By Matt Pais

To set and achieve goals, it is important to create a realistic and actionable vision for your life, said 17-year MDRT member Nobuhiro Otsuka of Tokyo, Japan, who is also a Top of the Table member.

To do that, start with these three steps:

1. STEP ONE
Know where you are. When you participate in training, sit in the first row. You will learn more from there than in the last row. Not having knowledge or information could cost you a lot, but having good information can fundamentally change your life. Success comes from balancing the mind, knowledge and skills. My next step is to create the life planner matrix where I render what I know to be more learnable so that I can mentor others. You need to think, set goals and have a good strategy to act differently. I go on a power walk early in the morning to clear my mind and concentrate on my thoughts. The byproduct of the morning walk was that my daughter, then in the second grade, said, “I want to walk with Daddy.” So, my daughter and I had a great time together.

2. STEP TWO
Be the best for others. Once I learned more about myself, things started to look different. I went through many cycles of regret before making changes. After hours of thinking, I could finally see who I am and what I wanted to be. I want to be a good husband, a good father, a good friend and an outstanding life planner. I am fortunate to realize what I wanted to be.

This was excerpted from Otsuka’s 2013 MDRT Annual Meeting presentation “Your attitude determines your performance: Principles to succeed.” For more ideas from MDRT members, visit the MDRT website.

3. STEP THREE
Love, appreciation and honesty. When asked to do something, devote 120% toward getting it done. The skills you learned to serve others become a part of you. And when you are committed to being great, faithful and committed, you will be given bigger roles. Challenges help people develop. People who are extraordinary have overcome challenges in their lives. When you face a challenge, appreciate it, because it will help you prosper.

Are you doing enough to protect your staff and business?

By Derek A. Dingwall, AFP

Financial advisors specialize in preparing life plans for clients, but do we spend enough time planning for what happens to our staff after we die? The future of your business could be determined by the first person who answers the phone the morning after your death.

Picture the scene. Your staff is in shock about your death, and they’re not prepared for what to do or say. The phone rings, and it’s a worried client asking what will happen to their investments or policies. Meanwhile, your employees are worried about their livelihood and their future. If the client senses the staff’s anxiety and posts a message on social media about your office being in a panic, then the damage is done. But this scenario can be averted.

Protecting your staff protects your business

The first priority is to protect your support staff by making them beneficiaries of a life insurance policy that will provide them three months of income. This benefit will give them great peace of mind and security.

I also included a provision in a written agreement that my personal assistant will have three months of rent and other living costs covered if I die. A life insurance policy is the most efficient way to make funds immediately available. Whereas using a trust for this purpose isn’t practical as time is of the essence for your staff to receive support after you die.

Helping clients who are small-business owners

Once your plan is in place, look at other small companies that could also use a similar plan to provide security for their support staff and save their business. For example, in a doctor’s office, who will pay the nurses and receptionist if the doctor dies?

When you discuss what should happen in the event of your death with your support team, spouse, business partners and executor of your will, you are providing financial security to your team and loyal clients.

Derek Dingwal, of Benoni, South Africa, is a 42-year MDRT member. Contact him at dings@mweb.co.za.

They’re wrong! Why can’t they see it?

By Susan Robertson

You have some useful — even life-changing — information you’re presenting to prospects. They’re ideas they never thought about before regarding mitigating future risks. After you’re done, you don’t hear gasps of amazement. You just hear, “No thanks.”

What just happened could have to do with brain science.

When people (even you) encounter new information that contradicts their opinions, they only slightly refine but do not completely rethink their existing beliefs. Rarely will we assume when presented with new data that our existing beliefs might be wrong.

It’s frustrating, but this is how our brains work. Brains are Bayesian inference machines. Bayesian logic is a specific, formulaic reasoning that provides a disciplined way of combining new evidence with prior information. Our brains tend to make only incremental and minimal adjustments to existing beliefs when confronted with new data.

Adjusting to how our brains work

When you attempt to persuade clients or staff to a different way of thinking, present new information incrementally. Show them each step of the way how this change may be more like an expansion of their existing beliefs than a brand-new one.

For example, if a prospect doesn’t believe in life insurance, don’t expect them to quickly dissolve their long-held assumptions — even if you deluge them with charts, facts and figures. This approach may only cause them to tune you out. Instead, start with what they do believe in, such as their spouse and children having the ability to stay in the family home, even if the prospect should die before the children are independent adults.

What beliefs are the deepest?

The more experience a person has about a subject, the more likely they are to have assumptions about it. They may not even be aware that they have these embedded assumptions because these beliefs are so ingrained in their thinking that questioning these ideas does not even occur to them. These beliefs are presumed to be facts, which is why asking questions can help guide prospects to look at their mostly subconscious assumptions.

Given that our human tendency is to retain existing mental models, you need to consciously be doing things to help you, your staff and your clients break out of this natural opposition to new thinking. Remember, your brain will subconsciously limit your thinking in ways you’re not aware of unless you consciously and actively manage it.

Susan Robertson is a creative thinking expert with more than 20 years of experience speaking and coaching Fortune 500 companies. As an instructor on applied creativity at Harvard University, Robertson brings a scientific foundation to enhancing human creativity. To learn more, visit susanrobertson.co.

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