Family Matters
Next Generation Training

With a tough job market for college and university graduates, and the average age of advisors over 58, more and more financial advisors are bringing family (children, nieces, and nephews) into their Investment & Insurance practices.

Having family come into the business does not necessarily mean it is your succession plan – but still what parent, aunt or uncle wants to see their protégé fail?  And success may well lead to a succession plan that is a win / win for everyone.  However, regardless of whether succession is the plan or providing a great career opportunity is the motivation, having family come into “the business” is not without its challenges. For example, you may be dealing with:

• Pre-existing family dynamics
• Assumptions being made by all parties
• No defined training and development plan
• Inability of the senior advisor to identify training and development needs
• Inability of the senior advisor to train
• Lack of time to devote to training and development
• Lack of rookie training programs from MGAs
• Lack of industry product and skill development training
• Lack of business plans
• Reliance on training by osmosis

… and the list goes on.

Let’s be honest: you became successful by doing what you do best – meeting with clients and selling investment and insurance products. You’re not a trainer, and you don’t want to be! But you also don’t want to set up your protégé for failure.

Why risk your protégé’s future, your future and the future of your practice?

Investing in training and development goes a long way to ensuring success!

Think about the tremendous peace of mind and positive energy created by off loading all of these issues and concerns to a professional consultant who has lived the family succession experience and:

• Consults with you about your vision, goals and expectations for your protégé and business
• Consults with your protégé about their vision, goals and dreams
• Creates a custom 12 month training and development plan that addresses your unique vision, goals and expectations
• Schedules one on one or team Insurance training sessions
• Teaches practical insurance and financial sales skills, focusing on best practices, compliance, and increasing sales
• Implements a bi-weekly coaching plan
• Keeps you informed every step of the way with monthly training and development plan review meetings

Now imagine you can have all of this handled by an objective, professionally trained consultant, facilitator and coach! Stop worrying and keep doing what you do best – taking care of your clients and selling!

Family Matters is the answer you’ve been looking for! Here’s how it works and what’s in it for both of you:

1. Contract / agreement signed by all parties (senior, protégé and possibly MGA senior management)
2. Consultation meeting using 25 proprietary questions for both the senior, protégé and MGA 1 – 1.5 hour each
3. Facilitated meeting or conference call on areas of divergence and areas of agreement – discussion /consensus on areas of divergence and agreement on Objectives for the training and coaching contract
4. Job description and performance measures developed / written for protégé with 1/4ly Performance Review dates included
5. Income and Sales Production Plan developed and signed off by all parties (senior, protégé and MGA if involved)
6. Weekly 30 – 45 minute Sales Process and Product Training – “No sale is ever made without a prospect first.”
1. Prospecting – understanding your target market(s) – identifying needs, uniqueness, how to find, how to qualify, how to approach/developing your script and answers to objections
2. Strategies for making the telephone your friend
3. Painless Prospecting and Insurance Know-How training – facilitated training day with Senior, protégé and entire team when possible or chunked into Skype sessions when need be
4. What to say / how to lead the insurance appointments
5. Soft question fact finds
6. Asking for the order – COD or not
7. Answering objections
8. Managing expectations during the underwriting process
9. Business Insurance Fundamentals
7. Each session will be followed with an e-mailed summary which will include one or two assignments for the protégé to focus on for the week
8. Assignments will be reviewed /debriefed
9. Quarterly Assessments/ Written “Progress Reports”

Note – Insurance company specific product training will be the responsibility of the MGA, as will the tracking of the protégés business.

Thirty five years ago it was said that the training of 1 new captive agent for one (1) year was in excess of $50,000. That would translate into about $106,400 today!

Family Matters is only $25,000 (plus applicable taxes) for the year, with the breakdown being $10,000 (non- refundable) for the first quarter and $5,000 (non-refundable) each for the remaining three quarters. Think how quickly that is recouped with the senior advisor’s time and energy freed up to be selling their average case size and not using valuable selling time attempting to train and mentor when that’s not their forte! Or feeling guilty that they aren’t doing the training and mentoring!

Helena Smeenk Pritchard is a CLU, and followed in her father’s footsteps when becoming a career life insurance agent 2 years after graduating from the University of Western Ontario with a degree in Psychology. She is a certified Criterion Referenced Instructor which is a training philosophy believe in skill and competency building, not just an information exchange. Additionally she is a Peak Potential Trainer the Trainer graduate. Family Matters is her unique training and coaching programme designed to address the challenges of succession and ease the integration of family protégés into the family financial services practice. She has a successful life insurance sales track record, has been a Human Resource Consultant specializing in job fit and Performance Management, and developed several successful Customer Contact Programs as an Individual Insurance Market Manager for one of Canada’s leading insurers. As the Director of Training & Professional Development for one of Canada’s largest MGAs she wrote and implemented successful targeted training and development plans for all levels of advisors.

Call now 519-471-7800 to get your Family Matters started.