Tune in for a chat with Barbara Nilsen, President of National Creditors Bar Association and Sarena Gaylor, Board Member of NCBA and New Orleans native about the upcoming #NCBAConnect conference October 21-24 in New Orleans, LA. Hear about what to expect, new events, expanded networking opportunities, CLE sessions, judicial guest speakers, and more.
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Adam Parks (00:01.705)
Hello everybody, Adam Parks here with another episode of Receivables Roundtable. Today we're here to talk about the NCBA Connect Conference in New Orleans that is coming up at the end of October and here to talk with me today I have Barbara with Blinton Gaines and I have Serena who is joining us from Couch Lambert. How you ladies doing today?
Sarena Gaylor (00:22.732)
Great, thanks Kel.
Barbara Nilsen (00:23.109)
Okay.
Adam Parks (00:24.543)
Just to kind of kick this off and to give it a little bit of context and Barbara, I've been getting an opportunity to get to know you a little bit, especially out at the TU summit recently, but could you tell everybody who hasn't been as lucky as me a little bit about yourself and how you got to the seat that you're in today?
Barbara Nilsen (00:39.127)
yeah, absolutely. Barbara Nelson, I graduated law school in 2005. Licensed first job out of law school was in collections and I have been there ever since. I am currently a partner in chief compliance officer at Blitton Gaines. I was fortunate enough to be appointed my first board seat with NCBA. Back then it was NARCA from Harvey Moore, who was the president at the time.
Sarena Gaylor (00:53.979)
you
Barbara Nilsen (01:09.591)
sat on the board, moved up through the executive committee, and currently I am the president of the NCBA, the second female president of the NCBA.
Sarena Gaylor (01:18.711)
Ooh.
Adam Parks (01:19.697)
Excellent, love that. And Serena, could you tell everyone a little bit about yourself and how you get to the seat you're in today?
Sarena Gaylor (01:25.152)
Short thing, well first I'm born and raised in New Orleans. I went to law school at LSU. Did not want to go to law school. Had no desire to be an attorney, but here I am. Like Barb, couch Lambert was my first job and I've stayed in collections the entire time. I feel like once you're in the industry, you can't get out of it. You're just either meant for the industry or you're not. So lucky for me, I guess I found a really great place.
a member of the firm. And recently I was added to the board of NCBA thanks to Barb. Barb is my cheerleader and has encouraged me to join and get involved with NCBA as much as possible. I also sit as the co -chair for the executive experience and the education pillar.
Adam Parks (02:13.055)
Fantastic. I love meeting people that have climbed up through the organizations, you've probably done just about every job in the building, which I think provides some really interesting context. And I look forward
Sarena Gaylor (02:21.174)
Right.
Adam Parks (02:25.319)
to some additional conversations with you guys in the future as well. But let's talk a little bit about the NCBA Connect Conference right now, because that's coming up in just a couple of weeks here. My first trip to New Orleans. So as a local, what should I be expecting coming to my first trip?
Sarena Gaylor (02:43.641)
you're going to expect a lot of fun. That's the easiest way to say it. As soon as you get into your Uber, I'm just warning everybody, your Uber driver is going to speak to you. They are going to want to know who you are, where you're from, why you're here, if you want to come over for dinner. So just be ready for that. And New Orleans, it's very, very small for being such a large port city. I call it the 15 minute city.
Sarena Gaylor (03:12.792)
everything that you could ever want to get to is 15 minutes away. We obviously have fantastic food and Bourbon Street exists, but there's so much more to the city beyond the French Quarter and Bourbon Street. And so I would encourage everyone to, you know, feel out the city, Google search, see what you can find. And I'm a great resource and I'm definitely more than willing to share some opportunities there in the city. We always have festivals.
There's never a dull moment here.
Adam Parks (03:45.693)
I love it. And you know, I've been digging around on TripAdvisor for restaurants for dinners and things. I think I'm going to send them over to you if you don't mind and just have you kind of double check what I'm reading online, make sure that I'm going to the right places around town.
Sarena Gaylor (03:59.18)
Absolutely, and our city is very casual, so you don't have to dress very fancy. So you're just here for a good time, like I said. We have drinks flowing, people all on the streets who want to talk to you. So there's a lot of babies, there's a lot of honeys and sweethearts coming your way.
Adam Parks (04:17.813)
Sounds like a great place for a conference right to create that social environment and that social discussion. It's been 16 months since we were all together in Denver for the last NCBA connect conference. You know, what's been going on over that time? Barbara, any updates coming from NCBA about what we should be expecting at this year's conference?
Barbara Nilsen (04:43.029)
Yeah, we have a new President's Reception that will be Monday night and that will welcome and thank all of the committee members, peer forum members, SCBA presidents, volunteers, sponsors, current board members, past presidents, really just a new welcoming event, first -time attendees, new members, things like that, to kind of get everybody together. We really tried to expand the networking opportunities.
