave and when they do not, we want them held responsible.

A human being is a person in relation to other persons, to society. We judge how well someone is acting in relation to other people by using a standard that we call cultural norms. “Cultural norms are the standards we live by. They are the shared expectations and rules that guide behavior of people within social groups. Cultural norms are learned and reinforced from parents, friends, teachers and others while growing up in a society.”³ In recent decades we have experienced significant changes in what are considered cultural norms. Yet, there are some norms that seem to transcend generations and cultural shifts.

Human life. Every aspect of the financial services industry can be encapsulated in those two words. Because human life is finite, we offer life insurance. Because human life is fragile, we offer disability insurance, medical insurance, long term care insurance. Because human life can be unpredictably extended, we offer annuities and investments.

Like all of nature, human life is also generational. “Generational theorists Neil Howe and William Strauss are usually credited with identifying and naming U.S. 20th-century generations in their 1991 book titled Generations.”4 They have categorized and labeled the last six generations as follows:

• 2000–: New Silent Generation or Generation Z
• 1980 to 2000: Millennials or Generation Y
• 1965 to 1979: Thirteeners (America’s thirteenth generation) or Generation X
• 1946 to 1964: Baby Boomers
• 1925 to 1945: The Silent Generation
• 1900 to 1924: The G.I. Generation

For purposes of this article we want to focus on the human beings categorized as “Generation Z.”

“The Center for Generational Kinetics lists the latest generation as beginning in 1996 and labels these people either Gen Z, iGen, or Centennials.”⁵ The moniker, “iGeneration” seems to be catching hold. Labels help companies and marketers who are trying to reach young people. This latest generation is viewed primarily as relating to the world via technology (think iPhone, iPad) and, therefore, placing an “i” in front of generation seems to be apt.

Question: How Will the Financial Services Industry Serve the iGeneration?
Wendell Berry wrote a marvelous novel entitled Jayber Crow. Consider the way he describes human life in relation to the inverse relationship between time and memory. When we were young, “Life was all time and almost no memory.” When we are old, however, we see that, “Life is almost entirely memory and very little time.” In the end, we all, “Belong entirely to memory, and it will not be our memory that we belong to.”⁶

Point: There is an inverse relationship between time and memory. The implication is, the accumulation of useful wisdom flows in a direction that places the greatest treasure at the point it is least needed. Our memories of knowledge and wisdom gained through experience reach their peak at the moment we run out of time.

Proposal: What if we used the technology embraced by the newest generation in order to pass on the memories (knowledge and wisdom) our industry has accumulated?

The human beings comprising the iGeneration are not going to be “knowers or responsible agents” when it comes to their finances unless the financial services industry gets creative soon. We must be the “others” who help shape the cultural norms that will inform the behavior of iGen individuals.

Example: I discovered a web site offering an interactive game-like experience that teaches important personal finance concepts.

The web site is located here: https://www.genirevolution.org/overview.php

From the web site: “The Gen i Revolution consists of sixteen interactive missions in which students complete a variety of activities to help them learn important personal finance concepts. Within each mission, students are introduced to a character who is facing a particular financial crisis. As a part of the Gen i Revolution, the student learns about the crisis, strategically selects ‘Operatives,’ and then completes activities with the ultimate goal of solving the mission.”

This tool is available for teachers and students grades six through 12.

Consider these sample Missions:

• Mission 1: Building Wealth Over the Long Term.
  • Concepts: Compound interest, Saving.
  • Description: “Angela Faces the 401(k) Challenge. Why should she sign up now when retirement is so far in the future? Your mission is to convince Angela to invest in a 401(k) plan now to build wealth over the long term.”
• Mission 4: Budgeting
  • Concepts: Budgeting, Financial goal setting, Saving
  • Description: “Clayton and Casey ‘O’Neil are a young married couple with two children. They both have jobs and seem well off to their friends, but they cannot seem to save any money. They want to buy a home but need to save up the down payment. They keep good financial records, but do not have any money left over at the end of the month for saving. Your mission is to help the O’Neils identify how to save $300 a month for a down payment on a home.”
• Mission 6: Risk and Return
  • Concepts: Forms of saving and investing, Costs and benefits of saving, Risk vs. Return, Diversification.
  • Description: “Kai Chung’s wealthy grandmother has given each of her grandchildren $10,000 to invest for their future. Kai is planning to go to college and wants to use his gift for that purpose. In the meantime, he wants to put the money where it will grow, but he does not want to take a lot of risk with it. Your mission is to persuade Kai to invest his Grandmother’s $10,000 in a type of asset with the appropriate risk and return for the time when he will need the money for college.”
• Mission 15: Financial Planning
  • Concepts: Forms of saving and investing, Diversification, Risk vs. return, Financial goal setting, Bonds, Certificate of deposit, Diversification, Liquidity, Money market account, Mutual funds, Principal, Rate of return, Risk, Savings account, Stocks.
  • Description: “The Red Roosters community service club is sponsoring a financial planning workshop for its members. Gen i has been asked to conduct the workshop in the absence of the group’s president. Your mission is to conduct a financial planning workshop with several members of the Red Roosters community service club.”
• Mission 16: Risk and Insurance
  • Concepts: Dealing with risk, Insurance as a means of sharing risk, Types of insurance, Factors affecting cost and coverage.
  • “Eight Mile Community College is holding an insurance fair. Student Lamar plans to attend and is contemplating his options. Your mission is to educate Lamar on the basics of risk management, help him decide whether insurance is a good idea for him, and if so, advise him on appropriate insurance policies.”

