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Next Item Previous Item Go back to White Papers List Having a strong organizational culture enables you to hire, conduct business and attract clients in a consistent way that aligns with your overall values. With the fast pace of technological change today, a training culture can give you a competitive advantage when it comes to recruiting and retaining the best talent. Imagine that a quality candidate is considering your organization and another one, but you offer continuous training as a benefit. That will normally make the candidate’s choice simple and obvious. Investing in training for everyone in your organization shows them that you value their professional development and advancement potential. According to Arie de Geus, head of Shell Oil Company’s Strategic Planning Group and a visiting professor at London Business School, a learning culture is not only a strong source of sustainable competitive advantage; it is a critical corporate asset. He says, “Learning is the only source of sustainable competitive advantage.” Instead of investing in training once in a while — when someone requests it or when compliance requires it — make training a key element of your company’s or firm’s makeup. So how do you build training into your culture in such a significant way that it defines your organization? Here are some tips to get started. Survey everyone in your organization to find out what types of training they want to take. What skills do they want to improve, and what type of training do they prefer — online courses, webinars, on-site classes or off-site classes? Offer training to everyone. Instead of focusing only on advisors, for example, offer training to managers and support staff as well. Hire a training manager. Or assign the job of assessing, scheduling and evaluating training to one of your existing team members. This will show the people in your organization that you are committed to making training an integral part of your culture. Establish a mentoring program. Have your senior advisors mentor newer advisors and offer jointwork arrangements. Consider participating in the MDRT/GAMA International Mentoring Program. Create a coaching program. Coach everyone. Many managers make the mistake of focusing their coaching efforts on the rookies or poor performers. Offer coaching to your top performers. They will value the extra guidance on top-level issues, and it’s important to keep them happy. Leverage the expertise of your own people. Build a company e-learning program that enables your more experienced team members to share their expertise with newer employees. Let them be the subject-matter experts who provide some of the training, and reward them for doing so. Offer training in both “hard” and “soft” skills. Some of your team members need training in skillbased areas, while others probably need training in “soft” skills like negotiation, resolving conflicts and being more customer-focused. Attach specific goals to the training. Ask every team member what he or she hopes to gain from the training and how it can also benefit the organization. After the training, have your managers find out to what extent the training lived up to those expectations. This will help you evaluate the ROI. Communicate and celebrate training outcomes. If a training program was at least partially responsible for a team member being promoted, let everyone in the organization know about it. This is an effective way to reinforce the connection between the training you offer and the advancement of those who take the training. Measure the effectiveness of your training program. Consider using a feedback app, which can contain different sets of several questions for different situations. You can repeat the questions at various intervals to create a trend analysis. Use a SharePoint-based intranet to help employees track the progress they make in implementing improvements. Building a training culture requires an ongoing commitment and strategy. Unfortunately, too many agencies, firms and companies have a set-it-and-forget- it formula, which does not move the needle in the proper direction. The rewards of establishing a training culture will help turn each of your top goals and objectives into reality, in increased productivity, expanded markets, recruitment and ultimately retention. An Effective Training Platform for Managers and Advisors An effective resource for training financial advisors is Hoopis Performance Network, which features online, on-demand, total video-based training built on four Disciplines of Success with access to more than 400 sessions. The coursework can be either self-study or facilitator-led, and it complements any firm, agency or company training programs and marketing selling systems. Your advisors can access the video training anytime, anywhere, on their computers, smartphones, or tablets. It’s a cost-effective, time-efficient way to increase productivity, thus retention. An effective resource for training new or experienced sales leaders is HPN, an innovative virtual platform designed for financial leaders who are building a region, an agency or firm, a sales unit, or a sales team. You can get access to hundreds of high-impact sessions for all levels of experience, divided into five distinct elements of success. These sessions are short and easily digestible, averaging less than 10 minutes. Your managers can access the video training anytime, anywhere, on their computers, smartphones, or tablets. 10 Tips for Building a Training Culture

