2024 Executive Experience Agenda

12:00–3:00 p.m.

Total Eclipse Viewing

For anyone arriving a day early, the Omni PGA is having an informal viewing party of the total solar eclipse.

Location: Library Lounge and Tenth Fairway Terrace

5:00–6:30 p.m.

Registration Desk Open - Sponsored by TackleAI

Location: Library Lounge

5:00–6:30 p.m.

Welcome Reception

Meet up with your fellow Executive Experience attendees and NCBA staff for happy hour.

Location: Library Lounge and Tenth Fairway Terrace

7:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.

Registration Desk Open - Sponsored by TackleAI

Location: Wanamaker West Prefunction

7:00–10:00 a.m.

Continental Breakfast

Location: Wanamaker West Prefunction

7:00–11:00 a.m.

Pickleball Tournament – Sponsored by KnovaOne

Come out and join the fun at Courts of McKinney! All levels of experience are welcome and teams will be assigned based on skill level for a round-robin tournament. Separate registration is required for this event.

Meet for breakfast before getting on the bus in Wanamaker West Prefunction. Players will leave from Wanamaker West Prefunction at 7:55 a.m. and the bus will depart promptly at 8:00 a.m. for the Courts of McKinney. The bus will leave the courts at 10:20 a.m. to return to the hotel by 11:00 a.m.

Location: Wanamaker West Prefunction

8:00 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

Golf Scramble – Sponsored by TRAKAmerica

Join us for a morning of golf at the prestigious and beautiful Fields Ranch West at the Omni PGA Frisco. Separate registration is required for this event. Meet for grab-and-go breakfast before you hit the course behind the Fields Ranch Clubhouse on the lower terrace patio.

Location: Fields Ranch

11:15 a.m.–12:45 p.m.

Optional Roundtables

Roundtables are only available to creditors rights law firm attendees. There is no additional cost for these pre-event Roundtables, but please RSVP to attend.

Location: Wanamaker E

11:15 a.m.–12:45 p.m.

Media Training Workshop: Ace the Interview

You’re an expert in the field and so are your attorneys. You’re held to a higher set of standards, the Bar, and the CFPB. Preparation, integrity, and attention to detail are likely what got you to where you are. Scanning the headlines yields an unbalanced, oftentimes inaccurate narrative about the industry in which you work. Maybe you want to set the record straight. Perhaps you simply want to reach out to a journalist and introduce yourself, but are you prepared to work with the media, in the most public of forums?

In this interactive session, Chip Bergstrom, CEO of Evergreen Communications (NCBA’s agency of record) will provide attendees with the “tools” necessary for successful media interactions – from curating compelling content and working with our target media to interview techniques and effective message delivery. Chip brings more than 20 years’ experience in communications and public relations. He began his career in politics, working for Former NY Governor George Pataki and has since gone on to work with some of the nation’s leading financial institutions, helping executives shape their companies’ narratives.

There is no additional cost for this Workshop, but please RSVP to attend.

Speaker: Chip Bergstrom, Evergreen Communications

Location: Wanamaker D

12:30–1:30 p.m.

Welcome Networking Lunch – Sponsored by TransUnion

Location: Wanamaker West Patio

1:45–2:45 p.m.

Opening Session: Maximizing The Law Firm’s Organizational Leadership and Culture (From a Near Outsider)

What does your team want most from you as leader? Are your attorneys merely working a case load or do they feel they are part of the firm? These are just a few of the questions to explore in this interactive, group coaching session. Designed specifically for law firm owners and managing partners, Daverio Coaching & Consulting Founder and Head Coach, Michael Daverio, will lead attendees through an interactive workshop.

As a near outsider, Michael will share his insights from serving as a Senior Financial Services Operations Executive for over 35 years in the bank card industry. He will coach us through creating high performance and growth-oriented operations and cultures of highly engaged employees through work environments based on trust, accountability, and respect.

Key themes from this presentation will be part of our Day 1 roundtable discussions.

Speaker: Michael Daverio, Daverio Coaching & Consulting

Location: Wanamaker D

2:45–3:00 p.m.