This interactive tool was created by The Council for Economic Education (CEE). I encourage you to visit their web site found here: https://www.councilforeconed.org.

According to the web site, “CEE’s mission is to equip K-12 students with the tools and knowledge of personal finance and economics so that they can make better decisions for themselves, their families, and their communities.”

CEE Vision: “To reach and teach every child in America about personal finance and economics.”
While I celebrate this effort on behalf of CEE, I appeal to all of us in independent financial services to step up to the challenge of sending memories back downstream, generationally.

Applications:

1. Look at your professional life. How are you helping to educate the next generation?
2. What do you have in your hands, what investable assets do you own that you can direct to building relevance with people in the youngest generations?
3. Could you develop internships for members of the iGeneration?
4. Are you equipping clients who have children in the iGeneration to train them in financial literacy?
5. Could you and your team host Financial Training Camps?
6. Could you partner with your own community’s teachers of grades six through 12 to use the Gen i Revolution game?
7. Spend time on the Council for Economic Education website. Could you create similar content on your web site?

Summary:
The financial services industry exists because of human beings. We have served generation after generation. Our relevancy to the people in the younger generation depends on our ability to share with them our memories of experience, wisdom and knowledge. Now is the time to invest in platforms to introduce these young people to the benefits of owning the products we represent. As human beings their lives are connected to other people, and we do our best work in the space defined by those relationships.

This is your opportunity to maximize your humanity, to be a “person in relation to other persons, to society, to God, and to the end, or purpose, of human life.”

If we do this well, we will eventually belong entirely to the memory of others, including many in the iGeneration.

References:

1. https://www.luc.edu/philosophy/coursedescriptions/180.shtml#:~:text=As%20a%20treatment%20of%20the,or%20purpose%2C%20of%20human%20life.
2. https://www.symmetrymagazine.org/article/the-particle-physics-of-you.
3. https://www.globalcognition.org/cultural-norms/#:~:text=Cultural%20norms%20are%20the%20standards,growing%20up%20in%20a%20society.
4. https://www.thoughtco.com/names-of-generations-1435472.
5. https://www.npr.org/2014/10/06/349316543/don-t-label-me-origins-of-generational-names-and-why-we-use-them.
6. Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry, Counterpoint, Berkeley, CA Copyright © 2000.

What is it that distinguishes one person from another? In independent brokerage distribution, I have worked with thousands of people. Interestingly, no two are alike.

Sam Kean noted that, “Wine is well over 99 percent water and alcohol, but water and alcohol alone do not make a wine.”¹ Wine connoisseurs can often discern the grape, region and even the year that a bottle of wine was vinted or cellared. These are the same people who inform us that we can expect to taste chocolate, blackberry, plums, coffee, musk or other traces in a glass of wine. I do not have that sensitive of a differentiating pallet.

In case you are interested, you can purchase a bottle of 1945 vintage Château Mouton Rothschild Pauillac Red Bordeaux Blend for only $33,000. They say it pairs well with salami and prosciutto, pungent cheese, potato, pasta, white rice and pork. (It just doesn’t pair well with being able to afford to feed teenaged children, make a house payment or put gas in the car.)

Point: The smell, balance, depth and finish of a wine arise from less than one percent of its ingredients.

What Is Your One Percent?
I first met Ken Bowman in 1984. We have watched each other’s careers develop for over 35 years. While I only intermittently dedicated my efforts solely to retail sales of life insurance, annuities, disability insurance and property and casualty, Ken has steadfastly built his career one client at a time. While I pursued opportunities to positively impact other people by serving in the home office of carriers dedicated to independent distribution, Ken dedicated himself to discovering the means of changing lives in retail sales.

Ken is like most independent financial professionals. He is credentialed. He networks with advisors serving in legal and accounting capacities. He works primarily through referral. He attends continuing education seminars, remains curious about new ways to use financial products to improve lives and enjoys long-term relationships with clients.

Like a fine wine, Ken has improved with age. His distinction is in his humanity. Ken loves people. Selflessly. He learned of relatively unknown benefits available to surviving spouses of deceased veterans. Ken will spend hours with people trying to help them secure modest amounts of Federal money which, to them, will make the difference between staying in the family home or downsizing.

The one percent that makes Ken different from every other person I have known is his compassion. (I should add that no one has a laugh exactly like his. Explosive and full of heart as well as decibel.)

What Is Your Driver?
Every successful person is driven by something. For Ken, it is compassion. What is motivating you?

Have you ever been on a sailboat? Sailing is akin to being in the financial services business in the sense that both are driven by unpredictable winds. How is it that sailboats move at all?