Next Item Previous Item Go back to White Papers List Most people have at least one person in their past who inspired them to greatness they’d never imagined. A grade-school music teacher who saw a savant when teaching Beginner Recorder. A coach who spotted a potential future pro in the kid who showed up early and stayed late for every practice. A college professor who pulled the gifted math student aside to challenge her chess skills. What all these scenarios have in common is an influential leader who inspired someone to do more than they’d ever dreamed they could. A successful sales manager is that kind of leader. So let me ask you this: Are you a successful sales manager, or do you aspire to be? With this white paper, I want to inspire you to be the best sales manager possible. I want to challenge you to become the kind of leader who inspires a sales force to great success. First, let’s define the role of the sales manager. There are differing opinions on this topic. I’m often asked if a sales manager can also be a sales rep. While there are many examples of sales managers successfully carrying out the dual role of sales rep, for purposes of this paper, we are going to focus on dedicated sales managers with no direct sales responsibilities. A Forbes article a few years back went so far as to say that successful sales reps often make lousy sales managers. I concur. This is because I believe the No. 1 role of a successful sales manager is to focus on the sales team, not on the customer. Successful Sales Managers Are Strong Leaders If you have thought your most successful sales rep might make a good sales manager — or that your stellar sales record qualifies you for management — think again. The greatest numbers-driven, customer-centric, goal-busting sales rep isn’t necessarily a good leader. And when it comes to sales management, good leadership is a non-negotiable requirement. Some people have a natural gift for leadership. Others can learn it. Like every other skill, leadership requires practice. Being a great manager doesn’t make you a great leader. Leadership is a skill unto itself. It must be studied and practiced. The internet offers all kinds of opinions on the characteristics and habits of good leaders. When I’m working with sales managers (or aspiring sales managers), I look for the following 10 characteristics: Vision — Successful sales managers are always looking ahead and around. They’re paying attention to the organization and the competition, thinking about constantly growing and improving, and fully open to healthy change. Strategy — They have analytical interests and abilities. They know how to use data to find flaws and how to fan the flames of success. They seek out problems early and focus on solutions. Humility — They are never haughty, always open to constructive criticism, and readily accessible and honest. Honor — They act with integrity, dignity and honor. Their reputation is above repute. They tell the truth while being kind and respectful. Focus — They are not easily distracted by the latest and greatest trend or the shiny new idea floating around. They plan patiently and execute with discipline. Boldness — They are brave and willing to take action, even if that action may make them unpopular. Attractiveness — I’m not talking about being good-looking, though that is never a negative. I’m talking about the kind of person other people admire and seek to be like. Their dress, posture, gait, communication style, reputation and relationships represent the ideal, and in doing so, motivates others to improve themselves. Accessibility — They are clear in their message and open to dialogue. Their team can access them by appointment or “open door” and know they will be heard. Clients know how to reach them, and know they can if a relationship with a sales professional goes sideways. Company leaders also know they can access them when needed. Organization — They prepare agendas before every meeting. They set goals and create a plan to achieve them. Their desk, car, clothes and life are tidy. Positive attitude — Successful sales managers have positive attitudes. They practice good habits, including self-care, and they approach even the worst problems with a positive outlook. They inspire others to be positive as well. Successful Sales Managers Nurture Their Teams What is the responsibility of a sales manager? Is it to drive numbers? Ensure customer satisfaction or retention? Hire and fire a sales team? Report to the home office? Yes, a sales manager is responsible for all those things, but there’s another, less easily defined, responsibility of a sales manager: to nurture—to further the development of, or foster, others. While it’s critical to hire wisely, fire when needed, keep an eye on customer relations and achieve or exceed revenue goals, it’s equally critical to nurture the sales force. You can nurture the growth of your team members by recognizing when they are bored, leading them to grow professionally, working with them to set and achieve goals, and asking for their input on decisions, when appropriate . Nurturing others involves many responsibilities: Communication — Clearly communicating with your team means conveying your message clearly, ensuring understanding and listening to feedback. The proverbial open-door policy is a hallmark of any strong manager. This is not to say that a sales manager’s office should be a safe haven for complainers and trouble-makers. It shouldn’t. But it should be a place where members of the team can speak with you, ask questions, seek guidance, get your help in solving problems and receive