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Kathy Ryan, SPHR, is an award-winning author and owner of Pinnacle Coaching Group, LLC.  Over the last 30 years, Kathy has influenced thousands of people in the business and non-profit sectors through her coaching, consulting, speaking and on-site training. Her expertise covers a wide range of subjects including leadership, communication, human resources management, team dynamics, and performance management.

Kathy earned her B.A. degree in psychology and history from Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania and has been awarded a lifetime certification as a Senior Professional in Human Resources (SPHR) from the Society for Human Resources Management. She has experience working with diverse industries including insurance, hospitality and entertainment. She is certified in the use of the Myer-Briggs Type Assessment (MBTI), as well as a number of other assessments and tools to support development.

Kathy is author of the book, "You Have to Say the Words" An Integrity-Based Approach for Tackling Tough Conversations and Maximizing Performance, which won a Royal Palm Literary Award from the Florida Writers Association.  Her interactive training program based on the book has helped thousands of managers to improve their coaching skills and drive performance. Her articles on leadership and other personal development topics have been published in numerous magazines including the Insurance Journal. You can follow Kathy’s blog, Inspired Leadership, at www.CoachKathyRyan.com .

Frederick J. Fisher, J.D. is currently the President of Fisher Consulting Group, Inc. and was the Founder of E.L.M. Insurance Brokers, a Wholesale & MGA facility specializing in Professional Liability and Specialty Line risks. He is a Member of the Editorial Board for Agents of America;  a Faculty Member of the Claims College, and Member of the Executive Council, School of Professional Lines sponsored by the Claims & Litigation Management Association and Instructor for the Academy of Insurance.

Since his career began, Mr. Fisher focused on one vision: providing financial security to the client. The result was a successful 40-year career in Specialty Lines Insurance. In 1975, Mr. Fisher began his career on the service side, as an Independent E&O claims adjuster. In 1982, he bought the Company, continued with claims, while expanding the firm’s services to include qualitative claim auditing, risk management & loss control services, and acting as a TPA. In only 4 years, the annual billings increased by 400%. His claim auditing techniques and recommendations resulted in substantial client savings (including the SCRTD now known as the Los Angles MTA). Many Insurers and self-insureds adopted not only the performance standards raised in the audits but adopted his recommended Attorney Management Guidelines as a base, which are still in use today by many major insurers. 

In 1995, he formed what is now known as ELM insurance Brokers, a firm that has acted as an MGA and Wholesale Broker of Professional Liability Insurance and Specialty Lines. From nothing, the firm grew rapidly to a $30 Million dollar facility when sold in 2008. He has lectured extensively on professional liability issues since 1978 and authored over 64 articles in trade journals and periodicals. He is the author of BROKER BEWARE, Selling Real Estate within the Law. He designed a program to conduct on-site pre-underwriting risk management assessments of a clients' professional liability exposures. In 1993, he was elected to the Professional Liability Underwriting Society (PLUS) Board of Trustees. After serving in all Officer capacities, he was elected President in 1997. He remains a Special Materials Expert for several RPLU courses and is the Senior Technical Advisor for The Professional Liability Manual, first published by the International Risk Management Institute in 1990. He has taught over 100 CE classes and lectures. He testifies regularly as an expert witness in cases dealing with the duties and obligations of professionals as well as on coverage and claims-made issues.

Nancy Germond is the Executive Director, Risk Management and Education, for the Independent Insurance Agents & Brokers of America, the “Big I.” She is located in Phoenix, Arizona. With almost four decades of risk management experience, her unique insights and abilities help businesses better understand and manage their risk. Nancy has authored scores of risk management-related articles, and white papers and has consulted and presented to public-sector and private-sector insurance organizations. She is a licensed P&C agent and adjuster.

