Strong Aussie Influence at 2016 MDRT Experience

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Australia’s first-ever main platform female presenter highlighted a significant contribution by Australians at the recently completed 2016 MDRT Experience in Hong Kong.

360° Solution founder, Vicki Writer - first ever Australian female presenter on the MDRT main platform.
360° Solution founder, Vicki Writer – first ever Australian female presenter on the MDRT main platform

Conducted over three days, this event was attended by around 8,500 advisers from around the world, but mostly from the Asia Pacific region.

The value for advisers attending the event resided in their ability to access latest business development thoughts and relevant ideas from a range of main platform and session speakers.

Significant value also lay in the personal messages which reinforced the importance to all advisers attending the event that their future potential should not be determined by their own self-imposed boundaries. One of the speakers who advocated this message was Australia’s first female MDRT main platform presenter, The 360° Solution founder, Vicki Writer.  Talking to her audience under the theme of ‘Tell Your Life Where to Go’, Writer urged her peers to tell their own lives where to go so they don’t finish up wondering where it went.

…If better is possible, good is not good enough

The diverse range of presenters discussed topics such as pushing the boundaries of personal endeavour, ‘magic’ words and phrases proven to work within client interactions, the value of life insurance from the claimant and beneficiary’s perspective, lessons in leadership, mentoring and generational business succession, the value of giving, proven methods of identifying client types and building rapport,  keys to long-term personal health, how an understanding of different gender thought processes will enable a better client outcome, latest global economic and market trends explained, how to expand the opportunities that exist within an advice practice and other inspiring messages, including the global phenomenon created by young American, Alex Sheen, founder of ‘because I said I would‘.

Other Australian contributors at MDRT 2016 included a workshop presentation by NSW adviser, Matthew Collins, who drew on his experiences from within Australia’s life saving community to share with his peers how to build trust with clients. Collins advocated that “…Your clients will stick with you if you have their best interests at heart.” Well-known Aussie Dr Ross Walker, also spoke to the main platform audience in a humorous presentation that shared his tips on the journey to ultimate wellness, while the presence at the event of Queensland-based adviser Ross Vanderwolf, who now sits on the MDRT Executive Committee, was another reminder of the significant and growing involvement of Australia and Australians in this huge global adviser organisation.

Other key ‘takes’ from the event were encapsulated in some of our tweets, including:

‘If you want to know the value of life insurance don’t ask an Adviser, ask a widow’. Thanks Mary Fenwick for sharing your story…

The very best way to build client rapport is a face to face meeting – with food! We like your thinking

Listening to the amazing Dr Christina Liu explain the effects of the Japanese negative interest rate at

James McEvoy speaking at , seeing a world without borders, where everything today is connected…

“If better is possible, good is not good enough” – Caroline Banks at

“It’s not our job to predict the weather, but it is our job to help you weather the storm” – insights from Caroline Banks at

“You can pretend to care, but you can’t pretend to show up” – inspirational final presentation at thanks to

Riskinfo will report further relevant news and issues stemming from the 2016 MDRT Experience, including a Round Table feature article in the March 2016 edition of Riskinfo Magazine, sponsored by AIA Australia, which considers the similarities and differences that exist between the life insurance advice environments in Australia and Hong Kong, China and the rest of Asia.

The Asian-region MDRT Experience events are conducted every two years, with the next MDRT Experience taking place in Bangkok, Thailand in 2018.

The traditional country flag ceremony signalled the commencement of the 2016 MDRT Experience, with Australia's flag carried by experienced NSW adviser, Peter Graham...
The traditional country flag ceremony signalled the commencement of the 2016 MDRT Experience, with Australia’s flag carried by experienced NSW adviser, Peter Graham…
The 2016 MDRT Experience was attended by around 8,500 advisers, mainly representing the Asia Pacific region
The 2016 MDRT Experience was attended by around 8,500 advisers, mainly representing the Asia Pacific region