Home Posts tagged Amy Jamrog
Women of Impact 2023

CEO, The Jamrog Group

She Impacts Her Community, Her Industry, and the Lives of Her Clients

Amy Jamrog

Amy Jamrog likes to say that she wasn’t raised in Holyoke — she was raised by Holyoke.

By that, she meant the community’s people, businesses, business owners, institutions, traditions, and more certainly influenced her and shaped who she is today — much like a family would.

As an example, she noted her first job, which she took at age 14, at a business called the Party Store, a part of the former Quirk Paper Co., located in the city’s Flats section and owned by Jon and Helene Florio. This was a learning experience on more levels than she could count.

“I worked there all through high school,” Jamrog said. “And I met so many Holyoke residents who wanted to shop locally and support local businesses, and I really came to understand the DNA of Holyoke. I also learned customer service, what it meant to be a part of a community, and the importance of giving back, which they [the Florios] did so much of.

“So many of the things I learned growing up were about community, giving back, volunteering … and all of it happened here,” she went on. “It stayed with me.”

Suffice it to say that Jamrog — who has long had a Holyoke address for the Jamrog Group, the financial-advisory firm she founded and now serves as CEO — has spent a lifetime applying the lessons she learned while at the Party Store, as a candystriper at Providence Hospital, later while working at the Holyoke Mall, and while compiling a record that would earn her the rank of valedictorian at Holyoke Catholic High School.

“So many of the things I learned growing up were about community, giving back, volunteering … and all of it happened here. It stayed with me.”

Indeed, when she started as a financial advisor, she was focused on making a difference for her clients and their families. And while that focus remains, she has broadened and deepened her impact, committing herself to making a difference within her community, meaning the 413, and within her industry, especially with women in the profession or thinking about getting in.

She does this in many ways — through service as a board member to organizations like the Girl Scouts and the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts; as a mentor to countless young people in the industry, especially women, who face the same challenges as men and others that are unique to them; as an author, through two bestselling books, Life Savings Conversations and Confetti Moments: 52 Moments to Spark Conversation, Connect Deeply & Celebrate the Ordinary; and, most recently, though her election in June to the board of Finseca (Financial Security for All), a nonprofit organization advocating for the financial-security profession.

Amy Jamrog, seen here with her team at the Jamrog Group

Amy Jamrog, seen here with her team at the Jamrog Group, has helped many women enter the field and persevere through the difficult early years.

In 2020, she created a resource for financial advisors called Four Wings Consulting, with a dragonfly as its symbol. Four Wings was formed to help advisors cope with the many challenges they have been facing in recent years, from the pandemic and its many side effects to the wild swings in the stock market; from soaring interest rates to general uncertainty about the economy and what will happen next.

It’s just one of the ways in which Jamrog has become a true Woman of Impact.

 

Dollars and Sense

As she was cleaning out her office recently while preparing to relocate the Jamrog Group from its former home on Northampton Street in Holyoke, not far from where she grew up, to a small suite in the office tower at 330 Whitney Ave. in that same city, Jamrog came across a note she wrote to herself years ago, when the firm was in Northampton.

It took the form of a 10-year vision statement, something she updates every year, which included the goal to buy a building in Holyoke.

“I wanted to build an office that felt like an extension of home for people,” she recalled. “And I wrote in my 10-year vision that I wanted to own a building on Northampton Street, come back to my roots, be a taxpayer in the community that raised me, and build something permanent — which was the building I ultimately bought. And 10 years later, that actually happened.”

That note, and everything that has happened after she wrote it, speaks volumes about Jamrog and why she is a Woman of Impact — everything from her commitment to long-term planning and her ability to make plans reality to that strong attachment to the Holyoke community, to her understanding that ‘permanent’ is a relative term.

“For people who come into this business specifically wanting to make money, it can be very disappointing because it takes a long time, and you need grit and perseverance and a great work ethic to make it through the first five years. Most people don’t.”

Indeed, 10 years after she moved into the property on Northampton Street, the landscape had changed profoundly. Her team works remotely most days of the week now (everyone is in on Mondays), and clients see their advisors far more on Zoom than they do in the office. These are changes that negate the need for an office that feels like an extension of home.

The moral of this story, if it can be called that, is that planning is important, but revising the plan to meet a changing world is more important.