A second-generation insurance professional, Nancy was the first risk manager of the City of Prescott, Arizona, and has worked in the private and public sectors as a claim and risk manager. Nancy holds a B.A. in Communication from Mills College and a Master’s degree in sociology from Lincoln University. She also holds the Associate in Risk Management, the Associate in Claims designation from the Insurance Institute of America, the Insurance Training Professional Designation from the Society of Insurance Trainers and is a Senior Professional in Human Resource Management.

Chris Burand is the Owner/Founder of Burand & Associates, LLC.  Chris is the only insurance agency consultant with an Institute of Business Appraiser’s Certified Business Appraiser Accreditation and one of the very few who are certified by the two largest E&O carriers to provide audits for agencies.  With more than 35 years of experience in the insurance industry, Chris is acknowledged as a leading consultant and is a nationally recognized speaker and author.  His broad experience and wealth of knowledge have enabled him to work with hundreds of agencies, taking great care to learn the client’s goals and understand their needs while developing a solution for their specific situation.

Chris combines education, experience, and knowledge from multiple perspectives at proven levels that few other consultants or educators can provide.  This enables Chris to provide holistic solutions.  Chris’s services help agencies, individuals, and carriers identify strengths and opportunities, optimize productivity and profits, implement real-world strategies, leverage resources, and develop realistic plans of action in order to maximize profitable growth.

Chris established Burand & Associates in 1992 (originally known as Growth Planning).  As a consultant, Chris has consulted with hundreds of agencies and many major insurance carriers.  He built and now facilitates two insurance agency networking associations.  He is also a featured speaker across the continent.  To date, he has presented more than 400 seminars and educational programs, and his articles have also been published more than 500 times.  He is a monthly columnist for The Insurance Journal, a past columnist for American Agent & Broker for eleven years, and his articles have appeared in Rough Notes, The National Underwriter, A.M. Best, many regional insurance publications, and many other trade publications.  He also publishes Burand’s Insurance Agency Adviser for independent insurance agents.

Areas of Expertise

Insurance Agency Appraisals:  Chris Burand’s professional services include appraisals for Acquisitions and Sales, Buy/Sell Agreements, Mergers, Dissolutions, and Perpetuation Planning.

Contingency Contract Analysis:  Contingency contracts offer opportunities to increase compensation through negotiations and strategically placing business.  Chris Burand’s Contingency Contract Analysis® service provides the information agents need to take advantage of those opportunities.

Note:  Chris Burand and Burand & Associates, LLC are advocates of agencies which constructively manage and improve their contingency contracts by learning how to negotiate and use their contingency contracts more effectively.  We maintain that agents can achieve considerably better results without ever taking actions that are detrimental or disadvantageous to the insureds.  We have never and would not ever recommend that an agent and/or agency implement a policy of, or otherwise advocate, increasing its contingency income ahead of the insureds’ interests.

PEP® (Productivity Enhancement):  Chris’s innovative statistical algorithm method for identifying procedural consistency, compliance, activity cost, and opportunity cost savings.

Carrier MD® Stability Analysis:  A unique analytical method for creating opportunities to learn negotiating points and insurance carrier stability from an agency’s perspective.

Producer Compensation Plans:  Chris Burand develops plans that increase profits and motivate producers.

Chris Christian stumbled into insurance in 1985 as a temporary employee at GAF Insurance Services, a bank-affiliated insurance agency in San Diego.  After six years with GAF, Chris moved to the carrier side, opening the San Diego branch office of RLI Corp, an underwriter of specialty lines of insurance.  The San Diego office was dedicated to Directors and Officers Liability coverage, and was the launching pad for Chris’s specialization in professional liability.

Chris left RLI in 1997 to establish her own underwriting facility at London American General Agency and branched out thereafter into professional liability broking.

Chris joined U.S. Risk in November of 2005 and six months later relocated herself, her significant other, and 26 animals to Tennessee, where she continues her pursuit of the art and science of professional liability broking, and contributes to the industry as a frequent speaker, author and association participant.

