Episodes 1 - 5

•Tom goes through an example of what it means to have a high ceiling, meaning ongoing pursuit of growth and mastery. The good news is that we all have the ability to grow. He goes through an analogy of what his son is experiencing as he prepares to play college basketball, specifically the idea of a shot fake, what that means and the importance of nuance and detail.
•Tom talks about some of his latest thinking on asking the question about how would you characterize your own appreciation of safer dollars. Let’s think about that for a minute. You then give them the ability to categorize themselves in four different categories. First category is they already appreciate safer money and they hold it and they get it. Sometimes it's earmarked, other times they just like it and want it and they appreciate it. The second category is they already have it as a part of their allocation. It's 80/20, my advisor put me in it, you know I don't really think about it but I have it. The third category is they are not there yet. It’s all equity now, but with the right questions and asking them things like what's been your thinking up to this point, we can uncover those that have an interest in what we're able to do by getting them to think ahead. That 46-year-old who thinks about being 56, or the 36-year-old about 46, or the 48-year-old at 58. Playing it out and getting them to see it's multiple choice. And the fourth category is they’re just out. Not going to do it now, not going to do it ever. Don't care about safe and I never will. Tom's point is we often find ourselves spending too much time with the people that are out and are never going to do anything, no matter what we do. So that was a really good dialogue.
•Will discusses about how he's finding that the conversation about safer money and the "Lipscomb box" actually opens up many opportunities on the investment side. The Tom talks about how that's a differentiator between what others say, which is that they do planning, everybody says that and yet we have access to some unique tools and strategies at NM that others can't replicate. That's our key differentiator is that we have the ability to strategically integrate the efficiently designed life insurance solution into the plan.
•There's a really good dialogue between Will and Tom about how we're able to differentiate ourselves from what everybody else says they do in a way that's unique, compelling, interesting, and relevant. Tom goes through some amazing case studies where he got somebody to self-identify as being the third category, and rather than pushing through a process to sell them something, he was able to get them to open up to allow him to change the way they were thinking. The point was it was all in the nuance, all in the detail of what actually made it work.

•We go into some great content around the idea of avoiding left turns, and that's something that Tom has talked about before. He shares an interesting article about the idea that millennials don't eat cereals in bowls because they don't want to clean the bowls.
•Will talks about some language around positioning the portfolio-deferred income annuity. Will also talks about an idea that Tom shared with him about how it's responsive to rising interest rates and how our client's appreciate that they have a segment that isn't going down along with others that can go down, and that they get a bit of a bump. So really good language and mindset around that.
•We talk about examples of things that are not a left turns; having meetings on the phone at first and why that works, how to position it, how do you make things easier for clients so they don't resist and put things off?
•Will goes through some prospecting ideas from Keith Wagner at the annual meeting that are really helpful. We talk about why and how that works.
•Tom shares his idea of the types of people, the kind that really get it, want to give referrals, and then he adds some things about what if you call the people that were really responsive to that e-mail, will we get the 83% response rate? And if you said hey, tell me a little bit about these three people, tell me a bit more about what do they do, married, single, all those kinds of points. Really good dialogue around there about how to make it even better, and you get an example of Tom riffing in real time about some important and interesting concepts.
•We then talk a bit about the idea of showing people what's possible, and Tom's specific language about the use of the word today as a way to show people that what we're talking about is different today. Not yesterday, but today.
•We talk about the idea of how millennials want restaurants that are giving them experiences that are unique, things that are unique and customizable, so that is really interesting. We talk about how do we set ourselves apart? How do we avoid being as Tom says the Applebees or Red Lobster? Doing what everybody else does. How do we avoid that? It's in using their words and phrases. It's in customizing the box. It's not the same for everybody. It's different for everybody. How do we think about that and how do we do that in a way that helps people see the benefit of taking action? Also, why we're recommending that they do the things that we're recommending that they do.