Look at how Bill Streever describes the power of a sail:

“When air moves faster across the front of a sail, its molecules spread out and the pressure drops. There are fewer molecules in a cubic foot of air in front of the sail than in a cubic foot of air behind it. The wind in front of the sail creates a void. The wind behind it wants to fill the void.”²

Listen, every person you meet has a void. Something is absent in their risk management, retirement plans, college funding arrangements, investment returns, tax-leverage maximization, Will and Trust preparation or succession planning. Every person’s life is full of motion. Career changes. Additional children. Small business launches. Inheritance. Divorce. Illness. Retirement. All this motion means decisions ought to be made regarding the financial implications. The void is formed in the space created by not knowing what to do and/or not having the self-drive to address it. People need someone to bring pressure in the form of knowledge and urgency (not in the sense of pushy salesmanship).

Whether you are employed by a carrier, serve in a wholesale capacity in a brokerage general agency, or serve clients directly in retail financial services, you meet real needs of real people. What is it about you that makes what you do different?

Varieties of One Percent
Which of these describe you?

• Motivator: You are driven to help clients get the most out of their financial lives.
• Communicator: You are driven to explain technical product features and economic principles in clear terms that people can understand.
• Visionary: You embrace the fiduciary standard and want clients to explore all reasonable opportunities.
• Empathetic: You are driven to know what clients really need and research/recommend the one product/solution that is most appropriate for them.
• Relational: You are driven to keep in regular contact with clients in order to update them on current financial issues and opportunities.
• Quarterback: You are driven to assemble a broad range of experts to meet each client’s specific needs through a team approach.
• Navigator: You are driven to keep your clients away from mistakes, from wasting resources, and from untimely market swings.

I am personally driven by the desire to see people grasp the right perspective. A BGA once came to my attention that was working itself out of business. The agency’s sales were 95 percent term life insurance. The agents they worked with were primarily P&C based. This meant that these agents knew extraordinarily little about underwriting. The symptom of the agency’s sure demise was in the tension every case manager experienced. All sales were made based on illustrations assuming Preferred or Preferred Best rates. Every case was an argument with an underwriter. None of the agents really wanted to work on their cases after the initial sale. Underwriting requirements were difficult to secure.

The perspective I could offer was from other BGAs I worked with that had a better product mix and a more traditional life insurance agent base. We worked together to reduce the attention paid to agents causing disproportionate problems. We designed a recruiting effort to attract more experienced agents as replacements. In just a few years, the percent of sales arising from misquoted term fell dramatically and revenue increased sharply. More importantly, the atmosphere in the agency improved. Gone were the constant battles with underwriting. No longer were requirements remaining outstanding.

All it took was a little perspective provided by sharing the more profitable experience other agencies were enjoying.

Reputation vs. Identity
You may know that the three most important things on a wine label are the vintage date, the place where the grapes were grown, and the grape(s) used to produce the wine.

“The vintage date tells you that 95 percent of the wine in the bottle had to be harvested in the year listed. The place (State, County, or AVA) on the label tells you that 85 percent of the wine comes from the listed location. And finally, the grape varietal identified on the label ensures that the wine is produced from at least 75 percent of that grape variety.”³

Did you catch that?

1. How much then does location matter? Every year more than 17 million gallons of wine are made in California alone.
2. How important is the type of grape? In Napa alone there are 21,665 acres devoted to growing Cabernet Sauvignon grapes. There are 550 Napa Valley wineries that produce more than three dozen different wine grape varieties.

It is not enough to know that a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon is from California and was vinted in 1996.

Here is where we begin to discover distinction: Approximately “95 percent of Napa Valley’s wineries are family owned and nearly 80 percent make less than 10,000 cases of wine per year. Most wineries can be described as small, artisan producers. These vintners share a commitment to blending historical practices and achievement with an eye toward innovation, quality and prosperity for the Napa Valley.”⁴

Wine aficionados know the importance of getting to know a consistently dependable vintner.

Would your clients describe you as consistently dependable?

You are probably aware that the word “identity” is from the Latin idem meaning “same as” or “quality of being identical.” Your identity is bound up in your industry and related to other independent financial professionals. Why? Because 90 percent of what you do is the same as what most every other IFP does.

I am urging you to focus not on the sameness, but on the distinction you can create by focusing on your one percent. That one percent is what builds your reputation. That is the root of your particular identity.

References:

1. “Caesar’s Last Breath,” by Sam Kean.
2. “And Soon I Heard a Roaring Wind,” by Bill Streever.
3. https://www.everwonderwine.com/blog/2017/2/24/what-does-vinted-by-mean.
4. https://napavintners.com/vintners/.

“I would love to live like a river flows, carried by the surprise of its own unfolding.” —John O’Donohue

I like this quote for its poetry and sentimentality; however, as much as surprises can be delightful–they can also be devastating, depending on what life brings.

Imagine a conversation like this:
Claims Processor: “Good afternoon. How can I help you?”

Female Caller: “I am calling about my husband’s life insurance policy and claim.”

(Claims Processor collects the caller’s name, the deceased’s name, date of death, and the policy number.)

Claims Processor: “Thank you. Now, how can I be of assistance?”

Female Caller: “Well, I sent the Death Certificate and Claims form to your company over a month ago and have not heard anything from you since.”

Claims Processor: Typing… “Our records indicate that we did receive the Death Certificate and Claims form. I also see here that we remitted the check for the death proceeds ten days ago.”