James founded a Workers' Compensation consulting firm, J&L Risk Mgmt Consultants, Inc. in 1996.  J&L's mission is to reduce our clients’ Workers Compensation premiums by using time-tested techniques.  J&L’s claims, premium, reserve and Experience Mod reviews have saved employers over   $9.8 million in earned premiums over the last three years.  J&L has saved numerous companies from bankruptcy proceedings as a result of insurance overpayments.
  
Experience

James has over 27 years of experience in insurance claims, audit, and underwriting, specializing in Workers' Compensation.  He has supervised, and managed the administration of Workers’ Compensation claims, and underwriting in over 45 states. His professional experience includes being the Director of Risk Management for the North Carolina School Boards Association.  He created a very successful Workers’ Compensation Injury Rehabilitation Unit for school personnel.  

Education

James's educational background, which centered on computer technology, culminated in earning a Masters of Business Administration (MBA); an Associate in Claims designation (AIC); and an Associate in Risk Management designation (ARM).  He is a Chartered Financial Consultant (ChFC) and a licensed financial advisor. The NC Department of Insurance has certified him as an insurance instructor.  He also possesses a Bachelors’ Degree in Actuarial Science.

Awards

LexisNexis has twice recognized his blog as one of the Top 25 Blogs on Workers’ Compensation. J&L has been listed in AM Best’s Preferred Providers Directory for Insurance Experts – Workers Compensation for over eight years. He recently won the prestigious Baucom Shine Lifetime Achievement Award for his volunteer contributions to the area of risk management and safety.  

  
Associations/Publications

James is on the Board of Directors and Treasurer of the North Carolina Mid-State Safety Council.  He has published two manuals on Workers’ Compensation and three different claims processing manuals.  He has also written and has been quoted in numerous articles on reducing Workers’ Compensation costs for public and private employers.  James publishes a weekly newsletter with 2,000 readers.

Chris Amrhein, like most true believers in insurance, stumbled upon this business accidentally; specifically, after graduating from college and needing a job.

After beginning in this business as a life-health agent, he graduated to property-casualty sales where he first met the greatest mine of comedy material extant today, the ISO forms. Following several years as a producer and independent agency manager/owner, Chris spent many years as a full-time educator/VP-Education for the Florida Association of Insurance Agents and VP-Education for the Independent Insurance Agents and Brokers of America. Those years found him traveling about the country teaching seminars on everything from agency management to the claims made CGL. It has also taught him the absolute truth of Jimmy Buffet's famous observation about those who make a career of the property-casualty business: "If we weren't all crazy we would go insane."

Chris is now a speaker, consultant, seminar leader and training developer, and resides in Lorton, Virginia, with the love of his life (and wife) Donna and youngest son Alexandru (17). His two older sons - Patrick, 34 and Kevin, 32 – are doing quite well without him. His email address chris@insuranceisfun.com and website www.insuranceisfun.com, say it all.

Current Industry Activities:

• Member, CPCU Oversight Committee
• Member, Accredited Adviser in Insurance (AAI) Advisory Committee.
• Primary Author (AAI textbooks):
• Foundations of Insurance Production – Personal Insurance
• Multiple-Lines Insurance Production – Commercial Liability Insurance
• Agency Operations and Sales Management – Principles of Agency Management
• Monthly columnist (1993-present) - "Policy Issues" - Insurance Journal & American Agent & Broker Magazine
• Faculty member: IIABA’s Virtual University; Society of CIC James K. Ruble Seminars
• Developer of “Street Level Ethics” Program for AICPCU/IIA

Past Activities:

• Chairman. IIABA Future One Producer Development Task Force
• Member, IIABA Future One Subcommittee on Customer Service
• Author/Editor - Florida General Lines, Customer Representatives and Adjuster Study Manuals
• Member, IIABA Agency Management & Technology Committee

Winter Wheeler is an in-person and online-based mediator and arbitrator. She is a former civil litigator who brings an extensive and comprehensive body of experience to her current practice. She specializes in several areas, including wrongful death, catastrophic injury, personal injury, premises liability, nursing home, legal malpractice, medical malpractice, products liability, toxic torts, automotive and trucking liability, civil rights, false imprisonment, municipal liability, water runoff, construction defect, contracts, entertainment, and family law with a specialization in domestic violence.

