Schedule - By Day

View the LAMP 2008 Schedule by day of the week.

Sunday | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Special Events

Sunday

Learn the Methods: Sunday Sessions
2:30 p.m. – 4:30 p.m.

25 Secrets to Sustainable Success
Phillip C. Richards, CLU CFP RHU
Securian Financial Group
In this revealing session, hear Phil Richards introduce you to the “How To” tools that he has developed for field management. Get a first-hand account of Phil’s wisdom and insight on everything from servant leadership to market specialization. Phil will offer a detailed explanation of how he manages one of the largest, most successful agencies in the world. This session you won’t want to miss. Please go to www.gamaweb.com and click on Phil’s book, 25 Secrets to Sustainable Success, for further details and even submit a question that Phil might answer specifically at this insightful session.

Spanish Session
Pasión por la gente, pasión por el trabajo
Rafael Guerra Martinez
Director de Agencia de Grupo Nacional Provincial
Saludo y planteamiento de la posición de los productores en el mercado mexicano. El trabajo como una herramienta de crecimiento personal y bienestar. La función del Gerente de Campo como apoyo a emprendedores, planteamiento inicial, Venta de la carrera y compromisos de ambos La motivación como ingrediente siempre presente en la relación con el productor y la Importancia de predicar con el ejemplo. Exhortación al entusiasmo, determinación, coraje, valores, servicio.

LAMP Orientation
4:45 p.m. – 6:15 p.m.

This session will show attendees how to maximize their LAMP experience. There will be an overview of how to take advantage of educational programming and special events. Take advantage of the mini-focus group in which you can ask specific questions about LAMP or any of the other benefits or services provided through your GAMA International membership. Anyone can benefit from this session, not just a first-time attendee.

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Monday

Hear the Stories: Professional Speakers

Dick Hoyt
Rick Hoyt uses a wheelchair. He has also competed in the Boston Marathon 25 times and in Ironman Triathlons eight times. He, along with his dad, Dick, have formed “Team Hoyt” and they compete around the world doing marathons and triathlons. They have appeared on HBO’s “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel,” and they also travel the world speaking out about people with disabilities and promoting the Team Hoyt motto, “Yes You Can.” Hear an inspirational story that is truly positive and uplifting.

Ken Dychtwald
Over the past 30 years, Ken Dychtwald, Ph.D., has emerged as North America’s foremost visionary and original thinker regarding the lifestyle, marketing and workforce implications of the “age wave.” During his career, Dr. Dychtwald has addressed more than two million people worldwide in his speeches to corporate, association, social service and government groups, and his strikingly accurate predictions frequently receive prestigious national media coverage.

Monday - Meet the Experts

Edward G. Deutschlander, CLU CLF
GAMA International President 2007–08, Securian Financial Group

Joey Davenport, CLTC, & Peter H. Hoopis
Northwestern Mutual

Learn the Methods

Monday, March 17
1:30 p.m. – 2:30 p.m.

1. Building the Right Culture for Your Agency
Leadership & Culture

Ronald C. Dickstein, CLTC
John Hancock Financial Network

How do your advisors and staff feel about coming to work every day? Do you know? The culture of your organization can make you or break you. And it starts at the top, with you. What are you doing to make yours the firm of choice? People want to be part of something great, and you are responsible for making it so. Learn how to set the tone for your firm and establish an agency and a recruiting culture. Find out what the all-important “little” things are and how to implement them. Culture is critical to the success of an organization. Long-term success is doomed without it!
Get the Presentation Slides

2. Reaching the Right People: Marketing Locally for Maximum Impact (From the GAMA Foundation)
Sales & Marketing

Athan Vorilas, CLU CLTC CMFC
The Prudential Insurance Company of America
IMA Diamond

Learn how this Master Agency is using the GAMA Foundation’s Reaching the Right People: Marketing Locally for Maximum Impact to market at the local level.
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3. Hidden Curriculum: Acronym — “A.G.E.N.T. P.O.W.E.R.”
Leadership & Culture

Norman G. Levine, CLU ChFC RFC
Levine Enterprises
GAMA International Hall of Fame 1982

Learn how to help your associates increase their productivity, have more fun … and better serve their clients. Norm will show you how to coach your advisors on such topics as prospecting, sales skills, client relationships, developing trust with clients, empowerment and yes, even recreation, so that you can turn your advisors from product pushers to financial advisors, while at the same time increasing their productivity and service to your clients. Use the 10 steps in A.G.E.N.T. P.O.W.E.R. to take your firm to the next level.
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4. The Recruiting “On and Off” Switch
Recruiting & Selection