Female Caller: “You did? What address did you use?”

Claims Processor: Typing… “Oh, I am sorry. We do not show you as the rightful beneficiary.”

Female Caller: “What? What do you mean? Who did you send the money to?”

Claims Processor: “I am sorry Maam, but you are not entitled to that information.”

Female Caller: “Hold on. Just wait. Don’t tell me you sent the money to his ex-wife!”

This is the kind of surprise life can bring when care is not taken.

The above conversation is fictitious only in the sense that the situation is merely representative. The harsh reality is that very similar conversations take place regularly. Nothing about the conversation is imaginary.

Question: When was the last time you systematically updated your clients’ beneficiary designations?

Sadly, a tremendous number of people still have prior spouses or deceased relatives named as the current beneficiary on a retirement account, or on a life insurance policy purchased years ago.

It is imperative that independent financial professionals stay current with their clients. Marriages, divorces, births, deaths and other major life events generally require policy holders and account holders to review and, if necessary, update beneficiary designations.

Negligence in reviewing beneficiary designations can lead to one of the most common and potentially costly insurance, retirement and estate planning errors that clients can make. In cases like the one described, in which a divorce occurred followed by negligence to update the beneficiary designation, the ex-wife or husband receives the proceeds.

Point #1: All independent financial professionals owe it to their clients to be intentional and consistent in helping them maintain up-to-date beneficiary designations.

Building a Bridge to Beneficiary Satisfaction
“I learned that a long walk and calm conversation are an incredible combination if you want to build a bridge.” —Seth Godin

Getting the most out of your clientele means building relationships. Strong relationships are built by providing practical and periodic reviews that can help your clients stay informed and organized in order to make better decisions. Things that are important take time and thought, which is why they are often overlooked. Would your clients know where in their life insurance policies the beneficiaries are named or what the carriers have on record?

Clients are exceedingly satisfied when their financial advisors surpass their expectations, even slightly. One simple step to achieve client satisfaction is to automate an annual review of coverages, types of policies owned, status of the policies and the named beneficiaries.

• This simple review can:
• Keep them out of a bind
• Help them make decisions
• Prevent negative surprises
• Enhance their trust in the relationship

The basic participants in a life insurance contract are:

1. Contract Owner: The person who owns the life insurance policy.
2. Insurance Company: The company that issued the policy.
3. The Insured: The person whose life is being insured by the life insurance policy.
4. The Primary Beneficiary: The person who will receive the death benefit when the insured person dies.

Question: Which of these four participants receives the least amount of attention from the independent financial professional?

Typically, the primary beneficiary is someone the independent financial professionals do not know well.

It is possible to build a bridge to beneficiaries that will lead to future revenue.

Important Reminder: As you design the bridge think about the people who will cross it.

Beneficiary Designations Supersede the Will
People often think an updated will is all they need. However, the clients will or trust will not override what is named in the beneficiary designation on a life insurance policy, annuity, or retirement account (like an IRA or 401(k) plan). Beneficiary designations take precedence.

Regardless of the client’s current relationship status with the beneficiary on record, and regardless of how the client’s current will reads, the proceeds from the life insurance policy will be paid to the latest person named in the beneficiary designation.

Point #2: The beneficiary is the key to the client’s decision to purchase life insurance in the first place. It is because the client loves the beneficiary that there was even a policy at all.

Best Practices for Reviewing Beneficiary Designations
The process for building bridges with beneficiaries is as follows:

1. Help your clients make a chart of three columns.
2. In the first column, encourage clients to make a list of each one of their retirement accounts, life insurance policies, and annuities.
3. In the second column record the primary beneficiary for each account or policy. (If there are contingent beneficiaries, consider adding an additional column.)
4. In the third column record the date the beneficiary designation was last updated.
5. Save a copy of each client’s list in a file folder. Label these files by the date.
6. Open this folder every month and contact all clients whose annual review is due that month.
7. If a client needs to update a beneficiary, help them contact the respective company or companies.
8. Seek to build a relationship with each new beneficiary by learning what they mean to the clients. Get introduced to each one.
9. Make sure each beneficiary has your name and contact information saved on their phone for quick access should something happen to your client.

Summary:
All independent financial professionals owe it to their clients to be intentional and consistent in helping them maintain up-to-date beneficiary designations. You can achieve high client satisfaction by automating an annual review of coverages, types of policies owned, status of the policies and the named beneficiaries. You might just keep your client’s loved ones from experiencing a horrible surprise. In addition, a strong process can help you serve your clients and build a bridge to beneficiaries that will lead to future revenue.

If the people who your clients love are the very reasons they sought your help, imagine what your clients will think about you if your business model is designed to keep these people (beneficiaries) front of mind.

I am a voracious reader, but I can’t keep up. Seems like every week someone announces a new book that is appealing to me to read. “So many books, so little time,” right? One benefit of my limited capacity is a forced sorting-out that takes place just by the passing of time. What seemed like a great book when first announced soon fades under the weight of severe criticism or dies from lack of general support. Titles that intrigued me initially lose their attraction as soon as something else appears. This is the same principle at work with items in the salad bar. How many times have I begun to spoon some garbanzo beans onto my salad plate when green peas, black olives or chopped eggs caught my attention instead?