mentoring that brings out their best selves. Team building — Hiring and firing strategically is an important role of a sales manager. I’m not sure who first said, “Hire slowly and fire quickly,” but that person was right. Poor performers — or worse, those with poor attitudes — are a cancer to an organization. For one, their lackluster performance requires more of the manager’s attention. For another, their weak numbers can have a negative impact on the overall sales force, dragging everyone’s numbers down. Most damaging of all are the underachievers who make excuses for their performance or actively engage in a negative whisper campaign among colleagues. A successful sales manager invests the time in strategic networking to attract, engage, interview, research and negotiate with top sales professionals. If you haven’t seen my blog on using LinkedIn for recruiting. Other social networks, both online and in-person, are outstanding resources as well. Effective recruiting of top performers means the sales manager needs to be known everywhere those top performers are active, whether that’s around town, throughout the country or all over the world. Managing the business — Sales management isn’t about numbers alone, though that’s an important component. It’s about managing the entire business. That includes forecasting and measuring results; setting goals; establishing quotas; defining territories; communicating with organizational leaders and customers; coaching employees; designing and overseeing training, technique, messages and public relations; and of course, the functions discussed earlier. When you consider the time and attention all that requires, it becomes increasingly clear why trying to wear the dual hats of sales manager and sales rep doesn’t make much sense. Would you think of raising a child without interacting with her? Could you maintain a strong marriage without listening to your spouse or spending quality time together? Could you keep a long-lasting friendship without listening to your friend in good times and bad? Of course not. Successful sales managers actively nurture their sales teams. They spend time with the team, both collectively and individually. They care what’s going on in their sales reps’ lives and customer relationships. They are sensitive to the dreams, desires, likes and dislikes of their sales force. Let me try to make this point with two real-world examples. Sales Manager Amy loves golf. She golfed in college and was captain of her team. She belongs to a popular country club and has created a strong social network there. She speaks about golf and leadership at local businesses, clubs and schools. Many of the professionals on her sales team love to golf. All but Tyler. Tyler does not know how to golf and doesn’t particularly enjoy it. Tyler is a high-octane kind of athlete. He climbs rocks, kayaks in rapids and takes a HIIT class every morning before work. His sales performance is good, he meets and exceeds goals, and his customers like him. There’s just one problem: Amy is accessible when she’s in the office, but she spends a lot of time on the golf course. If Tyler wants one-on-one time with Amy, he knows he can have it with her over 18 holes but probably not over lunch, and certainly not on the rocks or in the rapids. The rest of the team doesn’t mind that Amy is consumed by golf. After all, they like golf. But Tyler considers Amy’s approach to be untenable and insensitive. For that reason, Tyler probably won’t stick around long if Amy remains his sales manager. Her lack of nurturing or consideration for his interests (and disinterest in golf) is probably going to cost her a top-performing sales rep. Only time will tell, but my money says Tyler will be looking for a new sales job soon. David is another sales manager with a looming problem on his hands: he does not like to be interrupted. That is understandable under many circumstances, but in his case, it’s a bit extreme. He works with his door closed, holds meetings with everyone standing up (to discourage lingering and idle chatter, he says) and to ensure that there are no unplanned interruptions to his day. David gets a lot of work done and impresses higher-ups with detailed reports, always submitted early. He keeps a busy schedule of community networking and has amassed an impressive social media following. What David doesn’t know is how this makes his sales team feel. They feel alienated, unheard and undervalued. So while David might be plowing through reports without interruption, more than a few people on his sales team are looking online for a more nurturing place to work. Successful Sales Managers Inspire the Best from the Sales Team The fact is, the most successful sales managers are those who bring out the best in their sales teams — the best production, the best morale, the best reputation in the community and the best overall retention. If you’re a sales manager, one way to know how you’re doing is to measure yourself in those areas. If you’re falling short of projections, finding yourself in conflict with more than one sales associate (or finding conflict among sales associates in general), having trouble attracting top talent to your team or losing new hires, you might need to take a hard look at where you can improve. Remember, your key performance indicators (KPIs) are about your team’s performance and your management performance. KPIs can vary from one organization to another. For example, if you’re managing a global sales operation, your KPIs will be different from those of a strictly local sales organization. In