Luis O. Barrionuevo, CLU ChFC LUTCF
The Principal Financial Group
IMA Gold

Where is the recruiting “on and off” switch: how do you know when a candidate is right for your firm? Lou will show you the whens, wheres and hows of recruiting that ensure the continued growth of your organization. This presentation will cover different resources that are effective in today’s financial services arena and everything from timelines to presentation flow. You’ll learn how to uncover the “hot” buttons of any potential recruit and the qualities to look for, as well as the habits and comments that should raise red flags. Lou will include a motivational section on the “right attitude” about recruiting.
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5. You, Too, Can Have It All!
Practice management

Gregory Manto
AXA Equitable

Who says you can’t have it all? If you follow Greg’s advice, you can actually be a top producer and a top manager, too. Greg will share his proven practices for branding, sales, ensuring uniformity of culture, developing and rewarding associates, balancing production and management and much more. Find out how when you hire people who will be with you forever and raise the bar continuously for peak performance, you can develop your associates, continue to serve your clients and increase your own production.
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6. Building High-Performance Adviser Teams (From the GAMA Foundation)
Practice Management

Patrick A. Ungashick, CLU ChFC
Securian Financial Group

Patrick will share his expertise on how to build an organization supported by advisor teams and discuss what the findings from the GAMA Foundation’s Building High-Performance Adviser Teams both taught him and confirmed for him.
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7. Reinvent Practices for Growth
Practice Management

Mark Dean and Mathew L. Rauh, Jr.
Thrivent Financial for Lutherans
IMA Diamond

Do you want to learn how to build a long-lasting and sustainable, growing, vibrant practice that delivers a new level of client satisfaction? Leveraging research on how various firms have grown, Mark has created a system that helps leaders focus on how to bring added value to a practice. He will introduce you to the concepts and tools that are critical for execution while bringing in real-life examples of what has worked and what hasn’t. The session will feature discussions on leading practices that deliver double-digit growth while driving improved retention.
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8. Culture Can Make You or Break You
Leadership & Culture

Leo C. Tucker, Jr., CLU
Northwestern Mutual
Master Agency Award

In a fast-changing industry, there is one constant that can make or break your agency: your culture. Successful agency culture helps in recruiting and developing representatives; poor agency culture can undermine even the best of intentions. Leo will present an agency case study and guide you through the process of becoming aware of your current culture and making sure this culture aligns with your vision. Learn how culture is defined, measured and changed. You will also leave the presentation with the techniques you need to change your culture and the tools that will keep you on track.
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9. Unlocking the Code: How to Get Multiline Agents to Write More Life Insurance
Sales & Marketing

Raymond J. Vendetti, CLU ChFC
American National Insurance Company

The skills advisors need to sell property and casualty policies are different from those necessary to sell life insurance. Ray will take you through a simple series of skill-building steps that can significantly improve your life insurance interviewing skills. With these new skills, multiline advisors will be able to open life discussions on most contacts with their clients and prospects. Beginning with several paradigms that exist in the multiline arena, you’ll learn how associates can get to the “feeling” level with clients and how to begin a life insurance and financial planning interview. You’ll also learn how to overcome the two most common objections multiline agents hear: “I’m all set” and “I have it at work.”
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Monday, March 17
2:50 p.m. – 3:50 p.m.

10. Competing for Sales Talent in a New World
Recruiting & Selection

Rick Funke
LIMRA International

In today’s competitive business environment, it is more critical than ever that you are equipped with the latest and most effective ways to find the best sales talent for your firm. In this session, you will gain current, cutting-edge information and techniques that will increase the effectiveness of your recruiting program. LIMRA’s Rick Funke will present up-to-date research findings on recruiting trends in the financial services industry, as well as tell you how to connect with candidates from different generations. You will leave the session with concrete recruiting skills and techniques that you can implement and integrate into your own process.
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11. Super-Charge Your Recruiting Through Your Own Networking Organization
Sales & Marketing

Joseph W. Tucciarone, CFP
Guardian Life Insurance Company of America
IMA Diamond

Today’s networking groups have become a method of choice for both experienced and inexperienced agents. Every day, various networking groups are meeting. But have you thought about creating your own? Building your own networking group is a logical step for any agency. The value you can gain from it is enormous, both in recruiting and branding. In this session, you’ll learn why you should build a networking organization, how to use it for recruiting, the financial issues related to building a networking group and the secrets to marketing and branding your agency through your networking group.
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12. Building High-Performance Adviser Teams (From the GAMA Foundation)
Practice Management

