Cuisine Master, TV Star, and Author

Chef Jeff Henderson turned 10 years spent in prison into a career in food service and ultimately became executive chef at Las Vegas’s exclusive Café Bellagio. He’s also had a Food Network TV show called The Chef Jeff Project, and now his best-selling book Cooked: My Journey from the Streets to the Stove is being turned into a movie starring Will Smith!

Kaplan Mobray

Personal Branding Expert

Who can show you how to brand yourself for maximum success better than Kaplan Mobray? The Wharton B-school grad, who has led corporate marketing, advertising, and brand-development initiatives for Fortune 500 companies, also coaches and speaks on topics like leadership and networking.

Outdoorsman and Wilderness Advocate

In 2003, after nearly a week of being trapped alone in a 3-foot-wide canyon in Utah, pinned by a half-ton boulder, Aron Ralston cut off his right forearm with a dull pocketknife, applied a tourniquet, and hiked back to civilization. Now he’s got a book (Between a Rock and Hard Place), a movie based on his ordeal (127 Hours), and a don’t-miss story to tell.

Sponsored by Transamerica

Thought Leader and Author

To Susan Scott, talk isn't cheap, especially when it’s between business associates. So she founded Fierce Inc., based on the idea that “while no single conversation is guaranteed to change the trajectory of a career, a business, or a life — any conversation can,” and also wrote a book on the subject.

Sponsored by New York Life Insurance Company

Luis G. Chiappy
AXA Equitable

Luis Chiappy, CLU ChFC CFP LUTCF — GAMA 2012–13 president — is an executive vice president in the national division of AXA Advisors (an affiliate of AXA Equitable), and senior manager of AXA Advisors in South Florida. Check out his GAMA “state of the union,” covering all the hot developments at your association.

Tom Hegna
Tom Hegna, Inc.

In the retirement income planning business, there’s nothing like establishing credibility. Before starting his consulting firm, Tom Hegna, CLU ChFC CASL, was a New York Life Insurance Company first vice president, a vice president, and an annuity manager, as well as a top agent and trainer at MetLife. Now he’s a GAMA Resource Partner, helping our members tune up their skills with his new book, Paychecks and Playchecks.

Frank T. Scalese
MetLife

Frank T. Scalese, LUTCF, who launched his career as a financial services rep in 1990, won MetLife’s Management Development Award in 2005, three years after taking over as managing director of its North Coast Financial Group. Scalese’s passionate approach to helping managers find new markets in their own backyards will offer a fresh perspective and brand-new sources.

J.D. Trueblood

State Farm Insurance Companies 
 J.D. Trueblood, CLU ChFC CPCU, who joined State Farm in 1986 as a claims rep, became a manager of agency/sales resources in 2004. He’s now director of agency recruiting and agency/sales resources. This passionate recruiting pro established the State Farm Executive Military Recruiting Steering Committee to help connect military vets to State Farm and other companies. He will focus on this subject in his address to GAMA members.

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