{"id":16677,"date":"2019-08-26T08:09:00","date_gmt":"2019-08-26T12:09:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/Life-Insurance-Blog\/boxes-and-cubes\/"},"modified":"2019-08-26T08:09:00","modified_gmt":"2019-08-26T12:09:00","slug":"boxes-and-cubes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/2019\/08\/26\/boxes-and-cubes\/","title":{"rendered":"Boxes and Cubes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
<\/div>\n

\nGuy Baker was becoming frustrated as he tried to educate the five members of a CPA firm on the value of buying life insurance to fund a buy\/sell agreement. The CPAs were having a difficult time understanding what he was attempting to explain to them.<\/p>\n

\nThe whole presentation could have imploded, but Baker was resourceful. He asked the CPAs, \u201cDo you guys really know how life insurance works?\u201d They looked at him blankly and said no.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cSo they had a tablet on the wall and I walked over to the tablet and taught them CLU Part 1,\u201d he recalled. \u201cAnd when I was finished, they said, \u2018OK, let\u2019s do it!\u2019 I said, \u2018Do what?\u2019 And they said, \u2018Buy the insurance!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\u201cAnd I thought, \u2018Hmmm, maybe there is something more to this than I think.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\nSoon afterward, Baker had lunch with a life insurance prospect and taught her the same concept that won the sale with the CPAs. Within five minutes, she agreed to buy the coverage.<\/p>\n

\nAnd so The Box was born.<\/p>\n

\nBaker took his presentation and turned it into a booklet called The Box, a guide to the basic mathematics of life insurance. The Box has sold 500,000 copies. Its main concept is that life insurance is like a box into which you put money. The amount of money you put in depends on factors such as mortality costs, interest rates and life expectancy. The Box is a way of explaining how life insurance is priced and what actuaries consider when setting premiums.<\/p>\n

\nBaker said he has used The Box as part of every life insurance presentation he has done for more than 35 years. The Box is one of five books Baker has written during his 53 years in the business. Baker, 74, is the managing director of BTA Advisory Group and Wealth Teams Alliance in Irvine, Calif.<\/p>\n

\nHe is the recipient of the 78th annual John Newton Russell Memorial Award, the highest honor presented by the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors to a living individual who has rendered outstanding services to the institution of life insurance. Baker will receive the award at the NAIFA annual conference in September.<\/p>\n

\nIn addition to working in the financial services industry for more than five decades, Baker served as president of the Million Dollar Round Table in 2010 and was MDRT Foundation president in 2000. He has also been a continuing qualifying member of the MDRT\u2019s Top of the Table since 1977, one of only 25 agents to achieve this distinction.<\/p>\n

\nBaker credits his success in the business to several major factors: his passion for helping people figure out what he calls \u201cthe Rubik\u2019s Cube of finances,\u201d focusing on problems instead of focusing on solutions or products. And also employing a tactic from his days of playing high school football.<\/p>\n

\n\u2018Like A Rubik\u2019s Cube\u2019<\/h2>\n

\nBaker was about to begin his senior year at McKenna College in Claremont, Calif., in 1966, when Pacific Life recruited him for a college training program. He was one of 25 rising seniors who went through a training program in the summer and then sold insurance during their last year of college. Baker was the top salesperson in the group in terms of the number of lives covered, so Pacific Life asked him to train the next group of student-agents during the summer after he graduated.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cThat was my summer job before I started graduate school,\u201d he recalled. Baker went on to earn an MBA from the University of Southern California. He continued to recruit and train students for Pacific Life while he was in graduate school.<\/p>\n

\nAfter he received his MBA, Baker interviewed for a number of jobs but discovered that the jobs he sought paid much less than what he could make in the insurance business. His early success in selling insurance made him realize he had found his life\u2019s work.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cI found I enjoyed helping people think about their future,\u201d he said. \u201cI had a passion for it and I was good at it. I looked forward to every new engagement because it was like a Rubik\u2019s Cube \u2014 you had to figure out how to put all the pieces together.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nBaker often compares giving financial advice to solving Rubik\u2019s Cube, although he admits he has never been able to solve the actual Rubik\u2019s Cube.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cIt\u2019s too complex,\u201d he said. \u201cBut I think it is a great analogy because it is so complex and the movement of one color has an impact on the rest of the colors and alignment.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nAs Baker progressed in the business, he made the move from what he called \u201ckitchen-table sales\u201d to the business market. Success began to build, and the business market remains a focus of his practice today.<\/p>\n

\n\u2018Two-A-Days\u2019<\/h2>\n

\nBaker experienced some difficulties in his early years in business. He thought back to when he was a high school football player in San Bernardino, Calif., a desert community where the heat affected everyone\u2019s lives.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cBack then, we used to have what we called \u2018two-a-days,\u2019 where we would practice early in the morning before it got too hot outside and then we would practice again late in the day when it started to cool off,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cSo I adopted that concept for my business, where I would find two people every day who would talk to me about financial services, insurance or whatever. They didn\u2019t count unless I actually asked them to talk with me about insurance. If I asked them to have coffee with me, it didn\u2019t count. They had to know why I was coming and what I wanted to talk about. And if they said, yes, they would talk to me, I counted it as one of the two for that day.<\/p>\n