Shawn P. Smith, LUTCF
Farm Bureau Financial Services
IMA Gold

Shawn will share his expertise on how to build a multiline organization supported by advisor teams and discuss what the findings from the GAMA Foundation’s Building High-Performance Adviser Teams both taught him and confirmed for him.
Get the Presentation Slides

13. Grow Your Agency to Greatness
Development

Robert A. Arzt, CLU ChFC LLIF
Polaris One & InsuranceCoachU.com
Robert Ashton
First Command
Kerry L. Lawing
Ohio National

“If I knew then what I know now.” How often have you said those words? This workshop will enhance your leadership skills to allow you to build a strong organizational culture. Bob and several successful managers will present an enlightening discussion of best practices for agency development and management. They’ll teach you what has worked for them in providing leadership and inspiration to their organizations — and what hasn’t. Learn what actions were necessary to address their firms’ continued growth and enable the companies to more effectively plan, manage and execute their missions and objectives.
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14. The Power of Purpose
Leadership & Culture

James L. Cook, ChFC CFS
National Life Group
Master Agency Award

Can you change the world? Jim believes you can, and he’ll show you how in this session. The key to creating a cohesive organizational structure and building a Master Agency is purpose, both professional and personal. Jim tells the story of how one man of purpose may very well have changed the course of the Civil War. He’ll show you how to apply that same concept to your practice, how to differentiate between “good fear” and “bad fear” and how to build strong foundations for top producers by identifying the 14 key skills inherent in successful producers.
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15. Recipe for a Retreat
Leadership & Culture

Daralee Barbera, CFP CLF CMFC, and Mark Larsen, CFP CMFC
Waddell & Reed Financial Services
IMA Silver

Go ahead! Take a day off! Get away from the office, but why not take your entire team? “Recipe for a Retreat” will walk you through the steps to a profitable day away. Learn how to define multiple retreat goals; choose a theme; and organize a planning committee, activities and logistics. Spending a day away from the office looking at business issues allows retreat participants to see the big picture, drill down into details and view the subject from different angles. The result: successful team building, greater camaraderie and a new focus on profitability.
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16. Client Reviews Increase Client Retention and Profitability
Sales & Marketing

John Natoli, CLU ChFC CFP CLF CMFC
MassMutual Financial Group
CDA Diamond

Associates often focus on prospecting and finding where the next client will come from, as this is the lifeblood of building a successful financial services practice. Often overlooked in this quest for new business are their clients, yet clients are the best source of new sales and referrals. John will explain the process and importance of client reviews in cultivating the existing client relationship; in identifying, discussing and implementing additional needs; and in obtaining referrals. He’ll debunk the myth that you need hundreds of clients to start a client review system and share the successful client review system his firm uses.
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17. Get WISE about Attracting, Developing and Supporting Female Advisors
Diversity

Sherri L. DuMond, CFP RHU
Securian Financial Group

Fifty-one percent of the population is female. Does your firm or office reflect this demographic? In this session, you will learn how to attract quality women to your firm and share ideas on how to support the professional development of female advisors. Topics of discussion include: best practices for recruiting women, how to “speak” to women, what’s important to them, best practices for developing women and how to create a “female-friendly” environment for your firm. Sherri, the Securian director for Women’s Interactive Sales Exchange (WISE), will also give you an overview of industry statistics and information on women’s markets.
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18. BAM Will Kick Your Business Up a Notch
Practice Management

Mark Michael Rooney, CLU ChFC CFP
AXA Equitable
Master Agency Award

Mark tells clients, “People don’t plan to fail, they fail to plan.” Mark sells planning as a fundamental piece of all his firm’s activities. However, firms in the insurance and financial services industry generally don’t plan well for their own practices. And, like clients who do not plan well, they are worse off for it. BAM (Business and Market) Planning is a five-step way to better build and develop a practice. In this session, you’ll learn how to establish appropriate goals with reasoned expectations, convert your goals to necessary tasks, apply the tasks intelligently to targeted markets, use effective time management to complete all tasks and create accountability.
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Tuesday

Hear the Stories: Professional Speakers

Meryl Comer
Meryl Comer is an Emmy-award winning reporter, producer, moderator and talk show host with over 30 years of experience in broadcast journalism. An excellent speaker and moderator, Comer addresses current issues surrounding politics, the economy, healthcare and business. She was among the first women broadcasters to specialize in business news as it relates to public policy. For 18 years Comer wrote and moderated It’s Your Business, a nationally syndicated debate program on economic, business and political issues that aired weekly on 140 network affiliates and independent stations.