Most recently, Winter was a senior attorney at a prominent midtown Atlanta law firm. Winter is skilled in handling complex matters involving a diverse range of cultures, including Spanish-speaking clients. A graduate of Georgetown University and Tulane Law School, Winter has always combined her passions for culture, diplomacy, and the law. Winter was raised in Miami, Florida, and returns as often as possible.

Winter is very active in the legal community. Winter is a member of the National Bar Association and is a Board Member of the Women Lawyers Division. She is a member of the American Bar Association and serves as a Board Member of the Women in Dispute Resolution Committee. She is a member of the Lawyers Club of Atlanta and serves as the Co-Chair of the Membership Committee. She is a member of the Georgia Association of Black Women Attorneys, the Gate City Bar Association, the Georgia Asian Pacific American Bar association, and is also on the Board of the Georgetown Club of Metro Atlanta. She has been honored by the National Black Lawyers three times as Top 40 Under 40, as well as Top 100 for 2020. She spends her free time volunteering in her community and enjoying her husband and four children.

Winter is also co-author of the bestselling book, #Networked, which tells the story of how she developed a thriving mediation practice during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Brennan Quintus is the Chief Executive Officer of the North Dakota Insurance Reserve Fund (NDIRF), the source of risk services for North Dakota’s cities, counties, school districts, and other political subdivisions. Prior to being appointed CEO, Brennan led the NDIRF’s underwriting and loss control departments.

Brennan holds an undergraduate degree and an MBA from the University of Mary in Bismarck, ND and is currently pursuing a law degree from Concord Law School, an affiliate of the Purdue University System. He also holds many insurance designations, including the Chartered Property Casualty Underwriter (CPCU) and Certified Insurance Counselor (CIC) designations.

In addition to his role at the NDIRF, Brennan also serves as the President of the ND Roughrider Chapter of the CPCU Society and as an Executive Committee Member for the ND HR Collaborative.

Christopher J. Boggs, CPCU, ARM, ALCM, LPCS, AAI, APA, CWCA, CRIS, AINS, president of Boggs Risk & Insurance Consulting (BRIC) with a focus on education, training, risk and claims consulting with insurance agents and insurance carriers, began the practice of insurance in 1990.

During his nearly three-and-a-half-decade insurance career, Boggs has authored over 2,000 insurance and risk management-related articles on a wide range of topics. Additionally, Boggs has written 15 insurance and risk management books including:

• "The Insurance Professional's Practical Guide to Workers' Compensation: From History through Audit," (now in its second edition);
• "Business Income Insurance Demystified: The Simplified Guide to Time Element Coverages," (now in its third edition);
• "Property and Casualty Insurance Concepts Simplified: The Ultimate 'How to' Insurance Guide for Agents, Brokers, Underwriters and Adjusters;"
• "Wow! I Never Knew That! 12 of the Most Misunderstood and Misused P&C Coverages, Concepts and Exclusions;"
• "Insurance, Risk & Risk Management! The Insurance Professional's Guide to Risk Management and Insurance;"

Boggs is a regular speaker at industry events, having taught or spoken nearly 1,000 times. This includes sessions for the National Association of Mutual Insurance Companies (NAMIC), the National Society of Insurance Premium Auditors (NSIPA), the American Association of Managing General Agents (AAMGA), the Institute of Work Comp Professionals (IWCP), the Chartered Property Casualty Underwriter (CPCU) Society and numerous independent insurance agent state association meetings. He has also earned numerous professional accolades including the 2017 Institute and Faculty of Actuaries (IFoA) Brian Hey Prize and the 2019 Casualty Actuarial Society (CAS) Charles A. Hachemeister Prize as part of a professional collaboration with a diverse group of professionals.