general, I recommend taking a good, hard and honest look at your performance in these five core areas: Activity — This includes prospecting, appointments, presentations, promotions, time to close and new closes. You know the types of activity you need from your sales force to get the numbers you want. How well your team is doing in these areas tells you how well you’re managing your team. Team morale — How’s everyone getting along? Are those on your team friendly to one another, generally upbeat and supportive? Or are they bringing petty problems to you, complaining about a colleague or undermining one another’s client relationships? Employee attrition — This can be directly tied to morale, but it can also be tied to your hiring decisions. If you’re experiencing too much employee churn, you need to find out why. It can be the result of a flawed hiring process. Client attrition — Every sales manager knows how expensive it is to acquire a new client. Losing a client is even more expensive. Are your sales professionals attracting your ideal clients or swinging for the low-hanging fruit? A lost client is bad for business. Too many lost clients can indicate poor sales management. Growth — Are most or all of your sales professionals growing their business, quarter over quarter and year over year? Are they improving their ratios? Are they taking the time to continue their education and training, such as pursuing industry designations? Are they participating in team and organizational events, growing their social media following, and attending and perhaps leading social and business networking events? If your people aren’t growing, you need to find out what you can do differently to help them grow. Successful Sales Managers Resist the Urge to Micromanage Because sales managers’ compensation is tied to how many sales their teams make, they are highly motivated to ensure that their salespeople produce at high levels. That’s great, but it often leads to a scenario where they micromanage the sales team, hanging over their shoulders and constantly asking for updates. This is especially common with former top-producing salespeople. They want to feel like they’re in control of every situation, especially when it comes to their own salaries. But most salespeople are self-motivated and don’t respond well to this type of oversight. Their performance will probably suffer if they are micromanaged. This can lead to a vicious cycle where the sales manager becomes more and more frantic as the team fails to meet quotas. Sales management is a balancing act between providing guidance and direction without taking personal involvement to extremes. People tend to work best when they are provided with their marching orders but then are left to execute their jobs on their own. Achieving Next-Level Sales Management Success Not everyone is cut out for sales management, just as not everyone is cut out for sales. And being a stellar sales rep certainly doesn’t guarantee you’ll be a successful sales manager. Successful sales managers are strong leaders. They’re inspirational, they’re focused on their team and they’re focused on the business. If you’re a sales manager or looking to make the leap to sales management, your secret to achieving sales management success comes down to you. Can you lead your team to becoming its best, individually and collectively? Are you committed to ongoing education and training, open-door communication, leaderly oversight, faithful mentoring, maintaining a pristine reputation and diligently tracking metrics? If your answers to those questions are yes, then you just might have what it takes to achieve next-level sales management success. Helping sales managers and sales teams achieve next-level success is what we do best at Hoopis Performance Network. If you think we can help you step into a sales management role or step up your sales management results, give us a call or contact us here to schedule a free consultation. We’ll do everything we can to help you reach next-level sales management success. Leading Your Team to Success: Secrets to Next-Level Sales Management

Managing Director Octagon’s Baseball Division Alan Nero Managing Director Octagon’s Baseball Division Alan Nero is Managing Director of Octagon’s Baseball Division. Octagon is a leader in the sports management industry representing over 3000 clients, corporations and events worldwide. In 2008 Octagon was voted “Top Sports Agency” by Sports Business Journal. Alan’s clients include 50 current Major League players, A Field Managers (Joe Maddon: Tampa Bay several MLB Coaches) and 2 Hall of Fame Members (Wade Boggs: Baseball Hall of Fame and Andre Tippet: Football Hall of Fame). Alan was born in Providence, Rhode Island, in 1947, to first generation Italian-American parents. Growing up, Alan dreamed of being a coach. He was an outstanding high school athlete, excelling in wrestling, cross-country and outdoor track, and he was captain of his high school wrestling team. In 1965, Alan attended Springfield College, in Springfield, Massachusetts, to pursue his dream of becoming a coach and educator. Springfield College is the birth place of basketball and home to the Basketball Hall of Fame. The YMCA movement also had its beginning at SC. The values of sports and service were to shape Alan’s life forever. While attending Springfield College, Alan was captain of the wrestling team, sports editor of the school newspaper, and worked as a financial representative of Northwestern Mutual Life. During his senior year, Alan coached the local high school cross-country