Bruce Tulgan
Bruce Tulgan is internationally recognized as the leading expert on young people in the workplace. He is an advisor to business leaders all over the world, the author or coauthor of 16 different books and numerous management training programs and a sought-after keynote speaker and seminar leader. Since 1995, Bruce has addressed tens of thousands of leaders and managers in hundreds of organizations ranging from JP Morgan to JC Penney. He has been called “the new Tom Peters” by many who have seen him speak, and was named by Management Today as one of the few contemporary gurus to stand out as a “management guru.”

Meet the Experts: Practitioner Speakers

Christina Khoo
American International Assurance Company Limited

John T. Baier, CLU ChFC CFP MSFS
New York Life Insurance Company

Christian Allegre Marquez
Seguros Monterrey New York Life

Learn the Methods

Tuesday, March 18
1:30 p.m. – 2:30 p.m.

19. Build on Your Advisors’ Strengths
Leadership & Culture

Jeff Engebose, CLU ChFC CFP CASL CRPC
Thrivent Financial for Lutherans

Forget working on weaknesses! Research shows that a weakness can’t be converted to a strength. So help your advisors discover their strengths with a “strength finder” quiz you can use to coach to their strong points. In this session, you will learn how to build a team around complementary skill sets and why you shouldn’t try to make your advisors more like you but more like themselves. By focusing on each advisor’s individual areas of strength, you can help them raise their energy levels and, ultimately, their business results.
Get the Presentation Slides

20. Development of a Quarterly Marketing Event Process: Beating the Cross-Selling Blues
Sales & Marketing

Christopher P. O’Connell
Mutual of Omaha Insurance Company
IMA Gold

Are you tired of having associates miss cross-selling opportunities? Are your advisors stuck in call reluctance? Have they stopped doing annual reviews? Why don’t they manage the names they have? Beat the cross-selling blues with a quarterly marketing event process. This system encourages agents to cross-sell to group health, property and casualty clients and provides a platform for consistent annual reviews. Each section includes a detailed conversation about the system used to hook agents into activities that produce consistent results.
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21. Changing Minds
Leadership & Culture

Thomas J. Hosmanek, CLU CFFM FICF LUTCF
Modern Woodmen of America
IMA Silver

Learn how to move your management team to a recruiting mindset where recruiting really is “Job #1” and becomes a daily activity! Tom will share the techniques, experiences and activity-based tools that he used to measure, monitor and reward these changes as he accomplished this transformation within himself and his leadership group.
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22. Make Leadership Development a Top Priority
Development

Scott D. Butler, CLU ChFC
Northwestern Mutual

Growing leadership talent to support the organization’s growth is the most important and challenging role for leaders. Move leadership development into your important/ urgent quadrant by using a leadership system of accountability, balance and development. Scott will show you how leadership development promotes abundance, increases production and recruiting, improves retention and allows leaders to keep their promise of support by providing a healthy span of control. You’ll learn how to build a leadership culture, set expectations and accountability systems for developing leaders, develop role-modeling activities and create a compelling vision for growth, as well as how to use Scott’s shared staffing model.
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23. Launching New Agents and Increasing Senior Agent Productivity
Development

Clifford P. Karthauser, CLU ChFC, and Gary Karthauser, CLU ChFC
The Principal Financial Group
Master Agency Award

Cliff and Gary will share the partnership approach they take with their most successful producers and, with strategic coaching, use to help them reach new levels of productivity. They will show you how to help advisors with specific business and marketing plans, taking into consideration the current state of the producer’s practice, his or her willingness to change what needs to be changed and commitment to execute the plan with built-in accountabilities. You will learn how to develop the synergy necessary to keep the momentum going and how to build in rewards that will keep advisors motivated to achieve the results they are looking for.
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24. Top Ten Reasons for Considering Fee-Based Planning
Practice Management

Salvatore J. Durso
Securian Financial Group
IMA Silver

Sal will explain how his firm used a structured process to build a financial planning resource firm that not only allows advisors to build financial plans for their clients, but also retain them for a fee each year. His firm’s values-based financial planning approach brings his advisors closer to their clients and proves that relationships really do make a difference. Clients working with The Centennial Group’s financial planning resource center account for three times more commission compensation than the firm’s average sale and create ongoing revenue and client loyalty. Find out how Sal’s firm succeeds with its unique approach.
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25. Keeping the Right People (From the GAMA Foundation)
Retention

Harry P. Hoopis, CLU ChFC
Northwestern Mutual
GAMA International Hall of Fame 2003

Some firms achieve retention rates of 70 percent or more. How do they do it? Harry will tell you what the GAMA Foundation research study, Keeping the Right People, found out from top field leaders.
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26. Get the Appointment … and Improve Retention … through Effective Phone Coaching
Recruiting & Selection