This is the basic advice Jamrog gives to her clients as a financial advisor, a profession she assumed after taking a somewhat winding career route.

After she graduated from Middlebury College in Vermont, she entered the healthcare field, working first for Baystate Health and then for Hospice of Pioneer Valley, as a community liaison between hospice and the physicians in our community.

“My job was to meet with physicians and explain to them what hospice was really about so they could refer their patients earlier in their terminal diagnoses so families could take full advantage of hospice services,” she explained. “It was interesting work; I was 22, 23 years old … I was young, but I learned how to communicate effectively with physicians. Then I was recruited to being a financial advisor; it was a very natural transition.”

As for that recruitment effort, it was undertaken by Andy Skroback, then 62, who became her first mentor in this difficult business. And it was during her first few years under Skroback’s tutelage that she realized the profound impact she could have, as a female advisor, on families.

But over the course of her career, she has broadened her scope when it comes to impact, a pattern that continues today.

Amy Jamrog’s book, Confetti Moments

Amy Jamrog’s book, Confetti Moments, has made its way onto several bestseller lists.

“That word ‘impact’ has always been important to me,” Jamrog said. “I began my financial-services career really wanting to impact families and my clients, many of whom were physicians. Today, our clients are corporate executives, small-business owners, and nonprofit endowments, where we manage their portfolios. That’s where the shift to having a bigger impact on my community really started to matter. The work we did with nonprofits helping nonprofits manage their endowments really got us grounded in how important philanthropy and our nonprofits really are.”

 

Risk and Reward

After successfully building her business — there are now nine team members — and becoming actively involved in the community on a number of levels, especially with nonprofits devoted to “women and children as leaders,” such as Girls Inc., Girls on the Run, and the Women’s Fund of Western Massachusetts — Jamrog added an additional point of emphasis: impacting her profession.

She does this in many ways and through many vehicles, including Four Wings Consulting. Her specific focus is women in the industry, she said, adding that she coaches more than 100 of them across the country.

“Making an impact on women in our business is very important to me,” she said. “The business itself is difficult, but to be female is really challenging. So if I can help shorten their trajectory and become successful sooner, and realize just how much impact and satisfaction this career can have — that’s some of my favorite work.”

Elaborating, she started by saying that financial-security work is much harder than it might look to those receiving such services. The hours are long, the work difficult, and the failure rate is quite high: close to 90%.

“For people who come into this business specifically wanting to make money, it can be very disappointing because it takes a long time, and you need grit and perseverance and a great work ethic to make it through the first five years. Most people don’t,” Jamrog said, adding that, while it’s certainly challenging for everyone, the attrition rate for women is even higher, for reasons she explained in detail.

“Without stereotyping too much, most of my male counterparts — their one job is to be a financial advisor,” she explained. “Most of my female counterparts … one of their jobs is to be a financial advisor; they also have spouse, mom, the prepper of the meals, the taker of kids to school, and all the other things that women tend to have on their plates.

“So I try to really help women figure out the integration of all of the responsibilities and goals that they have and how we manage all of them and be successful in each of them; that’s the ultimate challenge,” she went on. “I often hear women say, ‘if I’m successful as a financial advisor, I’m not being successful as a mom, and if I’m focused on being successful as a mom, I’m less successful as a financial advisor,’ and that, to me, is such a sad statement because it doesn’t have to be the case.”

Jamrog knows because she’s lived that life for 27 years. She says it’s a constant challenge to be successful in the multiple roles women accept, but it is “absolutely doable.” She has shown that one can successfully balance work at home, in the office, and in the community, and succeed in each realm.

And in another realm as well: as an author. Her second book, Confetti Moments: 52 Moments to Spark Conversation, Connect Deeply & Celebrate the Ordinary, a collection of Jamrog’s uplifting blog posts from the deepest months of the pandemic, sits on a number of bestseller lists, including the Wall Street Journal, Amazon, and USA Today. It has become popular with CEOs, team managers, and even families as a way to motivate, accent the positive, and even build teamwork.

 

The Next Chapter

Jamrog is essentially done with her third book, which she described as her college thesis. “The paper copy has been sitting on a shelf for 30 years, and I’m in the process of editing it.”

