Are Insurance Events Wasting Your Time?

As an insurance professional, there are literally hundreds of events you can attend every year for education or motivation. My question to you on today's AgentLeader podcast is, are these events wasting your time? My answer is maybe. This episode of the Agent Leader Podcast is brought to you by the Becoming a Person of Influence masterclass. Go to brentmkelly.com SL masterclass. Hello and welcome. My name is Brent Kelly and thanks for listening to another episode of the Agent Leader Podcast. Now, last week I attended the first ever Elevate17 conference in the great city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, actually a town that I had lived in for about four years, many years ago, and it was hosted by Agency Nation and Trusted Choice. Now for, for any first time conference, there's a level of uncertainty from everyone, the host, the presenters, and of course all the attendees are a bit uncertain of what actually is to come. And I think that's expected. And I want to tell you first of all that the team at Elevate 17, the guys at Agency Nation, the ladies at Agency Nation, at Trusted Choice, they knocked it out of the park. It was a really great event. It was held at the Pfister Hotel in Milwaukee. A lot of people, you know, Milwaukee kind of gets a bad rap, so to speak, or maybe, maybe it's just overlooked. But great city, great time, great hotel. The speakers that I heard, and I heard most of them were dynamic and on point. The attendings were very hungry to learn and connect. It really was, it was an awesome event. And quick shout out to some friends, Stacey Stevens, Ryan Hanley, Sydney Rowe, Marty Agatha, and more. There was many more for creating a magnificent experience for all those who attended. Now, as much as I love to attend and speak at conferences like Elevate 17, let me say something that's I don't know if this is controversial, but I think it's important. Conferences do not change you or your insurance agency. Let me say that again. Conferences, events, even great ones like Elevate 17, do not change you or your insurance agency. I believe that conferences are a catalyst for change, but they do not create change. See, change only occurs when you move from an event to, to a process. As my mentor says, most people overestimate the importance of events and underestimate the power of a process. No one comes home from a conference changed. Now, maybe you're motivationally charged, maybe you're fired up, maybe you've got some new ideas. All that's great. I'm a big believer in all of that. But see, change only occurs when you take the information and the relationships you developed and you turn it into a consistent, consistent process. As a speaker, I want to create positive change for every single person in my audience. I love being in front of a group of people and sharing new ideas and experiences and maybe the audience have an awakening or two. But I fully realized that I can't change anyone. I've learned this now, being a full time speaker and a trainer and coach, that I can't change anyone. See, we all have the power to change, but change must come from within. And events like Elevate 17 and other insurance events, right? As I mentioned in the opening, there's hundreds of events you could attend every year. Events can offer new hope, they can offer ideas, they can offer resources to create positive change. But it's up to every single person, it's up to every single organization to instill to implement that change. In my presentation at Elevate 17, I spoke on being intentional. I spoke on being consistent and stretching beyond your comfort zone. Now, all of these concepts are easy to talk about, but they're very, very difficult, very challenging to put into action. However, as I've learned, and as I'm learning every single day, the power of process is so important in your life. And when you implement the power of process and understand that, your results will improve dramatically. So what's the difference really between an event and a process? You go to an event, maybe you hear a speaker, maybe you watch a YouTube. An event can be anything, right? But as John Maxwell writes about in his best selling leadership book, the 21 irrefutable laws of Leadership, here are a few things to keep in mind when you understand the difference between an event and a lifelong process. See, an event encourages decisions, while a process encourages development. An event motivates people while a process matures people. An event is a calendar issue, while a process is a culture issue. An event challenges people while a process changes people. An event is easy while a process difficult. And even that last one's important, isn't it? An event is easy while a process is difficult, Right? What do you mean easy? Brent? I had to pay money to go to this conference and I had to show up and get a hotel and do this and that, attend these speakers and all these kind of things. Listen, that may seem challenging, but nowhere near the challenge of a process. Taking what a speaker says or maybe relationship that you formed and you shared a new idea with someone and going, how do I actually put that into practice every single day. So what do you do after you attend a conference or any type of Event. You know, I have. Have you ever. I know this is true for me. Have you ever come back from a conference with pages and pages of notes, but put it in your desk and never put any of the ideas into action? I mean, again, I've done that in many cases, and what a waste. I mean, I hate to even say this, but if you go to an event and you take a bunch of notes and you meet a bunch of people and you never reconnect with those people, and you never do anything with those notes, and you never take any action on anything, you have wasted your time and your money. It's been said that if I need to be inspired to take steps forwards, then I'll intend an event. However, if I want to improve, I'll engage in a process and stick with it. So where do you start? Right? You're listening to this podcast. Where do you start? And again, maybe you went to an event recently, maybe you haven't. So whether you're coming back from the event, like Elevate 17 or any other event, or maybe you're planning on attending one later this summer or maybe in the fall or whatever it may be, what do you do? Where do you start? Right? When it, when it comes to content that you receive at a conference or relationships, I say start with one thing, just one thing. After you return from a conference or any event, what is the one, just one, one thing that you will begin to implement, execute day in and day out, look through your notes, comb through your notes, ideas you wrote down, not what the people said, but what that means to you. What is the one thing that's really speaking to you now? What is the one thing that