\nThat was the way I kept myself on track. I didn\u2019t pay attention to any other metrics. I just knew if I got two people a day to say yes to talking to me, that I would have the activity I needed to be successful.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nToday, Baker said, \u201cI have so many things coming at me from so many different directions, I really don\u2019t have to spend time finding things to do \u2014 they find me. But I like to keep track of the fact that I\u2019m on goal and I\u2019m headed where I need to be.\u201d
Baker began to make a shift from life insurance sales to money management in the early 1990s. By 2012, it had become a major part of his practice.<\/p>\n

\nHis 16-person agency has two main areas of interest, Baker said. \u201cOne is working with business owners, helping them transition their business, business succession, estate planning and retirement, attraction and retention of key people. That includes 401(k)s, pension plans, executive compensation.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nThe other is asset management. \u201cSo when they sell their business, someone has to manage those assets. We help clients figure out how to answer the three great questions no one can answer about retirement: What\u2019s my number? How much do I have to save to get to my number? How do I invest it so I make sure I get my income to my number?\u201d<\/p>\n

\nBaker serves the high-net-worth market, individuals who have assets of between $2 million and $50 million. Reaching this market and being successful with it, are two separate issues, he said.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cReaching this market is done mostly through word of mouth and referrals,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen you\u2019ve been around as long as I have, people either know you or they don\u2019t. And if they know you, you have a chance of working with them.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cAs for being successful with them, you need to learn a consulting process. I think that too often in the insurance industry, people are trained to be product-driven, solution-driven. I had to train myself to be problem-driven.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nBaker\u2019s clients have multiple financial problems for him to work through with them, and he said that\u2019s the fun part of his practice.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cAs I said, it\u2019s like a Rubik\u2019s Cube. And the thing that\u2019s so attractive about this industry for me is the complexity of those problems and the ability to sort them out and figure out how to put an integrated solution together,\u201d he said. \u201cSo I think it\u2019s the consulting integration process that makes it very interesting.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nA Lot Of Changes<\/h2>\n

\nBaker said the two biggest changes he has seen in the business during the more than half-century he has spent in it are the expanding variety of life insurance products in the market and the ever-shifting tax laws.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cWhen I came into the business, the only permanent policy available was whole life,\u201d he said. \u201cThen it shifted to variable life, universal life, indexed UL. And now IUL is getting a lot of variations. I think understanding the complexity of all those products and how best to fit them to your clients\u2019 needs is an important component when you\u2019re dealing with life insurance.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nAs for taxes, \u201cwe\u2019ve been in and out of estate taxes, in and out of income taxes,\u201d Baker said. \u201cSo you must constantly keep up with the tax laws and helping people keep in perspective that what the tax laws are today are not what they are going to be the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nIn addition to his passion for the complexities of finance, Baker is driven to educate others through his writing. His first book, Baker\u2019s Dozen, is a compilation of the 13 principles that he learned at a young age that helped him manage his own personal financial circumstances.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cI wanted to write them all down because I thought they were principles that would help anyone who wanted to learn them and apply them,\u201d he said. \u201cI thought it was important to document my own path and the things I had learned, so I at least had something to refer back to.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nThe follow-up book to Baker\u2019s Dozen is Market Tune-Up, which Baker described as \u201call the things I learned and changed in my business to make Top of the Table 42 times.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nAnother book, Why People Buy, \u201cis really the heart of the selling process,\u201d Baker said. \u201cIt\u2019s important for people in our business to understand that we sell problems, not solutions, and the buyer has a process that we need to understand and follow.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nTwo Innings Ahead<\/h2>\n

\nScott Brennan, who was MDRT president in 2013 and served on the MDRT Executive Committee with Baker, described him as having \u201cthe brain of an engineer applied to the life insurance business.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cHe can take a problem and break it down into three or four separate components,\u201d Brennan said. \u201cThey say really great baseball managers always think two innings ahead. That\u2019s how Guy operates. He is always ahead of the curve. He thinks deep, big, great thoughts, and he is incredibly bright.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nBaker and his wife, Colleen, have been married for 52 years. They are the parents of four children: Stacy (deceased), Todd, Andrew and Ellen. They have 10 grandchildren and will soon have six great-grandchildren. Todd and Ellen work with him in his practice, and Todd\u2019s son and daughter work there as well.<\/p>\n

\nBaker loves to play golf and play the piano, and is active in his church. In addition, he obtained a Ph.D. in financial planning and investments from<\/p>\n

\nThe American College in 2018. He was part of the college\u2019s first cohort in that doctorate program.<\/p>\n

\nLooking ahead, Baker said he has no plans to retire soon, but he is laying the groundwork for his practice to be successful after he does retire someday.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cI\u2019m building a team that will be able to step up and take this business and run with it. So that\u2019s my primary objective,\u201d he said. \u201cMy secondary objective is to build retention income for that company so they don\u2019t have to worry about how they will pay the overhead every month and they can concentrate on growing the business.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nBaker has been a leader in several industry organizations, and he said associations must do a better job of collaborating and building on each other\u2019s successes if they are to survive.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cAssociations need to do a better job of defining why they exist and why they are of benefit, and then use that to sell their value proposition to sell their membership.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nDo you know someone who would make a compelling profile story?<\/strong> Shoot us a quick email telling us who it is and why you think so. Send it to [email protected]<\/a>, and put PROFILE in the subject line.<\/p>\n

Read the original article at InsuranceNewsNetMagazine.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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