This is a coming-of-age novel about 12-year-old girls, she told BusinessWest, adding that readers from this area will find that it sounds quite familiar; it’s about growing up in a small town in Western Mass., as she did.

Then again, she didn’t just grow up in Holyoke, she was raised by that remarkable city, and everything she learned growing up there has helped shape her into a Woman of Impact.

Business Talk Podcast Special Coverage

We are excited to announce that BusinessWest has launched a new podcast series, BusinessTalk. Each episode will feature in-depth interviews and discussions with local industry leaders, providing thoughtful perspectives on the Western Massachuetts economy and the many business ventures that keep it running during these challenging times.

Go HERE to view all episodes

Episode 147: January 30, 2023

George Interviews Amy Jamrog, Holyoke-based financial advisor, coach, and consultant

Amy Jamrog

Amy Jamrog is a Holyoke-based financial advisor, coach, and consultant. And experiences in all of those roles have also inspired her to write. Her book is called Confetti Moments: 52 Vignettes to Spark Conversation, Connect Deeply and Celebrate the Ordinary, a title that pretty much says it all. Jamrog talks with BusinessWest editor George O’Brien about her book, what inspired it, why we all have confetti moments, and why we should celebrate them on the next episode of BusinessTalk, a podcast presented by BusinessWest in partnership with Living Local 413 and sponsored by PeoplesBank.

 

Sponsored by:

Also Available On

Banking and Financial Services

Taking Flight

Amy Jamrog

Amy Jamrog says she started Four Wings and wrote her book Confetti Moments to broaden her impact as a coach and consultant.

Amy Jamrog says the past few years have certainly been a rough ride for investors — and anyone looking for financial advice.

Indeed, between the pandemic and its many side effects, wild swings — and serious dips — on the stock market, copious amounts of uncertainty, and non-stop talk about inflation and recession, people have been looking for a calm voice, someone who can help them make sense of all this, someone who can help them cope.

Meanwhile … those doing the financial advising have been looking for all of those same things. And this certainly helps explain the rapid growth and intriguing staying power of a relatively new resource for these financial advisors called Four Wings Consulting. That name, and the accompanying logo, have some real significance.

“The dragonfly is the only insect that can fly forward, backward, up, down, and side to side,” Jamrog, a 25-year veteran of the financial advising sector, told BusinessWest. “And so, my coaching is about helping people figure out which direction they’re currently flying in and getting them moving in a forward direction.”

Elaborating, she said the coaching service was designed to help financial planners come up with relevant content, innovative solutions, and new ideas month after month — and pass on what they learn (often about subjects other than money) to their clients. At the same time, they were getting needed support themselves.

“The dragonfly is the only insect that can fly forward, backward, up, down, and side to side. And so, my coaching is about helping people figure out which direction they’re currently flying in and getting them moving in a forward direction.”

“During the pandemic, I was finding that so many financial advisors were working really hard to help their clients, and not having any support for themselves and feeling really isolated,” she said. “I just put out this idea of creating a community of advisors and coaching them as a group.”

Initially she thought maybe 20 or 25 of her colleagues might be interested in being part of such a group. But to her surprise, 130 signed up for it, and most of them continue to join each week.

 

Light in the Darkness

For Jamrog, Four Wings has become one way to share and spread ideas and inspiration. Another is the book she recently wrote called Confetti Moments: 52 Vignettes to Spark Conversation, Connect Deeply & Celebrate the Ordinary, a title that really says it all.

The book, finished in August and launched in November, is now a Wall Street Journal and USA Today bestseller, popular with CEOs, team managers, and even families.

Confetti Moments is a collection of entries to a blog Jamrog started near the start of the pandemic called Wednesday Wisdom, which was started to bring some light to some very dark times. To explain, she turned back to when the world shut down.

“I wanted to bring something positive to our clients in the wake of such uncertainty and depressing information everywhere,” she explained. “So I started blogging weekly with uplifting stories that I thought would be a nice diversion for my clients.

Amy Jamrog book

“I did it every week for two years during COVID, and I came to find out that thousands and thousands of people were reading it and forwarding it to their entire companies or their departments,” she went on. “I heard from people who said, ‘my boss sends me this every Wednesday, and I love your stories.’ And the feedback from my readers was ‘I wish you could package all these stories into a book — I would read the whole book again.’”