We've really listened to members and have tried to display that there is something for everything, everyone from the large firm to the solo practitioner. We have brought back pickleball, our golf scramble. We do a SCBA round table breakfast. Serena will talk about the fabulous education we have scheduled. But yeah, definitely a lot going on, planning for very big events. NCBA has not had an annual conference.
in New Orleans since 2001. So very excited to bring it back, although much like you, this is going to be my first time in New Orleans. I'm very excited.
Adam Parks (05:54.705)
It should be a great opportunity for everyone to get together. I think, you know, it's been such a long time since people have been able to connect in person that it always creates an additional layer of excitement for kind of everybody coming together for those discussions. I love the idea of the new president's reception. To me, I mean, when you started listing at all those groups, it sounds like this is a reception for those that are actively engaged with the association and adding value.
Barbara Nilsen (05:55.187)
Thank you.
Adam Parks (06:21.109)
So for those that are not on that invite list for this year, maybe this is your calling card. It's time to get engaged and involved with your association and start participating in new and interesting ways, right? Participating on a committee, volunteering, donating to the legislative efforts, all of those things. sounds like that's kind of what's driving the driving force behind that reception. Sounds like it's time for me to open my checkbook and make a donation.
The other thing that I was very excited about this year was doing a party in conjunction with NCBA for the first time for those of you that have been to my Margaritaville parties or Topgolf or the Navy Seal events and all the different things that we've done through the years. It's very exciting to have an opportunity to actually partner with the association to put on one of these events. So the bar, the live music.
The whole thing that you would generally expect from one of our parties and now the opportunity to do it in conjunction with the association is very exciting for me. So, you I really want to thank all of you for, you know, for the participation and for the opportunity to actually work together. I love to throw a party and then you throw New Orleans in the mix. Now I get to throw a party in New Orleans. I feel like that was just one of those bucket list items for my career that I just absolutely had to check off.
So very excited. If anybody has questions about sponsorship opportunities, you can reach out to us, but the party is going to be open to everybody at the NCBA conference. And our team has even got little pop -up banners with QR codes so people can easily find themselves in Uber if they don't want to wait for one of the buses that we have circulating between the hotel and the venue. So just a little bit of information there for everybody that's going to be out in New Orleans. The other thing I wanted to talk about was,
For me, when I was still wearing my debt buyer hat, the client meetings at NCBA were always a really important part of my participation there. What do you guys have going on this year in terms of client meetings? I'm sure there's quite a few different groups bringing their legal networks together.
Sarena Gaylor (08:29.698)
Yeah, we have all your big clients and your vendors, of course. We have the big box meetings for those clients. And then throughout all three days, you're going to have several client meetings one -on -one. And like you said, Adam, it's a great time to have that face -to -face interaction that we haven't had in very long time. We do realize it's going to be a very jam -packed week with all of those meetings. But I'm also going to go to
Sarena Gaylor (08:58.776)
throw in that Barb alluded to this earlier, the programming that we have in place specifically for our attorneys with CLE credits.
Sarena Gaylor (09:06.776)
This year we are offering 14 hours of CLA, which is the most we've ever done in one in CBA. And we had the defense bar step up and they are providing a lot of information and getting us all caught up with what's going on in the regulatory world, what we can expect to see from the opposition. And so we're also seeing a lot of bankruptcy.
getting involved, right? A lot of firms are interested in getting into that world. And so we have a lot of programming related to that as well. We also have some local judges who are going to be participating. And so you get to see from the judiciary side, which is a little bit different than what we've been able to provide in the past.
Adam Parks (09:49.149)
I love that perspective, right? I mean, it's kind of like holding a regulator panel for one of the other associations. But since you're so tied up to the judicial side of the world, and hopefully the CFPB starts to understand that with the law that you've got out there now, that NCBA has co -sponsored or assisted in getting out into the marketplace. So from a...
Education perspective, I know we're talking about 14 CLEs. else that you know, anything else we should be expecting from an education standpoint? What kind of exciting topics might we be discussing this year?
Sarena Gaylor (10:27.052)
So privacy and data security always going to be number one on everyone's list, right? With all of the data breaches that are occurring, whether in personal life or your professional life, that's always a big topic. Another thing I know Barb's very passionate about is AI and the use of technology. It's continuing to evolve.
Adam Parks (10:33.171)
Sure.
Sarena Gaylor (10:49.418)
every day, it seems like there's something new going on. so, Adam, I know you also have a lot of experience in this world. So, yeah, we can maybe look to you for some advice here.
Adam Parks (10:57.514)
Little bit.