It is eminently clear that writing a book and having it read are very different things.

Question: Have you read one or more of the variations of the “Chicken Soup for the Soul” books? Apparently, many people have. According to www.chickensoup.com:

• The Chicken Soup for the Soul book series of over 250 titles has sold more than 110 million copies in the U.S. and Canada.
• Chicken Soup for the Soul books have been translated into 43 languages, have been published in over 100 countries, and have sold more than 500 million copies worldwide.

The first book must have been an immediate best seller, right? Wrong.

Mark Victor Hansen and Jack Canfield had the idea in 1993 that “People could help each other by sharing stories about their lives.”¹ As motivational speakers, they came across myriad stories and shared these in their talks. So they compiled the best 101 stories they’d been told in a book. Instinctively, they knew they had a best seller on their hands! Not a chance. It was a huge struggle. They took the book to New York, hoping to sell it to one of the big publishers, but every single one turned them down.¹

Publishers were not breaking down their doors for the opportunity to get “Chicken Soup for the Soul” to market. Then, when the book was in print, they had a tough time getting anyone to buy it.²

What happened? What led to the above-mentioned success?

Every day they did five specific things that would move them closer to their dream of selling books.²

Mark Victor Hansen and Jack Canfield believed their book served a great purpose. They worked hard, and innovatively, to promote it. They were motivated more by their belief that people would benefit from reading their book than by their hope to earn millions of dollars.

Example: “One day we sent copies of the book to all the jurors in the O.J. Simpson trial. A week later, we received a nice letter from Judge Lance Ito thanking us for thinking of the jurors, who were sequestered and not allowed to watch television or read the newspapers. The next day, four of the jurors were spotted reading the book by the press, and that led to some valuable public relations for the book.”³

Point #1: If you have something valuable that you believe will benefit people, it is imperative to promote it and get it into as many people’s lives as possible.

Point #2: You have goals for 2020. You have long-term dreams. Challenge yourself to do five specific things every day that would move you closer to your objectives.

Life Insurance for the Soul
From the very first day I began selling life insurance I have been a believer in its intrinsic value to families and businesses. How do we know life insurance serves a valuable purpose?

• If it did not serve a public good, why would Congress have granted life insurance its amazing tax advantages in the very first Federal Tax Code?
• The very founding and history of life insurance reveals legal and economic structures created out of the simple intention to protect families from the death of the income providers.
• Even my faith informed my enthusiasm for life insurance. The New Testament contains this instruction: “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction.”4 Life insurance is expressly designed to benefit orphans and widows.

Sitting in my cubicle in the captive agent office where my career began, bubbling over with enthusiastic belief in the great importance and value of life insurance, was essentially equivalent to me writing a book that nobody wanted to read. I needed to get launched and there were two critical steps required:

1. Establish Credibility
2. Make Connections and build Social Capital

Credibility
Credibility is an asset when building a financial services practice.

There are many ways to develop credibility, including:

• Gain success through hard work (success really does beget success).
• Maintain customer-focus.
• Earn credentials and designations.
• Volunteer in community service organizations.
• Study and learn.
• Prepare well for every appointment.
• Keep commitments.
• Follow-up efficiently and punctually.

As a young agent, I needed to establish credibility.

I pursued and earned designations (CLU, ChFC), joined the American Red Cross Planned Giving Committee and learned the “Consultative Selling” approach, which put the customer first. Still, I needed something more in order to overcome my young age, especially in the small business market.

One Idea
I decided to write an article based on the financial applications inherent in the “law of the cumulative effect of little things over a long period of time.” (This is a phrase I discovered in the books by Ron Blue, including Master Your Money). I went to the Public Library and looked up the names of the editors and publishers of magazines serving the various industries represented by small businesses in my city. Every industry had its own publications. Tool and Die. Electrical Supply. Heating and Air Conditioning. Printing. Machine Tool. Packaging. I sent off my article to dozens of them. Lo and behold, ten or so magazines published it. Not only did these magazines notify me as to the future issue in which my article would appear, they subsequently sent a copy of the volume that contained it.

Armed with the magazine containing my article, I cold-called small business owners in each of these industries. It was simple to get past the receptionist because often the issue containing my article was there on a table in the lobby and I only had to open the magazine and point to my photo and name.

My article as door-opener worked so well that I sent the article to the “Cincinnati Business Courier.” The publisher at the time was named Scott Bemis. (Scott was the publisher of business journals in Indianapolis and Rochester, NY, and the Cincinnati Business Courier, before going to Denver in 1996 to become president and publisher of the Denver Business Journal).

Scott liked it and wanted to meet. His offices were on the 45th floor of one of Cincinnati’s tallest buildings. We discovered a shared faith and a similar sense of humor. We hit it off instantly.

Connection—“Can I Come?”
If every new customer does not lead to more customers, then all customers are, in a sense, nothing but individual dead-end streets. The quickest way for a person to give up as a young life insurance agent is to continually wander down one dead end after another.

Connecting with people involves both deep one-on-one relationships and broad social capital based on active referral-gathering and networking.

Scott Bemis said he was in a Bible study group with other business owners.

