Diversified Investment Advisors, Inc., has announced the 2010 Leaders in Health Care Scholarship program and is now accepting applications.

The Diversified Investment Advisors Leaders in Health Care Scholarship is available to first- and second-year graduate students pursuing degrees in health care administration. The national scholarship program recognizes minority individuals who exhibit leadership skills and can demonstrate financial need, a commitment to community service and academic excellence. In addition, they are evaluated on the basis of a personal statement about their interest in health care management and career goals, as well as an essay on the most challenging issues facing the future of the American health care system. Two $5,000 scholarships will be awarded in the summer of 2010. Applications will be accepted until February 26, 2010.

“This marks the fourth year that Diversified has sponsored the Leaders in Health Care Scholarship program and underscores our commitment to making a meaningful difference in the health care industry by cultivating a diverse workforce and expanding leadership opportunities for minorities in health services management,” said Brodie Wood, vice president and national 403(b) practice leader at Diversified.

More information about Diversified Investment Advisors’ Leaders in Health Care Scholarship, including the application, can be found at http://scholarshipaha.applicantsoft.com/index.php. Applicants may also contact the Institute for Diversity in Health Management, which coordinates the application and candidate selection process on behalf of Diversified, at 312-422-2658.

Diversified Investment Advisors, Inc. is a national investment advisory firm specializing in retirement plans. The company’s expertise covers the entire spectrum of defined benefit and defined contribution plans, including: 401(k) and 403(b) (Traditional and Roth); 457; nonqualified deferred compensation; profit sharing; money purchase; cash balance and Taft-Hartley plans; and rollover and Roth IRA. Providing comprehensive plan administration, investment and communication services for mid- to large-sized organizations, Diversified helps more than 1.5 million participants save and invest wisely for and throughout retirement. Headquartered in Purchase, NY, the company’s regional offices are located in Arkansas, California, Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah and Wisconsin. To learn more, visit www.divinvest.com. About the Institute for Diversity in Health Management In 1994, the American College of Healthcare Executives (ACHE), the National Association of Health Services Executives (NAHSE), and the American Hospital Association (AHA) responded to the lack of diversity in the health care management ranks by founding the Institute for Diversity in Health Management (IFD). The Association of Hispanic Healthcare Executives (AHHE) and, more recently, the Catholic Health Association (CHA) signed on as sponsors, and in 2002 the IFD Board of Directors voted to formally affiliate with the AHA.

The Institute for Diversity in Health Management, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, works closely with health services organizations and educators to expand leadership opportunities for ethnic minorities in health services management. The Institute’s mission is to increase the number of people of color in health services administration to better reflect the increasingly diverse communities they serve and to improve opportunities for professionals already in the health care field. To accomplish this, the Institute has designed several initiatives to generate significant long-term results through educational programs, summer internships, professional development and leadership conferences. For more information, visit www.diversityconnection.org.

Monty Bruell, Tru/Alpha Capital Advisors

Based in Midtown Atlanta, TACA is headed by Harvard-graduate and past Morgan Stanley executive Monty Bruell. Mixing its full-scale advisory expertise and network of reputable partners, TACA’s team brings years of experience, credentials and proven performance in the Alternative and International investment marketplace. The company seeks to provide its clients with increased portfolio diversification, lower correlation to traditional asset classes, lower overall portfolio volatility and access to best-in-class institutional money management talent. Tru/Alpha uses proprietary analytic technology and industry leading due diligence to safeguard proper asset allocations, performance evaluation and to troubleshoot market issues impacting overall portfolios.

“Central to our success is our niche focus on specific markets and our ‘talent scout’ approach to identifying emerging money managers who can be elusive in this industry,” said Bruell. “This is critical to avoiding catastrophic losses like we’ve seen recently with rogue asset managers,” added Bruell. Tru/Alpha On International & Alternative Markets:

Tru/Alpha brings more than 10 years investment advisory experience in international and alternative markets. This market positioning offers more focused insight on strategies such as International Equities, International Fixed-income, Structured Notes, Commodities and Hedge Funds among others. For TACA, the continued development in these areas provides more opportunity per unit of risk than other capital allocation options; and helps to better generate risk-adjusted returns in excess of conventional benchmarks.

“In the current investment climate, Foundations, Endowments and Corporate Treasury Departments need to find prudent ways to boost the yield of their portfolios. When allocated appropriately, Structured Notes, Private Equity, Senior Life Settlements, Commodities and certain other vehicles can raise the Alpha (yield) of a portfolio while decreasing its overall risk profile,” said Bruell. “With Principal Protected Notes in particular, the potential for loss can be scaled to match the risk tolerance of each particular investor,” he said.