team, leading the team to both a High School State Championship and a New England Championship. In 1969 Alan returned to Rhode Island; started a financial service business, with his childhood best friend, Harry Hoopis. That same year he became the assistant wrestling coach at the University of Rhode Island. At the time the URI wrestling team ranked 35th out of the 35 teams in New England. In 1973, Alan became the head coach and the team went on to win three out of four New England Championships (Division I). Alan was voted New England Coach of the Year all three years and in 1993; Alan was inducted into the URI Sports Hall of Fame. In 1977 Alan refocused his energy and attention on his financial service clients and developed innovative ways to insure athletes. This helped sports teams indemnify themselves against the possible disability and/or death of its star players. Bridging a gap between teams and players and setting a 35 year career as a sports agent in motion. Alan continues to achieve recognition for his innovations in the sports management world. The Sporting News voted Alan as the 6th Most Influential Behind-the-Scenes Person, in the annually published “Top 100 Most Powerful Figures in Sports.” Most recently, Street and Smith’s Sports Business Journal recognized Alan as one of the Top 20 Most Influential Agents in Sports. Although Alan is most known for his work as a sports agent, negotiating some of the largest contracts in Major League Baseball, he takes more pride in developing winning relationships with people around the world and dedicating himself to his family. A value he learned from his parents growing up. Alan has always found pride in helping others, whether coaching, selling insurance or advising and managing athletes, he finds a tremendous amount of gratification in his service to others. For this reason he recently was awarded an Honorary Doctorate Degree of Humanics by his Alma-mater Springfield College. Alan has been married to his wife, Lia, for 37 years. They have two children, Alana and Lou-Jon, and four grandchildren, Julia, Brody, Cooper and Emory. Alan and his wife reside in Lake Forest, and spend their summers in Rhode Island. Previous Speaker Go back to Speaker Network Next Speaker

The Hoopis Performance Network has formed alliances with industry organizations that complement our existing resources, products and services. Course Catalog Our digital resources are designed to be scalable and customizable depending on your organization’s virtual learning and development needs. For more than a decade, we have been providing digital learning solutions when, where and how your financial professionals and employees need it. Clients in over thirty countries throughout the world leverage our digital content to help them keep pace with the ever-evolving challenges of learning and development in the new world. HPN University helps getting new advisors off to a fast start or reignite experienced advisors to get to the next level? Either way, our digital content and learning solutions are designed to fit your organization’s unique needs. Our content solutions are scalable, customizable and designed to increase advisor productivity and retention. View Catalog EDGE helps leaders succeed at every stage of the leadership journey. This comprehensive digital content library teaches essential skills for building a thriving business, creating a highperformance culture, and everything in between. Whether you want to strengthen your own leadership skills or build your leadership team, and whether you are new to leadership or have years of experience, EDGE has a solution for you. View Catalog Try It Free for 14 Days Get full access to the platform—risk-free. No credit card. No commitment. Just results. Start building your advisor bench today. Start Your FREE Trial

Next Item Previous Item Go back to White Papers List As technology continues to advance at warp speed and as the demographics and dynamics of the workplace change, it’s easy to fall behind. Here’s the good news: many common challenges that companies, firms and agencies face can be solved with e-learning. Here are six key areas in which e-learning can conquer the challenges that erode morale and profits in our organizations. 1. Generational Differences Can Cause a Disconnect With 80 million Millennials in the population, these 17- to 36-year-olds (in 2017) are the largest generation to date. Myriad companies have conducted research to discover how to provide training that will appeal to Millennials and result in the optimum outcome for organizations. In many companies, firms and agencies, there is a yawning gap in communication and mutual understanding among the generations. It’s important to train Millennials in a way they respond to. It’s also critical that Millennials, Baby Boomers and Gen Xer’s understand and respect one another’s differences in communication style, career mind-set and learning preferences. This type of communication gap can be an obstacle to your organization’s success, especially if your training manager is not on board with modifying training in a way that appeals to generations other than the one he or she represents. If that’s the case, that manager probably needs training and/or coaching to learn and accept generational differences. Here are a few tips for creating Millennial-friendly training, gleaned from our personal experience in training and from myriad research studies: Keep Millennials informed. They want to know what we expect of them, what criteria we will use to evaluate them and how it will impact them. Make the