"JOHN DOE" STATE OF HEALTH.

..........was the headline of the email I received on the weekend, JOHN DOE in place of his true name.

When I said "yes" to joining Manulife's outside team to help with orphaned policies, I knew to expect the unexpected.

I have clients who are in the midst of some strange scenarios (litigations between business owners and key persons, victims of fraud, etc).

When I met John (again, changed for the sake of the post), he had a whole slew of changes that needed to be made. He had 3 policies, and his deceased wife was the beneficiary of all 3.

He wanted the policy on his daughter, which he still owned and paid for at the ripe age of 83, to be transferred. He had also been told by others who were to take his cases that, because there is no compensation available to them, they would pass on the opportunity.

How would you feel if you had a mountain of work and no one to help? I viewed this chance with Manulife, not through the lens of padding my pockets, but through the trust that this man has put into this system, and SOMEONE must attend to his needs.

The opportunity for an advisor is that these people have decades of experience as clients, and I, in turn, would have to wait decades for my own clientele to age into these issues.

I gain stories and guidance through this, but the clients are finally able to trust someone to get them to the finish line.

Speaking of the finish line, if John Doe's health doesn't return, then how timely was our relationship?

The result of the work is that all of his policies (some initiated as early as 1968), are properly designated to the intended beneficiaries, and his family can rest assured that this part of the journey has a path.

Not all work pays in dollars and cents. Most of it pays in character development and context you will be able to use in your conversations going forward. We wish John Doe a speedy recovery.

Liam Cameron