Networking Break

Location: Wanamaker West Patio

3:00–4:00 p.m.

Your Firm, Your Legacy – How To Make a Graceful and Prosperous Exit

You spent your working life thoughtfully building a profitable practice. How you exit is just as important as how you entered. Questions abound: What should your 1-, or 3-, or 5-year exit plan look like? Do you have successors? Will you consider M&A, private equity, or will partners take over? Before you even decide how to exit, there are important steps you might consider to positively impact your firm’s value and help make your exit more successful operationally and financially.

Our speakers, Daniel Struna, a Certified Practice Advisor with Atticus, a firm that specializes in getting law firms ready for owner exits, and Michael Lamm, Managing Partner and Co-Founder of Corporate Advisory Solutions, are seasoned strategic advisors with several decades of combined M&A experience in the legal space. They have been actively involved in law firm transitions and transactions.

Daniel and Michael will share strategies for a well-planned, successful exit. From preparing your firm for transitions and how to add value along the way, to setting expectations for the highest valuation and weighing your options, Daniel and Michael will guide law firm owners and partners to the exit with actionable insights.

Speakers: Daniel Struna, Atticus; Michael Lamm, Corporate Advisory Solutions; Eric Logvin, The Law Office of James R. Vaughan, P.C.

Location: Wanamaker D

4:15–5:30 p.m.

Roundtables

Roundtables are only available to creditors rights law firm attendees.

Location: Wanamaker ABCEFG

5:30–7:00 p.m.

Networking Reception - Sponsored by Equifax | The Work Number

Location: Wanamaker South Patio

8:15–9:00 a.m.

Yoga

Location: Palmer C

8:45–10:45 a.m.

Espresso Bar

Location: Wanamaker West Prefunction

9:00–9:30 a.m.

Breakfast

Location: Wanamaker West Patio

9:30–10:45 a.m.

Solution-Centric: Advocacy, Improving the Laws, Modernizing the Courts, and Reducing Case Traffic

To start this session, hear how NCBA takes a three-pronged approach to advocacy: representing and protecting our industry from a legislative, regulatory, and judicial perspective. We will share our latest themes, advocacy activities, priorities, concerns, and strategies, the pillars of grass roots and collaborative advocacy programs. For fun we will dive into election predictions—both Congressional and Presidential elections.

Speakers: John Anderson, RFA; Tom Koonce, RFA; Michael Stillman, Stillman Law Office; Nathan Willner, NCBA

The second half of the session requires audience participation. Joann Needleman, Member of Clark Hill, and Missy Meggison, Auriemma Roundtables, Director of CRC, and General Counsel will discuss an ongoing project to reduce court case traffic. This project is led by Stanford Law Professor David Engstrom and the American Law Institute (ALI), the leading independent organization in the United States producing scholarly work to clarify, modernize, and otherwise improve the law. They have started a multi-year project to look at collections lawsuits and are scoping the breadth of their efforts. ALI’s involvement is noteworthy because of their capacity to investigate this issue from a scholarly perspective. Missy is serving as an advisor on the project and will be able to report on the status and future aim of the project.

Professor Engstrom will join us next year at the 2025 Executive Experience. At this year’s Executive Experience, we will talk through the ALI’s project priorities and brainstorm ways NCBA can engage to be ensure the outcomes are beneficial to our industry. This will be an interactive session and we would like your input and insight regarding the business, legal, and tech landscape which impact the collections life cycle of an account. The goal is to share our ideas into the root of the problem and the effects of over-regulation, outdated laws, and other challenges. What data could we collect and share with the ALI? What myths can we debunk? How can courts be modernized to help our industry AND consumers?

Speakers: Joann Needleman, Clark Hill; Missy Meggison, Auriemma Roundtables

Location: Wanamaker D

10:45–11:15 a.m.

Networking Break

Location: Wanamaker West Patio

11:15 a.m.–12:15 p.m.