At that time, I was inspired to be courageous by the great book, Swim with the Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive by Harvey Mackay. I was focused on getting appointments with people who absolutely, positively did not want to see me. One way to get in front of successful people is to be introduced to them personally by other successful people.

So, when Scott mentioned his Bible study group, I asked, “Next time you go, can I come?” Scott was pleased to have me attend. At that first event I was introduced to multiple business owners. For example, Bob owned a customer-driven manufacturer of products for niche vinyl coated markets; Mike owned an executive search firm; another Mike owned a metal re-surfacing company. These men eventually introduced me to many other business owners.

(Note: It is difficult to operate without self-interest. My intentions for attending Scott’s group, or any other function I sought invitations to, were clearly driven by the desire to meet new people. The behavior I had to avoid was to use these occasions as pure prospecting opportunities. In each instance, I stated clearly what I did for a living, and that I was curious to meet people. That being said, it was also imperative that I not approach any person until we had become acquainted over the course of many encounters.)

Point #3: Asking “Can I come” is the easiest, best way to connect with successful people through other successful people.

Summary and Application

• Life insurance is something that has tremendous utility for solving the real-life concerns of real people. Because it is valuable, it must be promoted.
• To earn the right to tell the story of life insurance to others, the independent financial professional must establish credibility.
• Credibility is earned through hard work and innovation.
• Credibility is only important if your life intersects with others.
• Connections with other people and social capital are the key to success.
• Simply asking, “Can I come?” is a proven method for making sure each relationship is not a dead end.
• Success draws nearer when we commit to doing five specific things every day that will move us closer to our goals.

Many independent financial professionals believe as strongly as I do in the intrinsic value of life insurance. Some of them face a seemingly high wall between themselves and people needing their services. To get out into the market and change lives requires both credibility and connection. It is my hope that the above anecdotes from my story will prove useful. 

References:

1. https://www.chickensoup.com/about/history.
2. https://www.thinke.org/blog/2009/6/24/the-rule-of-five-swings.html.
3. Put Your Dream to the Test, John Maxwell.
4. James 1:27 (ESV).

“Letting go is the natural release that always follows the realization that holding on hurts.”¹ —Guy Finely

In my Freshman year at Miami University in Oxford, OH, I came under the influence of the Resident Adviser (RA). A slight, intense upper classman, Don converted me to two of his hobbies: Pipe smoking and sky diving. (When my wife and I got married, she disabused me of the idea that these could be life-long habits.)

I remember the first time we drove out to Green County Parachute Club (now known as “Skydive Greene County”). Don brought a bunch of people that day to experience the thrill for the first time. We all stood and received instructions regarding how to leave the plane, prepare for landing and what to do in case the main parachute did not open. We were instructed about the things that can go wrong. We were also informed as to what we could wear or have on our bodies. Then, divided into small groups, we took turns climbing into a small plane for a spiral rise up to 3,500 feet.

I was blessed to have Don along on my plane. He was known to me and I trusted him. The plan was to move over to the door. I was connected by a static line to the aircraft. This meant that on my first jump I did not actually have to pull the cord in order to deploy the chute. It would be done for me as soon as I left the plane. All I had to do was place my left foot on a small step (about the size of a door stop), push off when instructed, and reach for the wing strut. Wing struts, in those days, were tubular members on the airplane that acted as support structures. They connected the wing to the fuselage. By leaping out and reaching forward I would be horizontally positioned perfectly for the chute to deploy.

As you can imagine, on the first jump from an airplane 3,500 feet above ground, moving at airspeeds of up to 125 miles per hour, adrenaline floods the system, the reflexes are on high alert and everything is happening at a fever pitch. When Don yelled into my ear “Jump!” I obeyed. A little too vigorously. My hands not only reached for the wing strut, the force of my push off the step caused me to actually reach the metal bar. Next thing that happened was unintended. I clenched the strut with both hands.

It is one thing to sit and ponder a jump into space, and quite another to release your grip on the only thing keeping you from falling 3,500 feet. All of a sudden the whole notion of trusting in a static line to deploy my chute seemed incredulous. So, I held on. Within a split second, Don was adding further instructions to the initial command to jump. Things like, “Let go!” and something that sounded like “another trucker” kept pouring from his lips at high decibels.

Letting go was hard to do. I eventually did and ended up having a long walk back to the Green County Parachute Club Quonset hut. The jumpmaster recorded my actions on my first jump in my logbook.

Letting Go Is Sometimes Hard
“Real life is not static.”² Rarely does anything tether us to certainty. Instead, letting go means leaving one level of confidence before we can enter a new level. For the independent financial advisor (IFP), certainty is a good thing. The typical IFP invests significant time and practice in creating a proven process for discovering and realizing the client’s needs and dreams. Service is everything when creating differentiation. To the extent it is humanly possible, IFPs attempt to control the process from beginning to end to ensure a positive client experience. Does that sound like you?

Discovering Success by Letting Go
Letting go begins with the realization that you have limited capacity. I can juggle, but only using three juggling balls. I know people who can juggle five. I do not believe anyone can juggle, say, twenty. Our focus, our attention, our time and our energy are finite. When we face our limitations, we find our freedom. The freedom to become everything we can become starts by letting go of whatever holds us back. Success is the ability to achieve our best by releasing everything that is not critical.

