Episodes 6 - 10 

• Tom and Will have a very interesting conversation that Tom called “choose change.” There are several reasons where being different is incredibly useful to us, and the idea of thinking about change as something that we control versus something that happens to us is incredibly helpful.
• Tom goes through a very deliberate dialogue where he met with a client, a 57 year old executive, along with another rep and the client's wealth management advisor. He talks about how he got her to see value by expressing the areas of planning that other clients are finding particularly interesting and relevant and inviting her to pick which one she wanted to learn about. That turned that into a 90 minute conversation and a conversation that the wealth management advisor, her advisor for 14 years, had never ever had.
• Will and Tom have a great dialogue around the idea of teaching first. How does that play a role?
• Tom shares some language and an approach he had from another rep that was not particularly effective. Tom talks about how in that approach there were what he calls "trap questions" as opposed to the kind of questions that are more about adding value.
• Tom shares an idea that we have to think about how the client is going to perceive what we say. We have to make sure it makes sense. We have an interesting discussion about how our clients think about these things. It will be helpful to us all as we think about how do we change what we're doing. If something's not working, how do we make sure that we think about a way to get it to work. It’s a very interesting perspective

• Will goes through a sequence of how to get points across that help clients think about both aggressive money and safer money using some of the language and ideas from Nick Murray- equity as an asset class and how it exceeds inflation, how to get the clients to think over the proper time frames, i.e. long periods of time, to get them to really understand why this is a fit and how everything fits together.
• Tom shares his perspective around his take-aways on how he sees that to be a good fit
• Tom goes through some points on some of the things there that are effective.
• We talk about ways to make sure that we maintain our effectiveness in the presentation meeting.
• Tom shared some perspective on ways that he's observed if we get off track, what happens, and how we're not effective, and etc. How does that all work?

Tom talks about some of the things he's reading including a blog called "Barking Up The Wrong Tree" by Eric Barker.
Tom talks about a thought, and it's an incorrect thought that we often have, that “this shouldn't be happening.” Whatever this is, it shouldn't be happening. Then Tom shares a bit about what can we do? How do we have an alternative thought to that? So our thinking is things should happen the way we want, but then there's the real world, and people don't do the things they should do, and things don't always work out the way that we would like them to.
Tom discusses the replacement belief: expect the unexpected. So when someone reschedules, say I need a breather. It's normal, and overwhelming, and challenging to navigate the world we live in. We just have to understand that's how it works, and the 5% of things that go really, really well make up for the 95% of the things that don't. That's why we're here. That's why we do what we do and that's why we're needed in our clients' lives.
Tom discusses some questions that came to us from John Gatewood, a subscriber and friend of Tom and Will. John posed some very interesting questions about how to position ourselves uniquely both to existing clients and to prospects, specifically in the wealth management sense. Tom goes through a great dialogue of how to do that, and then a specific conversation about interesting and relevant. How do we become interesting in today's world? What does relevant mean? Tom goes through some things it means; it means new, it means helpful in their situation.
Tom discusses something he's read in Ben Carlson's "A Wealth of Common Sense" publication, a weekly blog, that there are certain aspects of our business that are becoming commoditized, and we need to focus on the areas that are value drives for clients. This is an amazing conversation about how to bring value. First, how to know what value we're bringing, and second, how to consistently bring it

At the beginning of the episode, Tom and I talk about Nick Murray's February 2018 newsletter around investing at what we feel is near the top of the market and some perspectives on that- expecting that things will work out.
We talked a good bit about how to get clients to experience what's happening. How to get them to think about volatility and what it means. Also how being right twice won't happen.
Tom talks about his take away was that human nature is a failed investor and Tom also wrote down human nature is a failed saver.
Tom talks about ways to get people to start saving money. This would be true for the 28 year old or the established executive or doctor. It’s how to help them adopt a philosophy to pay themselves first and how to help them start doing something on some basis and get them to see ahead. First they're going to notice it. They're going to say, oh wow, I had noticed all this and this has been difficult in terms of savings, the first few months, but then invariably they forget that they were even doing it. So really good conversation around that. Some great language as well.
We transitioned to the idea of how success is really paraded at regional meetings with ribbons and things. We had a conversation around that and Tom even talked a little bit about how even as a top 10 rep, this current year, that sometimes it can be not motivating in a way. Especially coming back from the meeting and having some difficult experiences. So then, Tom shared some examples of when things worked out later. Maybe it took longer than expected. Also the conversation around how do we maintain focus, practice and prepare.
We talked about how to help people -- so one of the objections Tom mentioned was a case where a client said he felt the commissions are repugnant, 10 year breakeven is too long, liquidity, how do I ever access money. Tom goes through a really powerful sequence of how he affirmed, so the client understood that he was heard and Tom wasn't going to fight him. He was calming to the person while affirming it. Then differentiating what he's actually talking about from what the client actual has. So that was really, really good. Really a great discussion around that. A really powerful sequence that can be helpful to any of us in terms of affirming what they say, re-orienting their thinking and continuing to have a good conversation around that. Specifically how dollars were cost recovered later, non-taxability of the interest, etc.
We had a conversation about the regional meeting presentation about being remarkable for our clients- what it means and Northwestern talked a good bit about tools and technology and etc. Tom and I talked about Tom's perspective that really it's about being interesting first. Interesting needs to occur before we -- before anybody would use the word remarkable. So first something has to be interesting before anyone ever remarks about it. So that's really good. Really great conversation and a really good wrap up on how to be interesting. How do we aim for interesting? How do we create value for people first by being interesting so that one day we can be remarkable and have them talk about it. We go through some examples of that.

We start with is the importance of strengthening words, versus weakening words. Tom goes through an example of a joint work case he did where the other rep introduced him in a way that used the word kinda and it put him at a deficit in the meeting.
We talk about examples of how we may be unintentionally using words that are weakening, as opposed to words that are strengthening. We go into what some of those words are- like strategic, well structured, efficiently designed, drives the efficiency, relative advantage, can't be replicated, strategically integrated into the plan, brainstorm on opportunity, confiscatory, bifurcate. We talk about where those words go.
We have a discussion on framing, sequencing and telling stories. How do you make the point? How do you sequence it in a good way?
We also talk about long-term care. How do we position long-term care today in light of rate increases and in light of the fact that the product has had some challenges?