Agenda - Monday September 18, 2023


*BREAKOUT # 1 FROM 2:15 PM - 3:15 PM in Florentine C (Main meeting room)*

A Deep Dive into How Living Benefits Can grow Your Insurance Book Real Conversations. Real Solutions. Real Results.
Most advisors know living benefits matter - but knowing and doing are two very different things. The gap between understanding a product and confidently introducing it in a client meeting is where growth opportunities get left on the table. This breakout session closes that gap. Rather than a high-level overview, we go deeper: into the client conversations that open the door, the real-life situations where living benefits make a measurable difference, and the planning discussions that turn a one-product relationship into a comprehensive, long-term one. Whether you're new to living benefits or looking to sharpen your approach, you'll walk away with a practical framework you can put to work immediately. Presentation Overview This breakout session will focus on practical ways to introduce living benefits solutions into client conversations. Participants will discuss how these products can help address real-life needs, strengthen client protection strategies, and support more meaningful planning discussions. The session is designed to give advisors a simple, clear understanding of how living benefits can be used to add value for clients. What Will the Advisor Learn from This Presentation? By the end of this session, you will be able to: * Start living benefits conversations naturally - without it feeling like a separate or awkward sales pitch * Recognize the client triggers - life events, business changes, and planning gaps - that signal a living benefits need * Explain the core products clearly - critical illness, disability income, and long-term care - in plain language that resonates with clients * Integrate living benefits into existing plans rather than presenting them in isolation, creating stronger, stickier client relationships * Overcome the most common objections with confidence, empathy, and fact-based responses * Identify high-opportunity client segments business owners, self-employed professionals, and families without group benefits where living benefits deliver the greatest value * Build a repeatable process for introducing living benefits across your entire book, not just with new clients
Perry Wong CPA, CA	Monica Fortney Agency Director
BREAKOUT # 2 FROM 2:15 PM - 3:15 PM in Florentine B (Room behind stage)

Ask a Lawyer Anything
This interactive seminar provides a practical exploration of tax and estate planning strategies for individuals, families, business owners, and incorporated professionals. The session focuses on minimizing tax, protecting wealth, planning for succession, and structuring estates efficiently. Participants will gain insight into how coordinated legal, tax, and financial planning can prevent costly errors and support longterm family and business continuity. Presentation Overview This seminar combines structured content with open Q&A, allowing attendees to pose realworld questions directly to a tax lawyer. Through practical examples and casebased discussion, the session highlights common planning mistakes, opportunities for taxefficient structuring, and the importance of integrating legal, accounting, insurance, and financial advice. Advisors will leave with actionable insight into how comprehensive tax and estate planning can improve outcomes during life, on business transition, at retirement, during incapacity, and at death. What Will the Advisor Learn from This Presentation? Advisors will deepen their understanding of key tax and estate planning concepts, including wills and trusts, corporate and estate freezes, family trusts, probate minimization, crossborder considerations, and succession planning. The session equips advisors to identify planning gaps, recognize opportunities for restructuring, and guide clients toward strategies that maximize aftertax wealth for future generations. Participants will also learn how proactive planning reduces risk and enhances longterm financial security.
Dale Barrett LLB, Tax Lawyer
*BREAKOUT # 3 FROM 3:15 PM - 4:15 PM in Florentine C (Main meeting room)*