#1 Let Go of Relationships
The typical IFP collects relationships with clients, BGAs, carriers, wholesalers and other advisors. IFPs tend to be people who like people, and are friendly and outgoing. The successful IFP knows when a relationship is contributing to success or simply tangential. The difference between essential and tangential relationships is found on either side of a divide created by these factors:

• Loyalty
• Reciprocity
• Shared vision
• Proven history
• Efficient time usage
• Contributions to personal growth

Some clients contribute to the IFP’s personal satisfaction and sense of professional accomplishment. The IFP simply needs to hear the client’s name and immediately the sense of achievement rises inside. “I remember when we first started working together and now look at the difference our relationship has developed!”

Other clients are nice people, even enjoyable, but little progress can be attributed to the relationship. Perhaps they need to be let go.

Similarly, most IFPs work with more than one BGA. The average is between two and three. Each BGA requires time and effort to keep a relationship productive. The successful IFP will select the best relationship and let the others go.

More carrier relationships are not always better. Representing a product now should mean representing that carrier into the future in order to properly service the business. To maintain an active appointment with multiple carriers is difficult. The successful IFP will let go any carrier relationship that will not be core to the model the IFP is building.

One BGA told me he and his team receive as many as 20 visits per month from wholesalers. These wholesalers spend as much as two hours in the office. That is one week of work (40 hours) each month spent by the team. When pressed, the BGA could not attribute measurable results from these visits. My advice? Let them go. When they call to schedule a visit tell them “no.” Of course, the wholesalers representing just the core partner companies should be allowed to visit, but only if their visit will generate results.

#2 Let Go Control
To be trusted, a leader must be followed. To be followed a leader must have character. To have character the leader must have purpose and vision. A leader’s trust is earned by having a clear purpose/vision, and by demonstrating true character. The same is true of you. As an IFP, you have an idea for your practice, and a preference for the type of client you are meant to serve. You know what it is that you do best. Anything that you do that is outside of your core purpose and competitive advantage dilutes your effectiveness.

No matter how hard we try, we cannot control everything that our business does. The successful IFP knows what she can do that no one else can do as well. She will make these decisions:

• Delegate any task that others can do as effectively
• Place complete trust in the person assigned each task
• Ask for minimal reporting from these team members
• Make sure that each person sharing in the responsibilities is clear about two things:
  • The IFP’s vision
  • The individual’s personal role in achieving that vision

When all tasks in the business process and service model are evaluated, most can be delegated. The successful IFP will simply let go and trust others to accomplish their assigned responsibilities.

#3 Let Go of False Comparisons
Most IFPs I have met are competitive. They like beating the averages, but what they truly enjoy is outperforming other IFPs. This often leads to IFPs making comparisons between their own practices and the business model of other IFPs. This, in turn, causes the individual IFP to embrace activities and business practices that are unnecessary, even contradictory, to his practice.

The only comparison required to grow your own business is contrasting your business model and success you have achieved to date against the ideal business model and ideal success you desire to achieve in five years. No successful IFP achieves her best potential by trying to be someone else.

The successful IFP will look into the future and envision the level of success that is possible to achieve. This will create the vision. The vision creates the priorities. The priorities reveal what needs to be measured. Everything else must be let go.

Next Steps
Whether you are a BGA, a wholesaler, an independent financial professional or have some other role in financial services, please consider taking these next steps:

Evaluate your business relationships. Who are the people who are likeable, but not likely to help you achieve your vision? You can stay friends, but you need to let them go when it comes to building your business.

Ask yourself, “What am I doing that others can do as well?” What tasks take your time but do not maximize your skills? Let them go. Delegate. Transfer responsibility to people who share your vision and embrace their individual role in helping achieve it. Trust them. Your trust in them will increase their commitment to you.

Review your vision and examine whether what you are doing was designed to achieve your purpose or is merely copied from the business model of another person attempting to accomplish her vision. Get your eyes off other IFPs. Focus your attention on your business model and how you will measure success in five years. Then, you will be able to identify your priorities. These will tell you what to measure.

Summary
Back to my first sky-diving experience. When I finally let go, and found myself quickly under canopy, gliding down to earth, I could hear everything on the ground. A woman far below was listening to music. I heard a dog barking. I saw the plane from which I had disembarked now circling down to collect the next group of skydivers. I found peace and wonder. I was free to soak in what it was I came to do and see.
Letting go is sometimes the best way to experience success.

References:

1. Read more at https://www.beliefnet.com/inspiration/galleries/7-secrets-of-letting-go.aspx#igSU2JDf98EiPUcg.99.
2. Ibid.

“Look, all I’m asking is for you to just have the tiniest bit of vision. You know, to just sit back for one minute and look at the big picture.”*

On July 11, 1997, Warner Bros released the movie Contact. The film opened with a scale view shot of the entire universe, beginning with a view of Earth from high in the atmosphere. The camera started zooming backward, first passing the Moon, then Mars, asteroids and other features of our solar system, then into interstellar space, through the Milky Way, and receded through other galaxies into deep space. While the scene pulled the viewer further and further from earth the movie-goer heard sounds of pop songs, TV show themes and famous speeches carried by radio waves of broadcast programming emitting from earth. The music and news broadcasts began with the present and retreated into the past.

