Giving Back and Paying Forward

Wednesday, August 24th, 2011

The fol­low­ing is based on one of Norm Trainor’s clients, Wal­ton Rogers.

What does it mean to be in the top 1% of your pro­fes­sion? For mem­bers of the Mil­lion Dol­lar Round Table (MDRT), it means that you are not only rec­og­nized as hav­ing reached the pin­na­cle of suc­cess in your pro­fes­sion, but also, that you are the ben­e­fi­ciary of a tra­di­tion of shar­ing that is unusual in our com­pet­i­tive world. Wal­ton Rogers was cho­sen by his peers to be the Pres­i­dent of MDRT for 2009 and to be a part of its Exec­u­tive Com­mit­tee for five years. His elec­tion to this august posi­tion rec­og­nizes his years of giv­ing back as a trusted member/leader in over 25 lead­er­ship posi­tions. How­ever, Wal­ton would be the first to admit that he has gained far more than he has given through this association.

When you meet with Wal­ton and one of his MDRT asso­ciates you may notice that they are proud of their mem­ber­ship and the num­ber of lives they touch. Wal­ton describes what this means as follows:

“We are proud that our ethics, our activ­ity lev­els and the results we achieve enable us to qual­ify to be part of this select group. The pride is in what we do with and for our clients. The pride is in the mem­ber­ship and the sym­bol­ism of the orga­ni­za­tion. It is not a pride in self. Rather, it is the desire to be the best in the world at what we do.”

MDRT pro­vided Wal­ton with a stan­dard of excel­lence early in his career. It taught him the power of the Whole Per­son Con­cept which is a reminder to keep your life and your career in perspective.

With a desire to keep all of life’s events in a proper per­spec­tive, Wal­ton has been work­ing with two younger asso­ciates, Jonathan Williams and Robert Zim­mer, to imple­ment a Suc­ces­sion Plan. Wal­ton sum­ma­rizes the impor­tance of plan­ning for the future and pay­ing forward:

“We have promises to keep. Our clients pay us for the future deliv­ery of a ser­vice or a prod­uct. If we are not there to deliver, then we are not ful­fill­ing our com­mit­ments to them. Suc­ces­sion plan­ning is a log­i­cal way to keep our com­mit­ments to our clients. Our clients now have three advi­sors to rely upon. My com­mit­ment to Robert and Jonathan is to pro­vide inspi­ra­tion, knowl­edge and expe­ri­ence in what­ever way I can. I learned through MDRT that you inspire by exam­ple and you learn from oth­ers. The three of us are com­mit­ted to learn­ing from each other, the Round Table and our col­lec­tive experiences.”

There are two qual­i­ties that I have observed in work­ing with Wal­ton. The first is that he is a very good lis­tener. He has that rare abil­ity to make you feel as if he is totally engrossed in what you have to say and is lis­ten­ing with all of his senses. The sec­ond qual­ity is that he is a man of prin­ci­ple who is com­mit­ted to mak­ing a dif­fer­ence in peo­ples’ lives. These two qual­i­ties have served him well in over thirty years of work­ing with clients to assist them in mak­ing the often dif­fi­cult deci­sions related to build­ing and pro­tect­ing the finan­cial well being of fam­i­lies and busi­nesses. Wal­ton, Jonathan and Robert are com­mit­ted to lis­ten­ing to the needs, wants and val­ues of new and exist­ing clients and cus­tomiz­ing a finan­cial plan to real­ize the client’s dreams.

Through his involve­ment with MDRT, serv­ing over 800 fam­i­lies and tran­si­tion­ing his prac­tice over time to Jonathan and Robert, Wal­ton is giv­ing back and pay­ing forward.

Norm Trainor is the founder of The Covenant Group, a com­pany spe­cial­iz­ing in prac­tice devel­op­ment for advi­sors. For fur­ther infor­ma­tion, visit his Web site at www​.covenant​group​.com.

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Tags: Beneficiary, Commitments, Competitive World, Executive Committee, Importance Of Planning, Jonathan Williams, Leadership Positions, Mdrt, Norm Trainor, Person Concept, Pinnacle, Proper Perspective, Robert Zimmer, Select Group, Standard Of Excellence, Succession Plan, Succession Planning, Symbolism, What This Means, Younger Associates
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Tags: Beneficiary, Commitments, Competitive World, Executive Committee, Importance Of Planning, Jonathan Williams, Leadership Positions, Mdrt, Norm Trainor, Person Concept, Pinnacle, Proper Perspective, Robert Zimmer, Select Group, Standard Of Excellence, Succession Plan, Succession Planning, Symbolism, What This Means, Younger Associates
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