By: Russ Kamp, CEO, Ryan ALM, Inc.

I’m getting ready to head to the Big Easy tomorrow for the International Foundation of Employee Benefit Plans (IFEBP) 72nd annual conference. This is a massive educational event (>5,000 participants) bringing together plan sponsors and service providers for pension and health and welfare programs. I’m pleased to have been asked to speak twice during the event. I’ll be presenting “Investment Basics Refresher” on Monday morning and “Addressing Negative Cashflow” later that same day.

I hope that you’ll be able to join me at the conference. Trustee education remains critically important, as we collectively fight to provide stability to these important programs. As investment strategies have become more complicated and opaque, having a strong understanding of the basic characteristics of each strategy/asset class becomes more critical. Trustees are often tasked with making decisions involving millions and perhaps billions of $s. Not having the appropriate education could lead to unfortunate outcomes.

Ryan ALM, Inc.’s mission (my personal mission, too) is to protect and preserve defined benefit plans as the primary retirement vehicle. We believe that helping organizations such as the IFEBP provide important educational content is of paramount importance in our pursuit of that mission. Hope to see you soon!