•We talk about how we are incorporating a Q and A component to the podcast.
•Tom talks about his latest reading of the Wall Street Journal and some behavioral finance conversations from Richard Taylor, specifically the idea of paying ourselves first and how do we get ourselves to combat human nature. Human nature being this idea of people not being wired to do things complacently and procrastination.
•Tom goes through some examples of how pay yourself first works, why it works. We reflect on how and why it works and talk about some cases where that's happened and the effectiveness of it.
•We go through some examples of how to stay in the circle. How do you get that person who is procrastinating to either do something on some basis or agree to procrastinate in a way that's congruent? We revisit classic Lipscomb phrases of “some of our clients think of it this way, some of our clients think of it that way, which one are you?” to get them to really think of differently. That's really, really powerful.
•We have a discussion about somebody who thinks they hate insurance. That is a fun one that we talk about getting them to see how insurance is going to be beneficial to them later.
•We wrap-up with talking about the idea of doing what's right for our clients really being the overarching theme of all of these discussions.

•Tom and I talk about how 4.9 is as low as it's been in 44 years. Tom shares how there's hardly anybody here that's ever had a conversation with a prospect about a 4.9% dividend interest rate; it's been higher than 5 for a long time.
•Tom talks about how his first big case in 1986 was a 90 life policy, $10,860, the dividend interest rate was 11.25. Tom talks about how that actually broke even in around five years compared with today and how it competed with anything. He shares how we need to help people see where it's useful in their picture as opposed to its own asset class.
•Tom talks about how important the ability to communicate where it's a fit for our clients today compared to years past has become more and more important. A segment of their safer money, getting them to see ahead, getting clients to see into the future, think about what they're going to value later as opposed to just what they think about today. Really great conversation there- getting them to see that evolution of thinking is very relevant and powerful.
•Will describes some of the kinds of things Northwestern's portfolio is able to do from the Ron Jolson and Scott Penning podcast. We go through some of the specific examples of the portfolio, and then Tom goes through again why is 4.9% better than 5. What does it allow Northwestern to do? They could pay 5, they could pay 6, but why is it that it's better for them and for us that they don't. You're going to love the answer- really relevant.
•Then we talk about how to structure the product today. How today we have the ability to use APs, Tom gives some examples, additional premiums, of cases that have occurred at a level that would not have been possible and how he gets introductions much faster and how he tells people that what he's doing is special and different than what others in the industry are doing. He tells them that, and how they respond favorably and see if he's willing to meet with their friends, their best people. Not just people, but their best people.

•Tom lays out an example of a rep named Guy Baker who's a perennial MDRT rep, a legend in the industry. The point is that with clients we have to lay out the pain of the alternative of not doing the recommendation versus talking about how great what we do is. We first have to get them to see the pain of the alternative, and then they'll take action. We have to tell them how they can mitigate the pain without us and that makes the solution obvious.
•Tom goes through some examples, including municipal bonds. They're earning 2.2% right now for 10 years. Tom references a website www.fmsbonds.com and he says, if corporate bonds were magically 6% right now today, then muni bonds would pay 3.5% to be attractive- that would be the mass dynamic there. He says, well, Northwestern Mutual, they're able to earn more without having to own munis, and you get the tax efficiency by tagging along for the ride with them. Tom says, with munis, the mass dynamic works against you. With this, it works in your favor- a really good sequence there.
•Tom goes through a ledger, having it in front of him and telling us exactly how to construct the ledger. He says here is the structure of the policy. Here's the pain of the alternative. Here's what it looks like when it's fully funded. Imagine that you're finished funding it and it's earning 4.2% net. How does that look? No tax on it. How does that grow over time? How do you talk about distributions, basis first, the uniqueness, the specialness of it, using numbers with exactly what he said in the conversation going through the specific numbers to get the client to say, hey, there's a cost and you get something for it.
•Tom goes through three forms of cost recovery in great detail. It is game changing stuff- so powerful and effective. This is going to change the way you present permanent life insurance.
•Tom talks about what he refers to as the construction phase and how you want to get through those first 10 years to get to the paid up period, to where then the sawdust is gone and it's a distant memory. So the point is the pay in the early years recover a multiple of it later in the form of not paying taxes on the interests it earned, then being able to access basis first, and then the bump up between the cash value remaining and the death benefit.