Are you like Bob?

By Patty Andree

Facing growing financial difficulties, Bob was hiding from creditors, including his auto finance company. In despair and tired of collection calls, Bob decided to pray. “God,” he said, “I’m about to lose my car and I need your help. Please let me win the lottery." The winning numbers were drawn but, unfortunately, Bob was not the winner.

Things got worse. His car was repossessed and, without transportation, Bob was unable to keep his job. With no income, his mortgage company foreclosed on the house. With no home, his wife left him and took the kids. At each event, Bob pleaded with God to let him win the lottery. As luck would—or wouldn’t—have it, each time someone else won.

Broke, hungry and living on the street, Bob tried again. "God, my life is a wreck. I have no car, no home, no family. Please let me win the lottery just this once so I can turn my life around. Please."

Amid bolts of lightning and rumbles of thunder, a voice came from the heavens: “Bob, meet me halfway. Buy a ticket.”

How many of us are like Bob when it comes to professional development? We know about ASCnet’s great education offerings, but we miss out because we fail to buy a ticket!  Several opportunities are coming up for you to change that. First is our Education Summit; that’s followed by Boot Camps and then TENCon. Interspersed among these are our Webinars.

Perhaps you’re not sure whether to go to the Summit. In the true spirit of users helping users (or in my case, a user stealing from users), I tapped fellow ASCnet members to highlight why you should attend. Earl Kelly, IT systems manager at Greene-Hazel & Associates in Jacksonville, Fla., shared his list of “Top Tens Reasons to Attend Summit This Year” in recent newsgroup postings. Here they are:

10.  Abundant training on Applied, Excel, Epic and HIPAA

9.  One word:  beignet

8.  This is the ONLY Summit this year!!

7.  Another chance to go thru Homeland Security at the airport

6.  Find out the answer to the age old question: Pray-leen or Praw-leen?

5.  Eat real Cajun food!!!

4.  Get two days of Sheraton points!!

3.  Meet with Applied Systems folks

2.  Network with peers who have the same issues

1.  Attend a class taught by Sandy Oliver!!

Earl quickly identified some of the other great presenters, including Todd Arnold, Sue Good, “Me, Myself, and I,” Keith Oufnac, Rhonda Talley, Angelyn Treutel and Ginger Wright. 

If you know Earl, you know his creative genius. He couldn’t stop at ten. In a follow-up post, he replaced some of his original reasons with new ones, including:

• One word: Boudin!!!
• More one-on-one time with presenters than at larger classes at TENCon
• The French Quarter is right around the corner
• Visit the birthplace of jazz
  • Airline food!!! (Peanuts or pretzels count as airline food. Plus, if you sit in first class you get really good food!!)
  • Get someone else to make your bed for two days.

Earl’s postings generated response from other members. With a dose of southern charm, Sherry Burrell, president of Grimes Insurance & Financial Services, Duluth, Ga., expanded the list to include:

• Get great additional training from Applied on Epic features!
• Network with other Epic Users and see how they are using Epic
• Attend the very first Epic chapter meeting during breakfast at Summit
• There’s a casino just two blocks from the Sheraton
• Get to meet me!

Hans Manhave, operations director at Jackson-Lloyd in Longview, Tex., weighed in on the newsgroups, as well, saying, “If anyone is sitting on the fence, wondering if they should go, they need to jump off the fence and go. This is not wasted time. Attending one of these meetings gives a person energy to go and do something for the good of the agency, with the resources already in their possession. 

“I'm an accounting/numbers kind of guy, not a hyped sales person, and I'm telling you, ‘Yes, it is worth the time and money,’” Hans added, noting that his remarks weren’t designed to disparage either sales people or accounting folks. “The best thing you can do in the current economy is study, train and learn to optimize the assets you and your agency already have. TAM is sitting there. Your brain, hopefully, is still there, as well. Optimize those things and results will fall into place.” Or as our ASCnet theme for the year says, “Commit. Connect. Prosper.”

So listen to Earl, Sherry and Hans. Take their divine advice: Buy a ticket!  Hope to see you there. Learn more at www.ascnet.org/summits. Register quickly--by April 30--and save $100!

ASCnet Education Committee Chair Patty Andree is a TAM Specialist at Johnson Insurance, Racine, Wisc.