What I Learned

1. The number of advisors working with Gen X and Gen Y clients continues to grow - quickly. The XY Planning Network had 250 members in 2016. Not bad, but the network was just shy of 500 members when the conference started. That's a lot of advisors dedicated to serving as fiduciaries for their clients. Especially when you consider parts of the financial services industry are fighting hard to kill or water down the Department of Labor's Fiduciary Rule. Advisors in the XYPN have embraced working in their clients' best interests.
2. FinTech (financial technology) for advisors continues to improve. There were some impressive new tools designed to help advisors better serve their clients. I wish I could adopt everything showcased at the conference. Too bad I have a finite budget for tech!
3. I'm adding a new college planning/pre-approval service to my practice. While at the conference, I took a day long workshop on college planning and learned ways to help clients and their children make better-informed decisions and, hopefully, save money, when it's time to select a school.
4. It's worth taking time off to go to a conference. The value of continuing education and time spent talking to my fellow planners far outweighs the costs associated with attending a conference.
5. I need to pack a hoodie for next year's conference. The main ballroom in the hotel was freezing.

Listening / Reading / Watching

Here's what has my attention right now:

• Where You Go Is Not Who You Will Be: An Antidote to the College Admissions Mania, by Frank Bruni. This book was recommended by one of the presenters at the XYPN conference. "Bruni, a best-selling author and a columnist for the New York Times, shows that the Ivy League has no monopoly on corner offices, governors' mansions, or the most prestigious academic and scientific grants. Through statistics, surveys, and the stories of hugely successful people who didn't attend the most exclusive schools, he demonstrates that many kinds of colleges - large public universities, tiny hideaways in the hinterlands - serve as ideal springboards."
• The Clockwork Dynasty, by Daniel H. Wilson. Here's another fun book from the author of Robopocalypse and Robogenesis. Instead of having robots take over the world, Wilson "weaves a path through history, following a race of human-like machines that have been hiding among us for untold centuries."