She did, and they are.

The 52 chapters in Confetti Moments take titles that include “Sometimes We Need a Wider Lens,” “You Can’t Take It With You,” “Stay in Your Lane,” “Lower Your Expectations,” “What Our Scars Say,” and “When Eight Oars Are In Sync.” Collectively, they are designed to provoke thought and inspire positive change, said Jamrog, who is doing all this in addition to her day job as a financial consultant with MassMutual.

“There are opportunities to impact one client at a time — that’s a fine career, and many people do really well with that. I got to a point, maybe five or six years ago, where I really wanted to have a bigger impact on my industry.”

As she talked about both Four Wings and Confetti Moments, she said they were both born from a desire to broaden her impact as both a financial consultant and coach.

“There are opportunities to impact one client at a time — that’s a fine career, and many people do really well with that,” she told BusinessWest. “I got to a point, maybe five or six years ago, where I really wanted to have a bigger impact on my industry. I knew that the work my team and I do as financial advisers is very, very good and very different than the average advisor, and I wanted to teach that.”

This was the start of Four Wings, through which she now coaches roughly 100 financial advisors, who take part in monthly Zoom sessions. This consulting work started a few years before the pandemic, she noted, but it really picked up steam during the early months of the pandemic, when, as she noted earlier, advisors were isolated, their clients were looking for answers, and many were just searching for a guiding voice.

“It started with financial advisors feeling isolated, trying to help their clients financially, and being resourceful for them,” she said. “But they were realizing that many of their clients were just stuck; they couldn’t make financial decisions, or they [the advisors] didn’t know how to move them forward in the wake of such uncertainty and panic for most people.”

Three years later, the community of advisors she created, who pay a monthly subscription fee to take part, continue to meet, with participants from across the 413 and also across the country, all of whom are still helping clients cope with a volatile market, uncertainty, and growing fears about recession and what might come next.

“Advisors want to be resourceful and bring a positive message to the clients,” Jamrog said. “But at the same time, they also need an outlet, someone to vent to, someone to present their worries and concerns to and get some great feedback. The biggest challenge in being a financial advisor is that we give advice and guidance all day long, but sometimes it’s nice to actually get some advice and guidance; that’s what I provide, and that’s what these groups provide.”

 

Sparking Change

As for Confetti Moments, she said she’s already sold several thousand copies of the book, which is comprised of what she considers the 52 “best” of her Wednesday Wisdom blog entries.

Each chapter has the blog post, followed by some “Ideas to Spark, Connect & Create This Week,” and a page to write down some notes.

In the chapter titled “Stay in Your Lane,” Jamrog writes: Safety features on cars are designed specifically to keep the drivers safe. Too bad we as humans don’t come equipped with those warnings too. Wouldn’t be great if we came programmed with a little sensor that reminded us periodically to stay in our lane? How often do we take on things that are not our business? Do you find yourself straying into other people’s areas with good intentions — probably even genuinely meaning to help them — but then realize that staying in your own lane is the better, safer place? For everyone?

For those ideas to spark, connect, and create, or ‘prompts,’ as she calls them, she has these:

• Look around at different areas in your life. Where are you drifting out of your lane?

• In an effort to be ‘helpful,’ have you drifted into someone else’s lane? Do you owe them an apology and a promise to stay out of their way in the future?

• What is your lane? Take some time to define this for yourself since it can change over the years. Once you identify the area(s) you excel and thrive, you’ll be happy to spend more time in those lanes.

“The prompts ask you to change something in your life over the next seven days,” she explained. “And then you do it again next week.”

Elaborating, Jamrog said the book is inspiring people to “celebrate the ordinary,” and in the few months since the book came out, readers, many of them business owners and managers, are heeding that advice and encouraging others to do the same.

“I have five appointments this week for corporations who want to book me for corporate speaking engagements because companies want to bring more Confetti Moments to their employees,” she said, adding that this was a typical week.

Summing things up, she said that all aspects of her work, including her day job, are about creating such Confetti Moments. That’s what she meant by broadening her impact.

And if the volume of book sales, as well as the number of advisors attending her weekly Zoom meetings, are any indication, then she is certainly succeeding with that goal.