training tech-based. For Millennials, education has always been delivered via online platforms. Many are “digital natives” who don’t know anything else. Make it visually compelling. Millennials are accustomed to icons, infographics and other visual representations of data. Massive blocks of text will bore them. Coach them. Follow up with them regularly. Guide them through the entire learning program, one step at a time. Many are accustomed to “sound bites,” and a longterm training program can seem overwhelming. Make training flexible and easy to access. Deliver it in a format that fits younger advisors’ lifestyles. Many younger advisors log in at 1 a.m. or midnight to watch training videos. It’s not about our schedule; it’s about their schedule. We need to note here that flexible and 24/7 training is important for veteran advisors, too. Sometimes older advisors feel like their lives are being turned upside down because of the constant, frenetic pace of change. Many of them are self-conscious about needing to get up to speed in certain areas in which younger advisors already excel. Deliver training and education they can watch anytime, anywhere, in the privacy of their homes or offices. Numerous studies show this is what veteran producers want. When we interview experienced advisors, and ask them what aspects of their current role they’re unhappy about, they often say something like, “When I first joined the firm, I got great training for the first three months, but then it disappeared.” 2. External Managers and Specialists Need to Adapt to Your Systems When you hire managers and specialists from outside the organization, it’s important to make sure their initiatives align with what you’re already doing. This is especially critical if you hire more than one external person at once. You want to make sure that if they are building something new, it’s all done according to consistent guidelines that anyone in the organization can duplicate. Each manager doing something differently is not the way to run an organization. It should be something anyone can grab off the shelf and use. Training also can help you make sure your external managers aren’t bringing ineffective systems with them. If they had used those systems successfully in their previous roles, they wouldn’t have left. 3. Staff Members Need to Learn Something New Too often, when companies and firms train staff members, they provide training that teaches them how to do the job they’re already in. Sometimes that’s necessary, but we also need to teach them skills that will help them progress and learn something new. Research shows that a lack of training is one reason talented people leave. We often see producers with anywhere from 3 to 20 staff members who do 99 percent of the client interaction. These critical support staff won’t talk with clients about subjects they don’t understand — and that translates into missed opportunities for cross-selling. Offer them training that teaches them about all the products you sell. Make it part of their responsibility to recognize what products each client needs, and reward that effort with an incentive. Your sales will skyrocket. 4. Day-to-Day Documentation Should Be a Priority Accepting the responsibility for annual compliance is something everyone learns early in this career. But what about documentation of day-to-day occurrences that can have a significant impact on your organization? What if someone hears a conversation that turns out to be important, but no one documents it? What if a customer complaint snowballs, and there is no record of what happened? Training is a simple solution. Educate everyone in your organization about the importance of documenting various interactions with clients. Specify who is responsible for what, and provide them with guidelines. Everyone needs to be able to prove that they’re handling things as they are required to by law and according to the organization’s expectations. Building a training program like this will require your management team to make some business decisions. But it needs to be done. As the old saying goes, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” E-training can help, whether you hire someone to customize it or you produce it in-house. 5. There Is a Lot of Expertise in Your Organization That You Can Leverage People often learn their most valuable strategies from their colleagues. By establishing focus groups, study groups, joint-work opportunities, teams and mentoring partnerships, you can leverage the vast knowledge and wisdom that already exists in your organization. Offering this type of in-house training will help you retain your reps because they are likely to value being able to learn new things. This shouldn’t be the traditional Monday new-agent school; it should be an ongoing effort to encourage reps to share what they know with their colleagues. This will be especially helpful to second-to-fifthyear agents and veteran agents, who have already completed all the formal training and may feel like they’re no longer growing. They can watch training videos together and share best practices regarding what is and is not working. And they can find ways to combine their expertise in a way that provides clients with more value. You can use e-learning with these groups for brainstorming, to look for something they haven’t seen or heard before and to serve as a refresher on concepts they may have neglected, such as networking. Advisors can use the training resources to help them grow their businesses, develop their staff or junior associates in a team-building arrangement or bring a son or daughter into the business. For example, with e-learning, a veteran producer can spend his or her time teaching the next generation valuable relationship-building skills and have the younger reps supplement that unique perspective with videos that teach the fundamentals of selling. This cannot be a set-it-and-forget-it program. I am amazed at the number of organizations that spend a lot of time building a system and delegating tasks to people, but then there is no follow-up. They have no idea if the system is working or not. But they never followed up on it, promoted it or assessed its value. 