Enhancing Corporate Supply Chains With Underrepresented, Needed Services

The launch of TACA enhances Georgia’s financial services landscape and helps reinforce the region’s growing financial services muscle. Additionally, as a Certified Minority Business Enterprise in Georgia, TACA creates more opportunities for corporate powerhouses interested in tapping ethnic-minority-owned financial companies — an underrepresented service area in corporate supplier diversity and strategic sourcing activities.

Tru/Alpha’s 5 Golden Rules For Investment Success — Foundations, Endowments, Charities:

There is no question that we are in the middle of a very tough economic time. From the horror of devastating Ponzi schemes to university endowment losses to corporate 401(k) plans and the collapse of several hedge funds, there has been enough investment pain to go around. Chief Investment Officers (CIOs) of foundations, endowments and charities may sleep better at night, by employing these Five Golden Rules (more on tips at Taylor Communications Group):

1.   Due diligence is King
2.   Don’t take on too much risk
3.   Use Alternative investments appropriately
4.   Look outside the United States
5.   Know when to sell

Tru/Alpha Capital Advisors (TACA) is a leading investment advisory firm that specializes in International and Alternative markets for institutional and corporate clients, as well as, high-net worth individuals and families. Tru/Alpha’s niche in the International and Alternative markets offers more focused insight and expertise on strategies such as International Equities, International Fixed-income, Structured Notes, Commodities and Hedge Funds among others. Headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, TACA is a Certified Minority Business Enterprise headed by Harvard-graduate Monty Bruell. For more information on Tru/Alpha Capital Advisors, go to www.trualpha.com.

One of the most crucial yet simplest tasks of the financial planner just took an evolutionary step from paper and pencil to digitized form with the release of PreciseFP (TM), a Web-based client data-gathering application.
Spectrum Input, LLC, an Alpharetta, Georgia-based company, formally released its flagship product to the financial planning and advising industry today wrapped in a sterling review from Joel Bruckenstein, columnist with MorningstarAdvisor and industry expert on applied technology for financial advisor professionals. Calling PreciseFP a “promising new practice-management tool”, user rates for PreciseFP have grown 260% since its soft release in early August and the release of Bruckenstein’s review.
Using a virtual advisor dashboard to customize and manage the online questionnaire and a client portal that can be easily accessed through a link provided by the advisor, PreciseFP was specifically designed to address the key barriers that may have kept advisors in the paper/pencil mode longer than practical.

“In an industry flush with Web-based financial planning and portfolio management tools — each one more sophisticated than the last — we were surprised to discover such a large percentage of financial professionals still collecting client data with a paper questionnaire,” observed Don Whalen, CFP®, co-founder of Spectrum Input, LLC, and a practicing comprehensive financial planner.

“While some financial planning applications come with their own online questionnaire, it’s typically a proprietary tool that’s available only if you buy the application,” added Whalen. “We saw no reason why every planner shouldn’t have an efficient way to capture client data and be able to access it for CRM, compliance record keeping, yearly updating, and quarterly reporting.”

Along with co-founder, Sebastian Skwarek, a specialist in electronic forms development and systems integration, the Spectrum Input team targeted client usability as key to making the online product a success.
“Ease of use and security are the two biggest concerns when you’re introducing an online questionnaire to clients who have always put pencil to paper to provide their financial history and relevant data,” says Skwarek, “so we focused on an intuitive user interface that guides the client in making logical choices at each data entry point. Security of that data is insured by maintaining the highest standards in encrypted technology that dramatically reduce the risk of identity theft that clients may be concerned about.”

Compatible with financial planning or portfolio management applications that exchange data using standard data exchange methods (e.g. SML), Whalen and Skwarek are running strong out of the gate by tackling integration with two industry heavyweights—Money Tree Software (TM) and MoneyGuidePro (TM)—both financial planning software applications. Integration with Money Tree was recently completed and is just starting with MoneyGuidePro (TM) according to Skwarek, Spectrum Input’s lead for integration processes.

Whalen and Skwarek anticipate a fairly rapid assimilation of PreciseFP into the marketplace. As a longtime active member of both the FPA and NAPFA, two prominent national financial planning organizations, Whalen used his professional network of planners as beta testers for early versions of the product.

“Precise FP represents the future of financial planning,” says one such colleague, Russ Thornton of Thornton Wealth Management. “It provides a consistent system which (helps) improve the client experience and create more efficient systems within a planner’s business.”