Success Stories - Simplifying the Financial Planning Process Through Visual Communication
This talk focuses on simplifying the financial planning process so clients can clearly understand each step along the way. By using simple pictures, the presentation highlights how breaking the process into clear, relatable steps helps clients feel informed, comfortable and confident in their decisions while strengthening trust and relationships. Presentation Overview This presentation demonstrates how simple visuals and clear, relatable steps can transform the client experience. Instead of overwhelming clients with jargon, charts, or product details, advisors learn how to guide clients through a structured, easy-to-grasp process that builds confidence and trust. Overview Structure 1. Why Simplicity Wins - Understanding how clients process information and why complexity creates hesitation, confusion, and stalled decisions. 2. The Power of Visuals in Financial Conversations - How simple pictures help clients see the process, understand their options, and stay engaged. 3. Breaking the Sales Process into Clear Steps - A practical demonstration of how to divide the journey into digestible stages that clients can follow from start to finish. 4. Real World Success Stories - Examples of how advisors used visual tools to overcome objections, clarify decisions, and strengthen relationships. 5, Building Trust Through Transparency - How a simplified process reassures clients, reduces anxiety, and positions the advisor as a clear, trustworthy guide. 6. Implementing the Model in Your Practice - How advisors can immediately apply these techniques to improve conversations, increase clarity, and elevate the client experience. What will the Advisor Learn from This Presentation? Advisors will gain a practical, repeatable framework for simplifying complex financial conversations. By using visual storytelling and step-by-step explanations, they will learn how to make their process easier for clients to understand and easier for advisors to deliver consistently. Key Takeaways * How to turn a complicated sales process into a simple, visual journey clients can follow with confidence. * Why pictures and diagrams outperform long explanations, especially when clients feel overwhelmed or uncertain. * How to create clarity at every stage of the conversation, reducing objections and increasing engagement. * A repeatable communication model that helps clients feel informed, respected, and in control. * How simplicity builds trust, strengthens relationships, and leads to more natural referrals. How to use visual tools to uncover needs, guide decisions, and reinforce the advisor's value. * Simplifying the process increases advisor confidence, consistency, and closing ratios. This session gives advisors a communication advantage - one that makes them easier to understand, easier to trust, and easier to do business with.
George Sigurdson BA, CLU
BREAKOUT # 4 FROM 3:15 PM - 4:15 PM in Florentine B (Room behind stage)

The Business Behind the Balance Sheet: See the Structure. Understand the Risk. Find the Opportunity
A balance sheet can tell us what a business owns, what it owes, and how well it may have performed. But it rarely reveals what matters most to the people who built it. Behind the numbers are business owners, families, shareholders, and key people. There are relationships, competing priorities, concentrated wealth, and unanswered questions about what happens if life - or business - doesn't go according to plan. Through practical business cases and a clear, accessible approach to building, protecting, and transitioning wealth, Micheline helps advisors look beyond the financial statements to understand the complete picture of the business owner. Advisors will learn how to ask better questions, connect the pieces, and uncover meaningful planning opportunities without getting lost in unnecessary complexity. Because sometimes the greatest opportunity isn't found in the numbers - it's found in understanding the business behind them. Presentation Overview This presentation takes advisors inside the real-world dynamics of privately held businesses. Through case studies and practical examples, Micheline demonstrates how to: * Interpret business structures and ownership arrangements * Identify risks that financial statements don't explicitly show * Understand the human factors behind corporate decision-making * Recognize succession, liquidity, and continuity challenges * Uncover insurance, tax, and estate planning opportunities * Build planning conversations that resonate with business owners * Provide clarity without overwhelming clients with complexity Advisors will leave with a stronger ability to see the story behind the numbers - and to deliver planning advice that aligns with the realities, relationships, and risks that define the business owner's life. What Will the Advisor Learn from This Presentation? Advisors will gain: * A deeper understanding of business structures and how they influence planning decisions. * How to read between the lines of financial statements to uncover risks and opportunities. * How to identify concentrated wealth, ownership issues, and succession vulnerabilities. * How to ask the right questions that reveal the client's true priorities, pressures, and blind spots. * How to connect personal, corporate, and family dynamics into a cohesive planning strategy. * How to spot insurance, tax, retirement, and estate planning opportunities hidden within the business structure. * How to simplify complex situations so clients feel confident and understood. * How to position themselves as a key advisor who sees beyond the balance sheet and understands the business owner's world. This session equips advisors with the insight and confidence needed to serve business owners more effectively - and to uncover planning opportunities others often miss.
Micheline Varas