6. E-Learning Can Be a Resource, Not a Curriculum Often, bite-sized training is more effective than a longterm, formal curriculum-based program. E-learning makes it easy for reps to access ideas, concepts, education, knowledge and skills. Many reps, especially Millennials, are more likely to use training that they view as a resource, not a curriculum. It needs to be something they want to learn, not something their managers expect them to do. With “sound bites” of training, such as short videos, reps can watch a brief segment over and over again. Repetition is the mother of all learning. When you hear something many times, you become indoctrinated into it, and your recall and retention improves. Lawyers don’t know every case study or precedent. They know the fundamental concepts by heart, and they know where to find the laws, regulations and proceedings that will help them with a case. 6 Common Challenges E-Learning Can Solve

Next Item Previous Item Go back to White Papers List With the constant growth in the power of tablets and phones, there has been a constant shift in the preference from traditional websites to gadget applications. Apps: Convenience on Steroids According to research, mobile users spend some 86 percent of the time on their smartphones or tablets, accessing their mobile apps. The apps are not only used as a source of daily information; they also form a platform for the interaction between companies and their field force and consumers. Some 68 percent of users employ apps this way. Companies use apps both inside and outside their organizations. Venturing into mobile app development depends on the company and industry. In many cases, mobile websites alone will not match the opportunities that mobile apps offer by increasing their outreach to their staff, field force, customers and the public at large. For financial services companies, a mobile website is not enough. Use of mobile websites alone will minimize a company’s optimal engagement levels, which in turn can reduce its productivity. To provide such services and products effectively, and stay ahead of the competition, you need an enterprise mobile app. Websites are losing more and more ground to mobile apps. Consumers have grown accustomed — or perhaps addicted — to using their devices for shopping and other activities. The constant pop-up ads that appear on websites are pushing customers to download mobile applications. On the company and firm side, professionals increasingly consider technological gadgets as extensions of their offices. They offer customers constant communication and access, inside or outside the office, at any time of the day or night. Consider it convenience on steroids. How Mobile Apps Improve Productivity One of the most significant benefits of apps vs. websites is improved productivity. The only way an organization can increase its profitability is by increasing productivity, reducing costs and minimizing waste. These outcomes are possible only when there is efficient communication within the organization so that everyone is focused on achieving specific goals. Here are some ways that apps can make that happen. Enhanced communication — Mobile apps make communication with financial professionals easier, quicker and smoother. Also, training and access to organizational resources are faster and more efficient than ever. According to one study, productivity in organizations that use mobile apps will increase by 20 to 40 percent. Apps also enable the organization to record, produce and use its data easily. Increased employee productivity — According to Fliplet, a study of more than 200 American federal workers in 2013 found that, when given access to mobile tools and portals, each employee will gain an extra 364 hours of productive time per year. Not only that, but they also report feeling more efficient and engaged. And, according to a study by Accenture, the overwhelming majority of executives agreed that mobile apps had made a significant impact on their businesses. In fact, 82 percent said that mobile apps are an integral part of their organizations, and 81 percent believe mobile apps will be the key to unlocking vital data from across their businesses. More efficient dissemination of information — Enterprise applications create a link between the company and the external world. Information such as changes in business operations is sent to individual customers and professional financial apps through push alerts. This faster, more efficient dissemination of the information and services a company offers outdoes what traditional websites can offer. Financial services customers like to keep in constant touch with their company to monitor their finances and weigh developments that might affect them. Customers need an easily accessible record to review their financial status so they can make decisions. And financial professionals will enjoy the opportunity to review their pending case requirements, case status, product