His professional background includes work as a risk management consultant, loss control representative, insurance producer, claims manager, journalist and columnist, quality assurance specialist, and insurance coverage product manager.

Boggs earned a Bachelor of Science in journalism at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia, and holds nine professional designations.

Jim Wochele is the Unit Manger in MarshBerry’s Sales Performance Consulting division. His team partners with insurance agencies by implementing tactical strategies that will allow them to achieve organic growth through new business production.

Their focus is helping agencies build a scalable organic growth engine through organizational capabilities best practices, sales process implementation, and improving producers’ individual sales skills through consistent coaching.

Jim is mainly responsible for relationship management of the Sales Performance clients, new client acquisition and onboarding, onsite client visits, carrier-sponsored sales trainings, and agency organic growth business planning.

Jim is a keynote speaker at educational seminars, insurance carrier conferences and executive leadership forums. He also leads the Organic Growth Leadership Seminars and SalesPro Producer Training sessions hosted by MarshBerry. Jim is also a frequent contributor to MarshBerry and industry publications.

Jim joined MarshBerry in 2011 as a Sales Management Analyst, which was followed by a promotion to Consultant in 2013, Senior Consultant in 2014, and Unit Manager in 2016. Jim has over eight years of sales, sales management and project management expertise. Prior to joining MarshBerry, Jim held a dual sales manager and project manager position for a construction firm located in Cleveland, Ohio.

Jim holds a Bachelor of Science in physics with a minor in mathematics from Baldwin Wallace University, while playing football and baseball for all four years.

Ian Adams is associate vice president of state affairs with the R Street Institute, responsible for coordinating R Street’s outreach and engagement at the state and local level. He also is involved in the institute’s insurance research, matters related to next-generation transportation and is a frequent commentator on the disruptive impact of burgeoning technologies on law and regulation.

Ian rejoined R Street, for whom he’d previously worked as Western region director, on a full-time basis in January 2017. He was most recently a public policy associate at the international law firm of Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP, where he maintained a national insurance regulatory practice specialized in developing creative solutions to business problems that incorporated legislative and regulatory strategies.

Earlier in his career, Ian was a Jesse M. Unruh Assembly Fellow with the office of California state Assemblyman Curt Hagman, R-Chino Hills, while Hagman served as vice chairman of the California Assembly Insurance Committee. He also served as a legal extern with the office of Oregon state Rep. Bruce Hanna, R-Roseburg, who was then co-speaker of the Oregon House of Representatives. Ian also worked as a law clerk for California’s largest insurance trade association.

Ian is a graduate of Seattle University, with bachelor’s degrees in history and philosophy, and received his law degree from the University of Oregon. He is a member of the California and Illinois bars.

Ian lives in a suburb of Sacramento, California with his wife, Ruth Yang.

Marty Frappolli is a risk management and insurance consultant with Longhorn Knowledge Resources, headquartered in Austin, Texas. Longhorn offers custom individual and group insurance training, research, writing, and analytical services.

Previously, Marty served 18 years as Senior Director of Knowledge Resources for The Institutes in Malvern PA. His experience there includes the design of educational courses and safeguarding the academic integrity of Institutes curriculum. His national presentations and articles include showcases at RIMS, PLRB, IDMA, CAS, ACORD, NAPIA, and the CPCU Society. His specialty areas include claims, the IoT, autonomous vehicles, blockchain, cyber risk, and data management.

He is the author of these Institutes courses: Auto Claims Practices, Managing Cyber Risk, Claims Handling Principles and Practices, CPCU 530 - Business Law for Insurance Professionals, Principles of Workers Compensation Claims, Liability Claims Practices, and Claims Leadership & Organizational Alignment.

Before joining the Institutes, Marty led the Data Management group at NJM Insurance. Marty earned his B.A. at Rutgers University and his Masters in Organizational Leadership at Quinnipiac University. He was awarded the Fellow in Insurance Data Management (FIDM) designation by the Insurance Data Management Association (IDMA).