Gail B. Goodman
ConsulTel, Inc.
Paul Blanco, LUTCF
MetLife

Most agencies lose associates because they don’t have enough “activity” — in other words, appointments. This presentation will show how the management team can improve the teaching and coaching of phone skills, thereby giving the new recruit a better chance at success. Because sales training outranks phone training by hundreds of hours, the average salesperson will instinctively use “sales language” instead of “phone language.” This presentation will focus on the manager’s role in teaching better appointment-setting phone skills during the first 90 days of a new associate’s career. Gail will discuss call reluctance, provide a simple structure for scripts and response handling and make suggestions on ways to structure your agency so that phone skills are a priority.
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27. Marketing for Margin: The Better the Bigger!
Sales & Marketing

Maria Umbach, CLU FLMI, and
Jerry Harnik, CLU
Guardian Life Insurance Company of America

This session will help you understand and apply the principles of marketing, as contrasted with selling, to avoid the trap of commoditization and improve your bottom line. A well-thought-out marketing strategy will increase productivity in your agency, improve your recruiting and retention efforts and ultimately help you and your producers to confidently sustain better business results. Maria will offer insights about acquiring the right marketing talent and recognizing it as a business asset versus an expense. She will also offer prototype marketing plans and key questions that will stimulate your thinking about your own unique value proposition. A case study from one of the most successful agencies in the country will be featured.
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28. The System Is the Solution
Practice Management

Charles R. Parks, CLU ChFC
The Penn Mutual Life Insurance Company
IMA Platinum

Ad-libbing is for amateurs! Great vision precedes great achievement, and spectacular performance is always preceded by preparation — in other words, the right system. Charlie will reignite your passion for bringing new people into this great business of ours. He’ll teach you how to grow your firm organically rather than by hiring industry retreads and to build a management team to multiply your capabilities. He’ll cover his seven-step recruiting process, testing procedures, record keeping and training, as well as the systems he uses and how he implements them.
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Tuesday, March 18
2:50 p.m. – 4:50 p.m.

29. LOTT (Leaders of Today and Tomorrow)

Michael R. White, CLU ChFC
Securian Financial Group
IMA Diamond

Whether your firm is large or small, is it built to last in the 21st century? Don’t miss this special workshop for managers in development and transition. Mike White will show you how to leverage resources, research and leading practices to maximize your professional development and catapult your career.
Get the Presentation Slides

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Wednesday

Hear the Stories: Professional Speakers

Bruce Christopher
“Laugh ‘til you cry … Learn ‘til you change!” These are the only rules that apply at a Bruce Christopher presentation. At the heart of it all, what separates psychologist-humorist Bruce Christopher from the rest of the pack is his outrageously funny and dynamic delivery of today’s hot topics. Bruce has been called “America’s foremost Enter-Trainer today” by the American Heart Association, he has been listed in the “Mission Possible” project as one of 12 great Americans to watch and he is a clinical psychologist holding degrees in both professional psychology and interpersonal communication. When you are faced with low morale, communication conflicts, customer service issues, managing change, the need for improved teamwork or just need a great laugh and attitude adjustment … this psychologist is in.

Mark Scharenbroich
Mark Scharenbroich is known internationally as a speaker, author and director of several award-winning programs on leadership and character education. His material is original. His message inspires people to take action, and his delivery is humorous. Mark comes to LAMP with over 27 years of platform experience. Mark believes the difference between a good speaker and a great speaker is that a good speaker engages their audience … a great speaker moves an audience to action. Mark moves his audience to take the steps to improve their performance.

Meet the Experts: Practitioner Speakers

J. Christopher Noonan, CLU ChFC
AXA Equitable

Thomas A. Dobberstein, CLU ChFC FIC FICF
Thrivent Financial for Lutherans

Learn the Methods

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Special LAMP Events

PRE-LAMP EVENT
Field Leadership Series: Building the Right People Workshop

Coming to LAMP 2008!
Saturday, March 15th from 1:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m. & Sunday, March 16th from 8:00 a.m. – Noon (BOTH DAYS REQUIRED)

Come to LAMP a day early and you can dramatically enhance your new-advisor retention rate. Create your own fast-start culture!

Attend this interactive and fast-paced workshop and learn how to:

• Select candidates who fit your culture and quickly assimilate them onto the team
• Set high expectations and hold new associates accountable for results
• Establish processes that will increase productivity and retention

Discover the proven techniques of Master Agency Award winners and Hall of Fame honorees and leave with the tools you need to build your own fast-start culture.

Space is limited, so register today. Register early and save! Registrations must be received by February 20, 2008. (Please note that this is a pre-LAMP event and is not included in your LAMP registration fees.)

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