Client Management and Compliance Program Efficiencies

Preparing for an audit, internal or otherwise, doesn’t have to be a manual, labor-intensive process. In this session, we will lay out the steps firms have taken to automate the audit and ensure, for example, consumer compliant data is at-the-ready. Specifically, we will look at how larger and smaller firms have approached this in different ways—all with the goal of having a more streamlined, efficient, and effective process.

Speakers: Celia Gapsis, Blitt and Gaines, P.C.; Scott Morris, Tromberg, Morris & Poulin PLLC; Jason Sims, Buckles & Buckles, P.L.C.

Location: Wanamaker D

12:30–2:00 p.m.

Breakout Roundtables and Working Lunch - Sponsored by ABC Legal Services + Docketly

Roundtables are only available to creditors rights law firm attendees.

Location: Wanamaker ABCEFG

2:00–2:15 p.m.

Networking Break

Location: Wanamaker West Patio

2:15–3:15 p.m.

Adopting AI in Debt Collection

The hype is real. AI and its applications within debt collection is here to stay. In the highly complex and ever-changing world of debt collection, ‘Adapt or Perish’ is indicative of the shifting landscape faced by creditors rights attorneys and the clients who seek their services. To be clear, regulators and clients are paying close attention. It’s not a question of whether we deploy AI, but when and how we deploy the technology. Will implementing AI technology truly make firms more efficient and compliant? And can utilizing AI increase revenue?

In this session, we will discuss the current scope of AI, the risks, and safeguards of the technology. We will walk through best practices and how to adopt the technology to improve efficiency and increase revenue. What’s more, always with an eye view towards compliance, we’ll review the four most critical applications of AI: data and consumer engagement, robotic process automation (RPA), generative AI, and conversational AI. Simply put, the time for passivity and reactive business operations is over. The digital transformation is here. Your firm and our industry must engage with it.

Speakers: Heath Morgan, Martin Golden Lyons Watts Morgan PLLC; Stacy Stein, Mountain Peak Law Group, PC

Location: Wanamaker D

3:30–5:30 p.m.

Afternoon Break

4:00–5:30 p.m.

Optional Workshop: How to Drive More Earnings in Your Business

Building business value means growing earnings. Every CEO knows dozens of things that would improve the profitability of the business. The challenge is not knowing a lot of ideas, rather which is the TOP priority. In this session, we will examine how to identify the one(s) that will drive earnings the most and those that will make any future initiative easier and more likely to succeed.

There is no additional cost for this optional workshop, but please RSVP to attend.

Speaker: Jim Lane, Redbank Advisors

Location: Wanamaker D

6:00–8:30 p.m.

Reception and Sit-Down Dinner – Sponsored by Provana

Clear your schedule for Thursday night because you won't want to miss this four-course served dinner experience with your fellow attendees.

Location: Panther Creek Pavilion

9:00–11:00 a.m.

Espresso Bar

Location: Wanamaker Foyer

9:00–10:45 a.m.

Brunch! + State of the Industry: Capacity Planning and Operations Hiring

Join us for brunch and to hear from Transunion’s Dan Simmons and be one of the first to receive a state of the industry and economic recap of Q1 2024, a forecast for the upcoming year, and what this means for your law practice. Attendees will learn how the economic climate will impact both staffing and capacity planning, at a time when wages have increased steadily yet our fees remain stationary.

The COVID Pandemic taught us that merely increasing staff when files are high and decreasing when low is not a sustainable plan. The path forward is through capacity planning. After the economic read out, hear how a panel of experts plan to strategically weather the ebbs and flows of file volume. Each will share their strategies on how they outsource, deploy technology, and adjust staffing levels (up or down) based on the volume of work and available systems.

As an added bonus, we'll be serving bloody marys and mimosas during this eye-opening closing session of the 2024 Executive Experience.

Speakers: Vinnie Iacono, TRAKAmerica; Ben Lambert, Couch Lambert LLC; Dan Simmons, Transunion; Phil Stenger, Stenger & Stenger, P.C.

Location: Wanamaker D

10:45–12:00 p.m.

Roundtables

Roundtables are only available to creditors rights law firm attendees.

Location: Wanamaker ABCEFG