updates, interest rates and compliance. They will also enjoy quick and easy access to notices and bulletins. Access to information, even when offline — With mobile apps, everyone can access their information both online and offline. With traditional websites, information can be used only when the desktop or laptop is accessing an Internet connection. But with apps, data and updates are locally stored within the app on the device until the device is reconnected to the Internet for further updates. People save a lot of time by using mobile apps because they can carry out their tasks from any location, even when they are offline. Increased revenue — Finally, mobile apps increase opportunities for a company to gain more revenue — sourced from services that are app-enabled and tailored to the company. For example, financial services companies are allowing mobile money transfer through their apps. This technique can yield an increase in organizational revenue because you can charge for such a money transfer. Most service industries are now implementing the use of mobile apps. Their time has come. And it’s time for all financial services companies and firms to get on board as well. After all, profitability and ultimate success largely depend on the constant and effective interaction with our field force and customers alike. And right now, with regard to interaction, mobile apps are about as good as it gets. Hoopis Performance Network Can Develop Your Customized Educational App Today, how financial professionals can access their training and educational resources is just as important as the material itself. HPN can provide your firm’s customized, branded virtual training via both website and mobile application delivery, providing your team with 24/7 access via any computer, smartphone, or tablet. Repetition is the mother of all learning, and now with HPN’s customized mobile app, it’s easy for everyone to get the answers they seek with only a few clicks from their fingertips. How Mobile Apps Improve Productivity

Owner Advantus Marketing, Marketing Strategist Tiffany Markarian Owner Advantus Marketing, Marketing Strategist Tiffany Markarian and her firm, Advantus Marketing, are devoted to helping financial professionals advance their marketing and business momentum. She delivers 24 years of field marketing and business development expertise having personally coached hundreds of wealth advisors, broker / dealers, brokerage agencies and insurance firms in driving productivity, practice equity and overall growth. What her clients say Tiffany does for them is create a much needed level of change and accountability. The real benefit to you in working with Tiffany is the clarity and direction you gain in your business, your relationships with clients and a more powerful presence in your local marketplace. Tiffany speaks at numerous industry conferences throughout the year and has been a past speaker for GAMA, NAILBA, the Financial Planning Association of Massachusetts, LifeMark Partners, Inc., Guardian Life Insurance, NAIFA, Vanderbilt Securities, Inc., the Society of Underwriting Brokers and numerous regional firms and broker / dealers. She has been featured in Life & Health Advisor, NAILBA Perspectives, and the GAMA International Journal for her results in helping firms and advisors increase the equity value of their practice and strengthening and retaining client relationships. She is known for helping advisors and firms capture and retain opportunities amidst heightened competition and economic volatility. Her clientele is national in scope and crosses all aspects of the wealth advisory industry, including: financial advisors, BGAs, independent RIAs, broker / dealers, and insurance firms. She draws from her deep field experience as a Director of Marketing for Allmerica Financial, Senior Consultant at MetLife / New England Financial, and Director of Marketing for John Hancock / Signator Investors, Inc. She served as the Director of Business Development for a Massachusetts wealth advisory firm for seven years prior to forming Advantus Marketing. Tiffany and the Advantus Marketing team look forward to helping you advance your marketing and business momentum. Previous Speaker Go back to Speaker Network Next Speaker

President, Rockstar Consulting David Fisher President, Rockstar Consulting David J.P. Fisher (D. Fish) is a speaker, coach, and author. Building on 20 years of experience as an entrepreneur and sales professional, he’s helped thousands of financial professionals develop the strategies and execute the tactics to build their businesses. As the president of RockStar Consulting and Director of Training Content at Ajax Workforce Marketing, he works with individuals and organizations to create more effective networking, sales, and marketing skills – both in the real world and online. He lives next door to a beautiful cemetery in Evanston, IL that reminds him to appreciate every day. Previous Speaker Go back to Speaker Network Next Speaker

Financial Wellness Save or Pay Off Debt Calculator: Saving vs using the money you have in savings to pay down debt. Try Our Save or Pay Off Debt Calculator Having savings is important, especially when the savings are part of an emergency fund or a hedge against a loss of income. However, when you also have debt, in the form of an outstanding credit card balance or loan, you might want to consider whether you are better off using the money you have in savings to pay down debt. Back to Financial Calculators We Invite You To “Test Drive” Our Financial Wellness Content Today! Test Drive