Adam Parks (11:03.271)
always happen to have always happy to have AI driven conversations and talk about the use cases that we can actually functionally use within the industry. I think that's one of those topics where a lot of people are talking about it, but very few people are actively doing anything with it. I also think it's interesting that you're going to have this opportunity to do some predictions and you guys are going to have the best visibility I would think going into the election, right being just a couple of weeks before the election.
actually goes down. So I'm sure that's going to be a pretty hot button topic kind of peppered in across the various sessions that will be going on over the couple of days there. From a from a networking perspective, I know we talked about the the President's reception, what other networking events and we talked about the party as well. But what other opportunities are there out there for the attorneys and the clients to spend some personal time together?
Barbara Nilsen (11:58.581)
We offer, as I kind of alluded to earlier, the pickleball. We do the golf scramble. We have several breakfasts or lunches, whether it is the SCBA forum. We do a peer compliance forum. We have a bankruptcy one going on as well as we try to be more inclusive and realize that.
these their members do practice in these other practice areas and that we can provide them a space to network and talk to colleagues. We also have a really robust exhibit hall as we talked about AI and some other things from the educational standpoint that I encourage everybody to visit. We have worked really hard to bring just top -notch vendors to our industry events and this is going to be no different.
Adam Parks (12:49.331)
Wow, it sounds like this is going to be an exciting week for the collection attorneys across the United States and a great opportunity for everybody to come together not only for some education, some networking, but also some socialization and the opportunity to spend a little bit of time together, which for me, I think has been what has drawn me to NCBA for the last
I don't even want to date myself. Let's call it the last two decades or so is really the people, right? That's what keeps me coming back is those personal relationships and the opportunities to to get to know people. Look, people do business with the people they like and the opportunity to create and spend some personal time together really starts to break down those barriers and create those real opportunities to generate the friendships that ultimately drive our
organizations in our industry forward because I would say some of my best friends are collection attorneys and that has come from my opportunities to spend time at the NCBA conferences both in the classroom and at the bar after the conference. Anything else that our audience should be thinking about aware of planning for or considering prior to their trip to New Orleans?
Sarena Gaylor (14:07.382)
If you haven't already booked your hotel, definitely book it. It's a great, great location. urban team did a wonderful job. It's directly across the street from the French Quarter. So the world's your oyster. And then also, speaking of networking, one thing that we are looking to do this year, which is a little bit unique, is we're inviting some local law students to participate and to kind of see what our world is like and try to, you know,
get some fresh talent in. So if you see a student or someone who looks a little bit younger than being at INSEGATE for the last two decades, that's why.
Adam Parks (14:48.616)
I absolutely love that talk about leadership development and taking that to another level, providing them with an opportunity to see what it's like, because I think people think about debt collection, and they get the wrong idea of who we are as an industry, not only the wrong idea of what we do, but who we are as individuals and people. So that opportunity, I think is what an amazing opportunity for future leadership development. I love that.
feel like that's something we should probably be looking at across the board as an industry, right? Across all the various disciplines is engaging more people at a younger level and demonstrating for them that there really is not just a job here, but career opportunities. I think all three of us have been at this for a minute now, right? And with both of you coming up through the same firm and staying with that firm for such a long time and being able to build a career on that initial opportunity out of law school.
demonstrates perfectly for those students why they should be considering this as an industry for their future.
Barbara Nilsen (15:50.273)
Absolutely.
Adam Parks (15:51.625)
Love it. Well, ladies, I want to thank you so much for coming on and having a chat with me today. I really do appreciate your insights, the information, and I am very excited to get out to the NCBA conference in New Orleans here at the end of October.
Sarena Gaylor (16:07.042)
Can't to see both of you.
Barbara Nilsen (16:07.179)
Looking forward to seeing you.
Adam Parks (16:09.243)
Awesome. For those of you that are watching, if you have additional questions you'd like to ask the ladies or myself, you can leave those in the comments below on LinkedIn and YouTube and we'll be responding to those. Or if you have additional topics you'd like to see us discuss, you can leave those in the comments below as well. And hopefully I get these ladies to come back at least one more time to help me continue to create great content for a great industry. But until next time, thank you ladies so much for coming on. I really do appreciate your time and thank you everybody for watching. We'll see you all again soon. Bye everybody.
Barbara Nilsen (16:36.299)
Thank you.
Sarena Gaylor (16:36.95)
I think so.
About Company
Blitt and Gaines, P.C. is a full service collections law firm dedicated to providing our clients with best-in-class representation while working diligently with customers to promptly and amicably resolve their matters.
Couch Lambert (formerly known as Couch Conville & Blitt) is a multi-state law firm, which focuses primarily upon a legal collection and creditors’ rights practice. The firm also maintains a general business practice, including transactional and business litigation (prosecution and defense).