This opening scale pan of Contact broke the record for the longest unbroken shot comprised entirely of computer-generated visual effects. Movie critics continue to hail this sequence as one of the best examples of what the movie industry calls the “Establishing Shot.” People sat in the theaters transfixed and silent for the full three minutes that the opening scene lasted. View the Establishing Shot from Contact here

The Establishing Shot
According to MediaCollege.com, “Establishing Shot” is defined as “the first shot of a new scene, designed to show the audience where the action is taking place. It is usually a very wide shot or extreme wide shot.”**

The Establishing Shot provides context and overview.

The most memorable Establishing Shots are often visually iconic or technically intricate and complex. The goal is to provide viewers with information about the story’s setting, time frame and perspective.

Clients Often Lack Perspective

“Everywhere is walking distance if you have the time.”—Steven Wright

The nature of humans is to self-deceive. “I have time enough.” “That won’t be a problem.” “Somehow it will all work out.” These can all be true statements—eventually. To face the facts, to embrace reality, requires courage. Or… assistance.

The role of the independent financial professional is to create the Establishing Shot for each client. Someone must show clients where they are in time and in life. Someone needs to give context, create urgency and drive decision-making. There is no better time than at the end of one year and the beginning of the next.

If you are an independent financial professional, I urge you to begin thinking of yourself as the “Big Picture” advisor. It is easy for clients to think too confidently, or, conversely, to lose hope. It is often the case that the clients find financial matters altogether confusing and decide that doing nothing is therefore the best strategy for now. We all know that procrastination never leads to success.

Impact of the Big Picture Advisor
For clients to properly think about problems they need to know how all the pieces fit together. Just like in the movies, where a well-done Establishing Shot can create context, you, as a Big Picture advisor, can help your clients to:

• Know not just how and what to do, but to know why.
• View the whole and not just its parts.
• See a vision and gain a sense of the bigger picture.
• Appreciate the full context of any situation.
• Have the ability to see beyond the obvious.
• Accurately assess the true consequence of putting off decisions.
• Avoid great swings of mood and emotion they go through when their desires and expectations are not met.
• Not be swept away by feelings that are based on an incomplete piece of the picture.
• Respond to the underlying conditions that have given rise to the problems they face, rather than simply reacting to the symptoms generated by those problems.
• Respond with patience gained by seeing with a broader perspective.
• Grow in confidence by establishing plans more likely to bring about the long term wellbeing that they desire.
• Understand that it is possible to create a legacy that will live on, whether in wealth or in the impact made on other people.

Your Job If You Choose to Accept It
The independent financial professional who desires to serve as the Big Picture advisor must know how to create the Establishing Shot for clients. Say for example that you will be meeting with a client at 2:00 pm tomorrow afternoon. You have allocated 60 minutes for the appointment. As Big Picture advisor you need to begin setting the scene. In the opening five minutes you need to pre-lap. In screenwriting, “Dialogue spoken over an establishing shot leading into the scene is called a ‘pre-lap.’”***

Pre-lapping is when dialogue begins before the director cuts to the scene in which the dialogue will be spoken.

This is what you might say to your client and what your pre-lapping might look like:

• You are someone who desires to have a more successful financial life.
• You have an open mind and are willing to creatively brainstorm and engage in a constructive dialogue about the goals that drive your life values.
• You understand that there are many alternatives and are open to exploring an array of choices.
• You are willing to make changes in behavior if doing so will serve your long term goals.
• You are open to viewing me as your Big Picture advisor for your financial life.
• You recognize that I don’t have all the answers, and that financial planning is not an exact science.
• You are willing to commit to providing me with applicable financial information and to respond to requests for information in a timely manner.
• You recognize that big goals can be achieved by making small changes consistently over time.

Through these table-setting comments, you establish the context of the dialogue about to take place and provide an apt description of the work you do on behalf of your clients.

Summary
Serving as the Big Picture advisor:

• Allows you to lead your clients in prudent decision-making.
• Enables you to keep your clients on track.
• Avails you the opportunity to help your clients see what others are doing successfully.
• Elevates you to the position of quarterback who can create teamwork among all the client’s advisors.
• Keeps your clients from stagnation and from wasting valuable years.
• Positions you to help clients find lessons in every experience, good or bad.
• Equips you with the ability to share insights from many different people.
• You can open your client’s eyes to an expanded world.

In Contact an alien (played by David Morse) says this about human beings:
“You’re an interesting species. An interesting mix. You’re capable of such beautiful dreams, and such horrible nightmares. You feel so lost, so cut off, so alone, only you’re not. See, in all our searching, the only thing we’ve found that makes the emptiness bearable, is each other.”****

Bottom line: people truly need a Big Picture advisor. Are you taking new clients?

References:

* Line spoken by Jodie Foster as Dr. Eleanor “Ellie” Ann Arroway in “Contact”
**https://www.mediacollege.com/video/shots/establishing.html
***https://screenwriting.io/what-is-an-establishing-shot/
****https://www.moviequotes.com/s-movie/contact/