will give you the greatest return in your business? Start with that. Now, this doesn't mean you have to abandon the other ideas and concepts you learn. You might have learned 50 different ideas. Doesn't mean you just have to forget about all of them. It just means you need to start with one. And you've got to give it your complete focus and attention. And let me tell you, this is one of the most challenging things I deal with because I love ideas, I love new things, and it's so easy for me to get distracted. But you got to ask yourself, am I even implementing the one thing that I started with fully? Now take the other ideas that you, that you learned at this conference or this event, or this workshop, or this speech, it doesn't matter, and put them on a box, place them on a shelf for later use. Darren Hardy talks about this. Great with productivity is that we have all these ideas and things you want to do. Just imagine, Just imagine you've got all these boxes, right, with ideas in them and things you want to do. Just take the one box, open that box up and dig into it and take the other boxes. You don't need to burn them or get rid of them, but take the other boxes and put them up on that shelf. You'll get to them. They're not gone, you're just putting them on the shelf. Now the second thing you need to do after an event, especially conferences, is build upon the relationships you formed. You know, I met some of the most amazing people at Elevate 17 and I think this is true. Really, at any conference, it's kind of up to you when you're there, right, to go introduce yourself and make connections. But I firmly believe the people we surround ourselves with and learn from can make or break your success. It really is a who do you know type of business. And I don't mean just some referrals and sales. That's part of it. I mean as far as sharing ideas and concepts and masterminding and again, just learning from each other, we all have our own struggles, we all have our own successes to share. Make sure you follow up with both new and existing relationships. Tell them how much you appreciated seeing them, learning from them, listening to them. It's been said that our network determines our net worth, and I believe that is so true. In fact, I'm not always good at this. I've had many conferences where I've had stacks of cards of people that I intended to follow up with and never really did. And then after a week goes by, I go, eh, well, you know, we'll touch base again, we'll cross paths again. And of course, we rarely do. I've just implemented something in a personal level. I'm using a service called BombBomb. It doesn't matter what it is, but it's a video service. And I'm going back to people I met and sending a personalized video to each and every one of them. Just real quick, just to say how we met and why. I enjoyed our conversation because I want to connect with people. I'm still working on that with other cards that I have from that conference. But it's very, very powerful. Whether it's an email, a phone call, whatever it is, stay connected. So I want to talk about the power, the true power of process. See, growth in leadership only occurs through consistent effort. There's a great quote that says this, says the secret to success in life for a man is to be ready for when his time comes. That's the power of the process, is being prepared for when your opportunity presents itself. I shared in my presentation that discipline is not sexy. Right. Discipline. If I say how many like the word discipline? Not many. But there is nothing more powerful than compounding consistency. Here's something to keep in mind. An event builds competency, but a process maximizes performance. Right? Just like when I do trainings, I can build competency. I can maybe give you a new idea or something to do, but the process is going to actually maximize your performance. Why I love coaching because I can take someone from competency to performance. One of my favorite quotes comes from President Theodore Roosevelt. Oh, Teddy Roosevelt. And President Roosevelt has a really amazing story, if you haven't. I was never really a historian with President Roosevelt, but I started to kind of learn more about him. I found him fascinating. And I want to share one of his most famous quotes because I think it's so powerful. He said this. It's not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strongman stumbled or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes short again and again, who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions and spends himself in a worthy cause, who at best knows that the end of the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither knew victory nor defeat. I think it's such a powerful action. Quote, right? That's the power of the process. And Theodore Roosevelt was a man of action. In fact, it's funny if you read stories of Roosevelt, maybe this isn't funny. It's not funny at the time, but Roosevelt was actually shot in Milwaukee before a speech. He was shot in Milwaukee. I did not know this until doing some research. Yet he finished the speech before he went to the hospital. Now, maybe that's a true man of action or maybe that's stubbornness. It's probably both. But again, very committed to what it is that he's doing. See, growth and leadership is a daily process. You must take action every day to build on the momentum of any event or experience that you have. Great leaders are lifelong learners. They understand that leadership is not developed in a day, but daily. And they never stop learning. So let me just give you a question to think about here as we wrap up. What would happen if you would take action every day on just one idea that you learned while attending an event of any kind? What would happen if you took action? Said this is the one thing I'm going to do and I'm going to be consistent with this every single day. What would happen if you nurtured a new relationship that you developed at a conference every day? Maybe followed up with someone and said, hey, I want to touch in? I know we met a couple months ago. I know we met a week ago. I know we met three months. Again, I'll say this, there is nothing more powerful than compounding consistency, so I challenge you to engage in the process today. Thanks for listening to this episode of the Agent Leader Podcast again. My name is Brent Kelly and I'm so happy you joined me today. If this podcast is adding value to you or your insurance agency, make sure to go to itunes or Stitcher Radio and leave me a kind review. It helps get the word out and I can help more leaders like like yourself. Again, today's episode was brought to you by the Becoming a Person of Influence Masterclass. If you want to grow your influence and your leadership skill in your insurance agency or your company, check it out at brentmkelly. Com Masterclass.